With thousands of books rolling off the Christian press each year, believers are often in a quandary as to which books are worthy of their attention. Unfortunately few of us are readers of books at all. Leadership Magazine once reported that only 50% of Americans read books. Another source a few years back claimed that the average American watches 2200 hours per year of TV but only reads five books during the year. I doubt that Christians, on average, differ greatly from the American norm.

As a result, when the average child of God does decide to read a Christian book (or any book) it is often because they are dealing with, or concerned by, some issue in their lives. On the other hand, even the most diligent of readers can only read a fraction of the Christian books that are written every year. So it is imperative that they do not waste their time reading that which is unbiblical, superficial, or just a complete waste of time.

The book reviews that we will offer will be our small attempt to help with this problem. When I began the ministry, almost 25 years ago, I set a goal of reading one book per week for the rest of my life, and reading has been a major and important part of my life. The reviews that we will present will be largely taken from current reading. Updates will be made on a regular basis, indexed according to specific categories, such as commentaries, fiction or Christian living. Reviews from our readers will be considered as well. If you have read a book that you would like to be reviewed here, submit your review via e-mail or snail mail.

Concerning our reviews let me offer this disclaimer and explanation: We will be reviewing specific books, not the ministries of the authors. Therefore, we may speak highly of a particular volume, even though we have strong disagreements with other things that the author has said or written. We will point out these disagreements briefly where they are appropriate. For example, we would recommend highly J. I. Packer's classic, Knowing God, yet grieve over the fact that he signed the ECT document. The reality that he has greatly compromised his present ministry, however, does not take away from the fact that reading Knowing God will greatly bless your life. We also want our readers to understand that although we give a book high marks, that does not necessarily mean we agree with everything in that book. Nor for that matter do we necessarily claim that there is no value in books for which we write a negative review.

We should mention two books in this introduction that may be of great help to our readers. The first is The Minister's Library by Cyril Barber. This is an invaluable work for any pastor or serious student. Thousands of books in numerous categories are briefly reviewed in this wonderful volume. No pastor can live without it (okay, I am exaggerating a little). The second book is How to Read a Book by Mortimer J. Adler. This is an absolutely wonderful and practical guide to reading. It should be used as a textbook for every college (and possibly high school) in the country. It is a true classic, and like most classics, is a book that everyone talks about but few have read. You can live without reading Adler's book, but why should you?