Christianity Today

42.The Purpose-Driven Life
Rick Warren
A recommended resource to have on hand when faced with a home intruder (a la Ashley Smith) or when seeking to turn around an African nation (a la Rwanda).

41.Born Again
Charles W. Colson
As we now know, the metamorphosis of a Nixon administration crook into a prison evangelist wasn't just a phase.

40.Darwin on Trial
Phillip E. Johnson
This Berkeley law professor's takedown of scientific naturalism launched Intelligent Design and gained creationists a level of public attention they hadn't enjoyed since the Scopes trial.

39.Desiring God
John Piper
Who expected a Calvinist Baptist to redeem hedonism for Christ?

38.The Gospel in a Pluralist Society
Lesslie Newbigin
"A profound rethinking of missions in a pluralist context," says Wheaton College English professor Alan Jacobs, who nominated the tome.

37.God's Smuggler
Brother Andrew with John and Elizabeth Sherrill
Brother Andrew's autobiography "instilled in me a concern for the persecuted church and ignited courage in my heart to serve those who suffer for Jesus," writes Charisma's editor J. Lee Grady.

36.Left Behind
Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins
The book launched a series that launched a marketing empire that launched a new set of rules for Christian fiction. The series spent a total of 300 weeks—nearly as long as the Tribulation it dramatized—on The New York Times's bestseller list.

35.The Stork Is Dead
Charlie W. Shedd
Shedd published his sex advice for teens in 1968 and got evangelicals talking about the topic four years before The Joy of Sex was published.

34.This Present Darkness
Frank E. Peretti
InterVarsity Press editor Al Hsu says Peretti's horror thriller "challenged evangelicals to take spiritual warfare and the supernatural seriously." Maybe, in some cases, too seriously.

33.The Late Great Planet Earth
Hal Lindsey with C. C. Carlson
In the beginning—before the Left Behind series was a sparkle in the cash registers of religious booksellers—there was The Late Great Planet Earth. It's hard to imagine that Jenkins and LaHaye would have sold 43 million copies of their bestsellers if Lindsey hadn't first sold 15 million copies of his dispensationalist hit.

32.The Cross and the Switchblade
David Wilkerson with John and Elizabeth Sherrill
Amazing things started happening when, in 1958, a country preacher arrived—Bible in hand and Holy Spirit in heart—in the ghettos of New York City. Christian Retailing reports that "more than 50 million copies are in print in 40-plus languages of the book that gave birth to the ministry of Teen Challenge."

31.The Next Christendom
Philip Jenkins
The Penn State professor confronted North American Christians with the shocking truth that they were not the center of the universe.

30.Roaring Lambs
Robert Briner
Back in the early '90s, when engaging the culture wasn't the "in" thing to do, Roaring Lambs inspired countless Christian artists to become artists who are Christians.

29.Dare to Discipline
James Dobson
In the permissive '70s, Dobson did what he still does best—calling us to focus on the family.

28.The Act of Marriage
Tim and Beverly LaHaye
The explicit marriage manual told men how to satisfy their wives. "Fundies in their undies," joked religion scholar Martin E. Marty.

27.Christy
Catherine Marshall
A privileged city girl finds faith and a husband in rural Appalachia—sounds like a TV series to us.

26.Know Why You Believe
Paul E. Little
Now we do.

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