Global Context Series (Preface)

One of the most striking memories of my childhood is the Prisoner Bulletin that my parents received several times per year during the last years before the fall of the Soviet Union. In this bulletin, which was written by Russian believers, we were made aware of the faithful but persecuted underground church, of pastors and believers dragged from their homes and thrown into prison and killed, of people whose lives were vastly different from my own.

My father would read the bulletin to us (mom, my brother and two sisters) and we would pray for these men and women who loved the same Lord. But we didn’t stop there; we prayed for the countless millions in the USSR, and in the USA, and around the world, who had little or no access to the gospel because they had never seen a Bible, a Christian, or a church. In short, my parents taught me that, in addition to studying God’s Word, we ought to study God’s world.

There are many ways to get to know the people of God’s world: travel to another land, invite an international student to your home, open your eyes to those who live in our neighborhoods, etc. Another significant way is to read books that make us aware of our global context.

Over the coming months and years, I will be posting book notices and book reviews under the heading, “Global Context Series.” I will be reviewing books that usually can be found easily at Barnes & Noble or on Amazon.com. Usually they are the type of books that will be found in the current affairs, history, or new release sections of the bookstore. Many of them are New York Times Bestsellers and should be fairly accessible to any interested reader.

The books that I list will not necessarily be the best books available on a particular subject, but they will be among the best books that I have read on that subject. I will try to tell you a little bit about the author, the style of the book, its readability, and of course a little bit about its content. I hope that you will find this series helpful. I hope you will enjoy the books, and will find them to be a stimulus to love God as you learn about, and learn to love, the people in God’s world.