We have some great recommendations for you this summer! Hope
you enjoy them as much as we have.
BLUE
LIKE JAZZ: nonreligious thoughts on Christian spirituality
by Donald Miller
This
book reminds me why I love to read. Donald Miller is engaging,
funny, vulnerable and has good things to say in a very fresh
way. I first bought this book because it was only three dollars,
had a cool cover and a quote on the back that interested me.
After reading the first few chapters, I went back to the store
and bought all of the remaining copies to give to friends. So
you can judge
a book by its cover :-)
(click
to read more or buy the book)
SOUL
SURVIVOR: how my faith survived the church
by Philip Yancey
If
you like Yancy, and even if you don’t, you’re in for a treat
as he delves into the lives of thirteen people who have significantly
influenced his life and thinking. These people range from the
well known, like Martin Luther King Jr and Gandhi, to the more
obscure, like the Japanese author Shusaku Endo. Each chapter
is a multi-faceted gem as it introduces us to great men and
women, lets us learn from their strengths and weaknesses, challenges
us to reevaluate our lives and takes us along on Yancy’s own
spiritual journey (click
here to read more or buy)
GIRL
MEETS GOD and MUDHOUSE
SABBATH
by Lauren F. Winner
Lauren
is a skilled writer and (thanks to Greg Thompson, who gave it
to Scott Murphy, who loaned it to us) we thoroughly enjoyed
the story of her path from Reformed Judaism to Orthodox Judaism
to Christianity in Girl
meets God. It provided me with a lot of food for thought
about the experiential way Jews incorporate their religion into
their life and pass it on to the next generation, so I was pleased
to come across her next book Mudhouse
Sabbath (a signed copy, even, in a small bookstore in Blowing
Rock, NC) which is about “…Christian practices that would be
enriched, that would be thicker and more vibrant, if we took
a few lessons from Judaism.”
FOUR
SOULS: a worldwide odyssey in search of the epic life
This
book traces the adventures and insights of four friends who
spend their first six months after college traveling the globe
together, staying and working with Christians everywhere from
Guatemala to Siberia to Vietnam. At www.foursoulsthebook.com
you can actually access the full text of the book online...
or read
more reviews and buy it here.
Our Summer
For
us July means RAICES, youth leaders training conference. This
year the conference is 
in
Lima,
Peru and not only will we be visiting a new country; we
will be fulfilling a new role. As a result of some of the strategic
planning we did in Spain in February, the continuing education
part – training for trainers – of RAICES will no longer be an
additional conference, but will be done through the animated,
interactive classes we’ve been working on for the last year
and a half (click
here for more info and photos)
It
will take a major effort byat least five different people to
get the CDs, containing with the classes, the text and the homework
assignments, ready in time for the conference.
We
appreciate your prayers for this process, as well as for our
travel, the conference, and our ability to communicate this
training process to the youth leaders in a way that is clear
and that motivates them to continue their training.
