In The Spirit of Christ & The Postmodern City, author Viv Grigg continues and contributes to “an ongoing conversation about God and the cities”. The author extends his previous research to develop a theory of “Citywide Transforming Revival,” which is “a concept of synergistic revivals in multiple sectors of a mega-city” resulting “in long-term change […]
“In other words, ‘resident aliens’ lived neither as natives nor as tourists. Though they were not permanently rooted, neither were they merely travelers who were just passing through.” I found Center Church to be a typical Keller book: thoughtful, logical, biblical, humble, irenic, provocative and thankfully lacking dogmatism. I love the fact that while he […]
In Where Mortals Dwell: A Christian View of Place for Today, author Craig Bartholomew is concerned with the recovery of the Christian view of place and practice of placemaking. In part 1, the author expounds extensively on biblical research, following the traces of place from Creation to Revelation. In the second part, place is traced […]
In the revised and expanded 2011 edition of Walking with the Poor, author Bryant Myers has provided fresh insights and relevant up-to-date information from agencies and the development community around the world. Now a professor of international development at Fuller Theological Seminary, Myers has widened his scope of resources since leaving his executive role at […]
In his book, Culture Makers, Andy Crouch raises the question, “What does it mean to be not just culturally aware … [or] culture consumers or even just culture critics, but culture makers?” (Crouch, 2008). Drawing from the field of sociology, Crouch first explores the meaning of culture. He then ingeniously retells the story of Scripture […]
Written as a textbook for students and practitioners of community development, Asset Building & Community Development presents the reader with basic concepts, a map of institutions, common strategies, case studies, and available resources for urban developing work (Green & Haines, 2012). Not intended to be “cookbook on how to mobilize communities,” the authors focus more […]
In their book, To Transform a City, author Eric Swanson and co-author Sam Williams aim to help the reader to “understand how to think about cities” (Swanson & Williams, 2010). Written at a strategic level, the authors present the big ideas and ideals of city transformation. Examples, illustrations and charts are given to inspire the […]
In The Tangible Kingdom, authors Hugh Halter and Matt Smay tell the story of the birth of Adullam, “a congregational network of incarnational communities in Denver, Colorado.” Having trained church planters and consulted churches over a period of seven years, their hopes are that more leaders will become missional and incarnational. Halter, the primary author, […]
In his book, To Live in Peace: Biblical Faith and the Changing Inner City,[1] author Mark Gornik challenges the reader to “consider the promise and possibility of God’s peace for the changing of the American inner city” (p. 1). Drawing from multiple disciplines, Gornik sets out to answer three basic questions: how we are to […]
In his book, A Theology as Big as the City,[1] the author Ray Bakke challenges the reader to think theologically about cities. Spanning 25 brief chapters, Bakke tells stories from his 40-years of inner-city ministry experience as well as from cities in the Bible. We are facing challenges as never seen before: in numbers (50% of […]