Faculty Book Recommendations

We asked our faculty members to share some of the books they’ve been loving lately. So if you’re still looking for a last-minute gift idea, or you want to enrich yourself in the new year, here are some of their top recommendations—including some of their own recent work!

John Burgess
James Henry Snowden Professor of Systematic Theology

• Barth, Karl. The Christian Life. New York: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, 2017.
• Burgess, John P.  Confessing Our Faith: The Book of Confessions for Church Leaders. Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press, 2018.
• Small, Joseph D. Flawed Church, Faithful God. Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2018. [Pictured below.]

Tucker Ferda
Associate Professor of New Testament

• Gorman, Michael, Becoming the Gospel: Paul, Participation, and Mission. Grand Rapids, Michigan:  William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2015.
• Levine, Amy-Jill and Marc Zvi Brettler. The Bible with and without Jesus: How Jews and Christians Read the Same Stories Differently. New York, New York: HarperOne, 2020. [Pictured below.]
• McCaulley, Esau. Reading While Black: African American Biblical Interpretation as an Exercise in Hope. Downers Grove, Illinois: InterVarsity Press, 2020.
• Sanders, E.P.  Jesus and Judaism. Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1985.

Leanna Fuller
Interim Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of Faculty; Associate Professor of Pastoral Care

• Holton, M. Jan.  Longing for Home: Forced Displacement and Postures of Hospitality. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2016.
• Jennings, Willie James.  After Whiteness: An Education in Belonging (Theological Education between the Times). Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2020. [Pictured below.]

Scott Hagley
Associate Professor of Missiology

• Immerwahr, Daniel. How to Hide an Empire: A History of the Greater United States. New York: Picador, 2019.
• Johnson, Luke Timothy. Sharing Possessions: What Faith Demands, 2nd Ed. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2011. [Pictured below.]
• Johnson, Walter. River of Dark Dreams: Slavery and Empire in the Cotton Kingdom. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2013.

L. Roger Owens
Professor of Christian Spirituality and Ministry

• Gutierrez, Gustavo. We Drink from Our Own Wells: The Spiritual Journey of a People, 20th Anniversary Edition. Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books, 2003.
• Holmes, Barbara A. Joy Unspeakable: Contemplative Practices in the Black Church. Minneapolis, Minnesota: Fortress Press, 2017. [Pictured below.]
• Laird, Martin. Into the Silent Land: A Guide to the Christian Practice of Contemplation. New York, New York: Oxford University Press, 2006.
• Owens, L. Roger. Everyday Contemplative: The Way of Prayerful Living. Nashville, Tennessee: Upper Room Books, 2022. (Will be released in February.)

R. Drew Smith
Professor of Urban Ministry

• Sanneh, Lamin O. Translating the Message: The Missionary Impact on Culture. Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books, 1989.
• Wright, Almeda M. The Spiritual Lives of Young African Americans. New York: Oxford University Press, 2017. [Pictured below.]

Denise Thorpe
Former Interim Director of the Doctor of Ministry Program

• Kinloch, Valerie. Harlem on Our Minds: Place, Race, and the Literacies of Urban Youth. New York, New York: Teachers College Press, 2010.
• Morgan, David. Religion and Material Culture: The Matter of Belief. London and New York: Routledge Taylor and French Group, 2010. [Pictured below.]
• Rambo, Shelly. Resurrecting Wounds: Living in the Afterlife of Trauma. Waco, Texas: Baylor University Press, 2017.
• Sharpe, Christina. In the Wake: On Blackness and Being. Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2016.

Edwin Chr. van Driel
Directors’ Bicentennial Professor of Theology

• Holland, Tom. Dominion: How the Christian Revolution Remade the World. New York: Basic Books, 2019.
• Jennings, Willie James. Acts. Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2017.
• Paas, Stefan. Pilgrims and Priests: Christian Mission in a Post-Christian Society. London: SCM Press, 2019. [Pictured below.]
• Van Driel, Edwin Chr. Rethinking Paul: Protestant Theology and Pauline Exegesis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021 (a paperback edition will come out next year).
• Van Driel, Edwin Chr. What Is Jesus Doing? Divine Agency in the Life of the Church and the Ministry of the Pastor. Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2020.
• Wells, Samuel. A Nazareth Manifesto: Being With God. Malden: Wiley Blackwell, 2015.

Happy holidays—and happy reading!