I love when well-known Christian pastors, theologians, and websites begin posting their favorite reads of the year. Many of these books eventually end up on my shelf or in my hands.
In this blog, I’ll post my ten favorite reads of 2023 (in no particular order), and then I’ll post a link to other people’s favorite reads. My list will include books published in various years (the book descriptions are from Amazon). Other people’s lists will usually pertain to books published in 2023.
Grace at Work: Redeeming the Grind and Glory of Your Job by Bryan Chapell
For many people, their job is merely “the daily grind” needed to provide for family or pay the bills. Yet our work is a vital means for fulfilling God’s purpose for our lives and displaying his grace to those around us. We bear God’s image in our workplaces, experiencing his blessings and expressing his nature through our efforts, integrity, creativity, generosity, and excellence. No earthly chore is without the opportunity to observe his divine hand. No challenge in task or relationship is without opportunity to represent God’s heart.
In this book, author and pastor Bryan Chapell shares this biblical perspective of vocation, explaining how God gives purpose to our work by making it an instrument of his grace to our own hearts, as well as a way of bringing his goodness and glory into our world. Chapell explains how we can worship God by our work, rising above drudgery, duty, or self-interest with the understanding that our jobs are unique callings for displaying God’s character and care. Our work is worship when we see the glory beyond the grind, the mission in the mundane, and the grace at work.
- Ideal for Christians in the Workplace: Contains encouragement for those looking for purpose in their jobs
- Biblically Grounded: Chapell teaches how the gospel blesses attitudes and responsibilities relating to success, creativity, money, integrity, leadership, and even sin in the workplace
- Kingdom Minded: Explains vocation in light of the grace Christ provides to and through his people for blessing our world and bringing him glory
How to Speak a Sermon so that People Will Listen by Larry Trotter
A powerful sermon must have not only clearly organized biblical content but also engaging delivery. How to Speak a Sermon is about sermon delivery, particularly extemporaneous sermon delivery. Combining biblical principles with the best insights of the ages and personal experiences, it explains the power and pitfalls of extemporaneous speech, how to develop speaking ability, and why preaching method matters.
Spurgeon and the Poor: How the Gospel Compels Christian Social Concern by Alex DePrima
Spurgeon and the Poor is a fascinating study into the life and ministry of Charles Haddon Spurgeon, exploring his understanding of the place of benevolence in the ministry of the local church. Alex DiPrima examines the way Spurgeon’s belief that gospel preaching and soul-winning formed the church’s mission informed his view of social concern as a compelling argument for its power. Readers will gain insight into Spurgeon’s theology and experience as he ministered to the oppressed through ministries, private philanthropy, and public advocacy.
Short of Glory: A Biblical and Theological Exploration of the Fall by Mitchell Chase
When looking around at the world, it is easy to see that all is not as it should be. This brokenness within the world and humanity finds its roots in mankind’s rebellion against God. The fall, as recorded in Genesis 3, sets the stage for creation’s need for redemption―ultimately found in Jesus Christ.
In this book, pastor and professor Mitchell Chase argues that in order to understand the fall and recognize its profound impact on later Scripture and the world today, Christians must first understand Genesis 3. Chase identifies themes found in Genesis 3―temptation, shame, messianic hope, and more―and shows how they reverberate throughout the rest of the storyline of Scripture. Understanding Adam and Eve’s fall is crucial to understanding the world as it currently is and the need for redemption through Jesus.
The Vanishing American Adult: Our Coming-of Age Crisis by Ben Sasse
Raised by well-meaning but overprotective parents and coddled by well-meaning but misbegotten government programs, America’s youth are ill-equipped to survive in our highly-competitive global economy.
Many of the coming-of-age rituals that have defined the American experience since the Founding: learning the value of working with your hands, leaving home to start a family, becoming economically self-reliant—are being delayed or skipped altogether. The statistics are daunting: 30% of college students drop out after the first year, and only 4 in 10 graduate. One in three 18-to-34 year-olds live with their parents.
From these disparate phenomena: Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse who as president of a Midwestern college observed the trials of this generation up close, sees an existential threat to the American way of life.
In The Vanishing American Adult, Sasse diagnoses the causes of a generation that can’t grow up and offers a path for raising children to become active and engaged citizens. He identifies core formative experiences that all young people should pursue: hard work to appreciate the benefits of labor, travel to understand deprivation and want, the power of reading, the importance of nurturing your body—and explains how parents can encourage them.
Our democracy depends on responsible, contributing adults to function properly—without them America falls prey to populist demagogues. A call to arms, The Vanishing American Adultwill ignite a much-needed debate about the link between the way we’re raising our children and the future of our country.
Rescuing the Gospel: The Story and Significance of the Reformation by Erwin Lutzer
The Reformation unfolded in the cathedrals and town squares of Europe–in Wittenberg, Worms, Rome, Geneva, and Zurich–and it is a stirring story of courage and cowardice, of betrayal and faith.
