My Top 5 Christian Books of 2011

Not all of my reads were published in 2011, nevertheless - here we go, counting down.

5 - Generous Justice (Tim Keller) and The Pastor (Eugene Peterson)
Yep, a tie. I've put Tim Keller's book in my theology reference section. Evangelicals (I put myself in this category) need to be aware that our theology must lead to godly Christian living. In other words, our input must lead to a visible output. J I Packer once said something along the lines of 'theology must always lead to doxology'. So Keller's book is very good to remind us (as it did me) about these things.
Eugene Peterson's book was very good also. There is another way to be a pastor besides relentless formulaic programming, and that is to be a student and servant of the word, to keep praying, keep preaching faithfully, and to enter the lives of your congregation to pray and weep with them.
I enjoyed this book immensely as it gave me (a pastor) a real shot in the arm to keep going with what I am doing.
My only criticisms were that he did spend a lot of time in the book talking about his new church building and its architecture (although good to see how theology can really influence church architecture!) and not a lot of time on his later works (eg the writing of the Message and later years).

4 - Zondervan Exegetical Commentary of the New Testament: James (Blomberg/Kamell)            
This whole series is fantastic for pastors like myself. It contains the original Greek text as well as commentary and theology of each book. I think it's the best commentary I've seen so far for week-to-week preaching help. I preached through James this year and found Blomberg's commentary outstanding for its ease of use, comments on the Greek and theology. It's probably the first commentary I've read from beginning to end. Well done Zondervan!

3 - Sex, Lies and the Truth: Developing a Christian Ethic in a Post-Christian Society (Belleville)  
A handy book, only 114 pages to read, a to-the-point commentary on current social/cultural sexual trends in society and how we as Christians can be effective witnesses to our culture about God's way in the 'sexual' arena. The book addresses the trends of casual sex, same-sex marriage, and heterosexual laxity about marriage. The book has a lot of statistics too (although US-based) which were helpful to back up some of her statements about these trends. Belleville writes that she has been teaching a course on sexual ethics for about 20 years, so she knows what she is talking about. Highly recommended.

2 - The Wisdom of Each Other (Eugene Peterson)
After reading 'The Pastor' (see number 5 above) I followed through on more of Eugene Peterson's books. I found this little one and wanted to see if it would be worth giving to some new Christians in our congregation. It is a brilliant little book. It's a conversation between a pastor and a new believer. The pastor gives advice to the new believer on a range of topics including prayer, good books to read, how to interpret inconsistent Christian behaviour, ups and downs in faithfulness and so on. If you're a pastor give it a read.  

1 - The Radical Disciple (John Stott)  
John Stott died this year. I can't say I've read a lot of John Stott's books. However when I heard this was his last book I thought it would be good to see what wisdom he might leave with us after such a wonderful global Christian influence. I believe this is a must-read for believers. It was for me having been a Christian for 18 years! It's not a hard read (and really all of the top 5 are popular books except for the commentary) but so helpful in showing a snapshot of wholehearted Christian living. It has chapters on non-conformity, Christlikeness, maturity, creation-care, simplicity, balance, even death (amongst others). Excellent biblical instruction and advice about being a follower of Jesus.