Comings and Goings

It is cliched and dumb for bloggers to apologize for not blogging. But I'm doing it anyway. Sorry for the lack of substantive blogging. Life's been busy.

A few updates, however.

I recently signed the contract for my next book. It will be a Bible study resource (with multimedia leader kit available) called God vs. Suburbia which will release from Threads sometime in the Spring of 2010. The study can be done by individuals but is designed mainly with small groups in mind, and it will highlight gospel-centered spiritual formation. Specifically, the book will be about how to subvert the idols of our age and culture (e.g. comfort, convenience, conspicuous consumption, individualism) with the rhythms of the kingdom of God (prayer, Scripture reading, fasting, generosity and service, community). I hope it will be a blessing to many.

In the meantime, I have completed the outlining stage of my next trade book, which is tentatively titled Postcards from the Revolution: Parables as Sabotage. I hope to have a submittable manuscript for it sometime in the next few months.

The Docent Group's Glenn Lucke recently outed me as a ghostwriter "to the stars" :-), and he's the guy who signs my checks, so I suppose it's okay to mention that I've gotten enough editing, book doctoring, and writing work from some great pastors and thinkers that I've been able to stop doing the regular "seminary monkey" work of sermon research I'd been doing for over a year. It was fun work and I enjoyed serving some sweet, humble men of God who have ministries a thousand times larger than I'd ever have, but being able to focus on the writing/editing side of things is more in my gifting.

One last thing:
I was recently humbled and honored to receive an invite by my old blog-friend Joe Carter, one of the first uberbloggers in the Godblogosphere, to join some other megabloggers in launching an evangelical group blog under the illustrious banner of First Things. I was, frankly, stunned by the invite. How I got included with these actually reputable online writers -- Justin Taylor, John Mark Reynolds, Hunter Baker, Russell Moore, et.al. -- is beyond me, but once upon a time Joe's Evangelical Outpost and my first (group) blog The Thinklings were big fish in a small Godblogospheric pond. It pays to have made friends back then. Even Tim Challies knows who I am. :-)

In any event, the site is called Evangel, and the fellows and I have begun posting, starting with the question "What is an evangelical?".

My first post: People of the Gospel

Needless to say, all of this plus, you know, real life keeps me busy and not as prolific as I'd like. But I've got some good stuff in the hopper for The Gospel-Driven Church.

Thank you for reading, friends.

Catch you on the flip-side.

Btw, Spring is currently wide open for me right now, so if your church or group might be interested in having me speak, preach, or yell at somebody, go here and let me know.

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