The story begins with the Catholic Church and its desperate need for reform. The dramatic events that followed are traced from John Wycliffe in England, to the burning of John Hus at the stake in Prague, to the rampant sale of indulgences in the cities and towns of Germany, to Martin Luther nailing the Ninety-Five Theses to the door of the Castle Church in 1517, to John Calvin’s reform of Geneva.
Erwin Lutzer captures the people, places, and big ideas that fueled the Reformation and explains its lasting influence on the church and Western Civilization.
The Wolf in Their Pockets: 13 Ways the Social Internet by Chris Martin
We can hardly remember a time when we didn’t feel the influence of that back pocket device. The average social media user spends about two-and-a-half hours a day using social media. That’s more than enough time to shape our values and desires. Pastors, teachers, and parents feel their influence slipping away. We’re seeing increased loneliness, disunity, and self-absorption. But where do we go from here?
In The Wolf in Their Pockets, Internet expert Chris Martin examines the many ways we are being changed by social media. With a biblically informed voice, Martin both exposes the ways the Internet is distorting our life in Christ and shows us how to faithfully respond. Martin teaches us how to care for people who are obsessed with followers, views, and likes—and how to love those whose online influences have filled them with cynicism and contempt. Martin looks at how the social Internet is changing how we understand sex and beauty—what to do about the epidemic levels of anxiety—and how to redirect our hearts to worship Jesus Christ.
Shepherding and leading people has never been easy, but the social Internet has brought new challenges. We need the miraculous work of the Holy Spirit and a powerful prayer life. Martin provides the biblical wisdom, direction, and hope necessary to combat The Wolf in Their Pockets.
Pure: Why the Bible’s Plan for Sexuality Isn’t Outdated, Irrelevant, or Oppressive by Dean Inserra
Few things bring more immediate scrutiny and impassioned angst among young adult Christians today than hearing the words “purity culture.” Serious flaws from purity culture deserve to be scrutinized, especially given its lasting negative effects on some raised in the movement. Many Christians today reject the movement—and all that it stood for—wholesale. However, we can’t ignore the clear sexual ethics of the Bible.
Pure dives into the big picture of God’s design for men and women regarding sexuality, and seeks to reclaim one of the clearest teaching in the scriptures: the call to sexual purity. While purity culture gets the truth right, the approach and gospel elements it espouses are often wrong. Let’s not throw the baby out with the bath water, but rather celebrate God’s great design for marriage and the loving boundaries he has put in place for our joy, protection, and flourishing.
The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure by Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt
Something has been going wrong on many college campuses in the last few years. Speakers are shouted down. Students and professors say they are walking on eggshells and are afraid to speak honestly. Rates of anxiety, depression, and suicide are rising—on campus as well as nationally. How did this happen?
First Amendment expert Greg Lukianoff and social psychologist Jonathan Haidt show how the new problems on campus have their origins in three terrible ideas that have become increasingly woven into American childhood and education: What doesn’t kill you makes you weaker; always trust your feelings; and life is a battle between good people and evil people. These three Great Untruths contradict basic psychological principles about well-being and ancient wisdom from many cultures. Embracing these untruths—and the resulting culture of safetyism—interferes with young people’s social, emotional, and intellectual development. It makes it harder for them to become autonomous adults who are able to navigate the bumpy road of life.
Lukianoff and Haidt investigate the many social trends that have intersected to promote the spread of these untruths. They explore changes in childhood such as the rise of fearful parenting, the decline of unsupervised, child-directed play, and the new world of social media that has engulfed teenagers in the last decade. They examine changes on campus, including the corporatization of universities and the emergence of new ideas about identity and justice. They situate the conflicts on campus within the context of America’s rapidly rising political polarization and dysfunction.
This is a book for anyone who is confused by what is happening on college campuses today, or has children, or is concerned about the growing inability of Americans to live, work, and cooperate across party lines.
Defending Shame: Its Formative Power in Paul’s Letters by Te-Li Lau
Our culture often views shame in a negative light. However, Paul’s use of shame, when properly understood and applied, has much to teach the contemporary church. Filling a lacuna in Pauline scholarship, this book shows how Paul uses shame to admonish and to transform the minds of his readers into the mind of Christ. The author examines Paul’s use of shame for moral formation within his Jewish and Greco-Roman context, compares and contrasts Paul’s use of shame with other cultural voices, and offers a corrective understanding for today’s church. Foreword by Luke Timothy Johnson.
Other People’s Favorite Reads of 2023
Christianity Today’s 2024 Book Awards
The Gospel Coalition 2023 Book Awards
Andrew Wilson’s Books of the Year 2023
12 Top Biblical Counseling Books of 2023
Trevin Wax’s Favorite Reads of 2023
Tim Challies’ Top Books of 2023
McDuff's Stuff 