WESTMONT, IL—Outreach magazine has honored IVP’s You Found Me and Taking It to the Streets as Outreach Resources of the Year, with three additional books from IVP making the short list for the Also Recommended resource in its category.
The Outreach Resources of the Year aims to highlight valuable resources for church leaders and bring deserved attention to resources that can help churches better engage in effective outreach to share the gospel and reach their communities for Christ. More than 150 resources published between November 1, 2018, and October 31, 2019, were submitted for consideration and placed into eleven categories. An expert in each category evaluated the resources and chose what they considered to be the best. The experts also chose how many resources to recognize, and whether to include any as Also Recommended. The resources are featured in the March/April issue of Outreach magazine.
You Found Me: New Research on How Unchurched Nones, Millennials, and Irreligious Are Surprisingly Open to Christian Faith was honored as the best Resource of the Year in the evangelism and discipleship category. Researcher and practitioner Rick Richardson unveils the findings of the Billy Graham Center Institute’s groundbreaking studies on the unchurched. A study of two thousand unchurched people across the country reveals that the unchurched are still remarkably open to faith conversations and the church. Even unchurched “nones” and millennials are quite receptive if they are approached in particular ways.
Kevin Palau, president and chief executive officer of the Luis Palau Association, said, “At a time when many are assuming that the Christian movement across America is down for the count, Rick Richardson provides far more than a ray of hope. In his new book, You Found Me, Rick describes the strategies that the top ten percent of churches growing through actual conversion (conversion communities) are using to make headway in evangelism, living out and joyfully sharing the good news. In my hometown of Portland, Oregon, a proudly progressive and unchurched place, we’ve seen great gospel progress through active engagement with our community, which is seeking to continually encourage and equip everyday believers to share their faith. Unchurched people are far more open than we give them credit for. There’s so much more we can do to share in the harvest, which Jesus continues to assure us is ripe and ready!”
Outreach’s best resource in the church category was Taking It to the Streets: Lessons from a Life of Urban Ministry by Harry Louis Williams II. Known around Oakland, California, as “O.G. Rev,” Rev. Williams’s calling is to the streets: to the hungry, homeless, addicted, incarcerated, and vulnerable. In this book he takes on racism, the plight of children in the inner city, gentrification, urban violence, the prosperity gospel, and more, all from the perspective of someone who understands these phenomena from the inside. Taking It to the Streets offers firsthand accounts of urban life alongside large-scale considerations of its systemic challenges, all in the context of the life-giving good news of Jesus.
“Rev. Williams seeks to take his readers beyond the headlines and stereotypes to expose the reality of communities and people who have been neglected and abandoned by society,” said Michael L. Pfleger of Faith Community of Saint Sabina in Chicago. “He tries to educate people on the realities of whole segments of our society who have been demonized and treated as throwaways. He reminds us that the good news of Jesus calls us not only to do the acts of charity that call us to care for our brothers and sisters but to demand justice and transform a society that has become comfortable with leaving brothers and sisters on the side of life’s road.”
IVP titles chosen as Also Recommended resources include:
CHURCH:
Why Church? A Basic Introduction by Scott W. Sunquist
“In a post-Christendom era, a primer on what the church is all about is sorely needed. Sunquist offers us a book that is fluent and fresh, combining profundity and down-to-earth simplicity, with healthy doses of humor and no-nonsense realism. After reading it, you are very likely to agree with him when he writes: ‘the church is really one of God’s best ideas.’”
—Jeremy Begbie, Thomas A. Langford Distinguished Professor of Theology, Duke University
CROSS-CULTURAL AND MISSIONAL:
Teaching Across Cultures: Contextualizing Education for Global Mission by James E. Plueddemann
“Masterful weaving of both theory and practice . . . Teaching Across Cultures will be helpful to virtually every audience whether the differences are cultural, generational, ethnic, gender, or regional. We all want to be better teachers. We are all concerned with outcomes as a result of our teaching; this book takes us there as well.”
—From the foreword by Duane Elmer, author of Cross-Cultural Servanthood
SPIRITUAL GROWTH:
The Common Rule: Habits of Purpose for an Age of Distraction by Justin Whitmel Earley
“Habitually choosing what is best over and above what is loud and urgent has never been more difficult than in a culture of perpetual distraction. ‘But where do I begin?’ people ask. In this book, Justin Earley offers the answer. Follow his lead, and you will find much of your life handed back to you.”
—John Stonestreet, president of The Chuck Colson Center for Christian Worldview
For a complete list of IVP award winners visit ivpress.com/awardwinners.
Founded in 1947 as an extension of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA, InterVarsity Press serves those in the university, the church and the world by publishing thoughtful Christian books that equip and encourage people to follow Jesus as Savior and Lord in all of life. For more information, visit ivpress.com.
Contact: Krista Clayton, 630.734.4013 kclayton@ivpress.com
