40 Books I Plan to Read This Year

John C. Richards, Jr.
Jan 1, 2022
1 min read

Updated: Apr 30, 2022

I start the year each year with a list of books I plan on reading. Many of you are long-time readers and know that I read 52 books a year. So why 40 this year? Easy. I still plan on reading 52, but I created space to add at least 12 new titles that catch my eye over the course of the year. Anyhow, without further ado...40 books I plan to read this year (by category).

Leadership

Canoeing Mountains: Christian Leadership in Unchartered Territory by Tod Bolsinger
Change Your World: How Anyone, Anywhere Can Make a Difference by John Maxwell
They Smell Like Sheep by Lynn Anderson
Letters to My Students on Pastoring by Jason Allen

Biography

Where the Light Fell: A Memoir by Phillip Yancey

Spiritual Growth

Gentle and Lowly: The Heart of Christ for Sinners and Sufferers by Dane C. Ortlund Where the Light Fell: A Memoir by Phillip Yancey
Divine Disruption by Tony Evans
Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life by Donald Whitney
30 Days to Growing in Your Faith by Max Anders

Preaching/Communications

If Jesus Gave A TED Talk: Eight Neuroscience Principles The Master Teacher Used To Persuade His Audience by Charles Stone
Called to Preach: Fulfilling the High Calling of Expository Preaching by Steve Lawson
Preaching to People in Pain: How Suffering Can Shape Your Sermons and Connect with Your Congregation by Matthew Kim
Learning from a Legend: What Gardner C. Taylor Can Teach Us About Preaching by Jared E. Alcántara, Ralph Douglas West
The Kind of Preaching that God Blesses by Steven Lawson
Letters to My Students on Preaching by Jason Allen
Let the Legends Preach: Sermons by Living Legends at the E. K. Bailey Preaching Conference by Jared E. Alcántara, Joel C. Gregory
Sitting With The Sages: Twenty Outstanding Men of God Among the Most Iconic Preachers of the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries by Clifford E. Mclain (Kindle Edition)

Culture/Politics

God, Technology, and the Christian Life by Tony Reinke
From the Garden to the City: The Place of Technology in the Story of God (Revised Edition) by John Dyer
Winsome Conviction: Disagreeing without Dividing the Church by Tim Muehlhoff And Richard Langer
God’s Law and Order: The Politics of Punishment in Evangelical America by Aaron Griffith
We the Fallen People: The Founders and the Future of American Democracy by Robert Tracey McKenzie
How the Nations Rage: Rethinking Faith and Politics in a Divided Age by Jonathan Leeman
One Nation Under God (DP): A Christian Hope for American Politics by Bruce Riley Ashford, Chris Pappalardo

Apologetics

Urban Apologetics: Restoring Black Dignity with the Gospel (Edited by Eric Mason)

Social Justice/Ethics

Reparations: A Christian Call for Repentance and Repair by Duke Kwon and Gregory Thompson
Getting to the Promised Land: Black America and the Unfinished Work of the Civil Rights Movement by Kevin W. Cosby
Moving Past Talk to Systemic Change by Christina Barland Edmondson, Chad Brennan

History/Church History

The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism by Edward E Baptist
When Affirmative Action Was White: An Untold History of Racial Inequality in Twentieth-Century America by Ira Katznelson
Turning Points: Decisive Moments in the History of Christianity by Mark A. Noll
Bad Faith: Race and the Rise of the Religious Right by Peter DeHaan
The Strange Career of Jim Crow by C. Vann Woodward, William S. McFeely
Fire in a Canebrake: The Last Mass Lynching in America by Laura Wexler