Who doesn’t like to read? I can’t imagine life without books, especially good books written by good authors. So far, the only writer that I kind of know is Mark Noll, the preeminent historian of American Christian history.
What other writers we here like?
I really love Carson, I’ll have to pick that up. Thanks, by the way, for that Frame recommendation from a while back. I’ve been reading as much of his stuff as I can online. Going to put a couple of his books on my Christmas list!
Nothing novel, but:
Surprised by Hope - N.T. Wright
The Lost World of Scripture: Ancient Literary Culture and Biblical Authority - John H. Walton
Pensees - Blaise Pascal
Prayer - Tim Keller
Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life - Donald S. Whitney
I never read Tim Keller, but now I remember hearing about him because my pastor likes that guy. John Walton is also the editor of the NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible which I bought two months ago.
Thanks @Jay313 and @NoahWhite for the suggestions.
Tim Keller is always interesting. RJS (who writes on science and theology and on Scot McKnight’s Jesus Creed blog) is doing a kind of book club blog series on Keller’s latest, Making Sense of God right now if you are interested.
Some of my favorites are:
Michael Bird (on the New Testament, Jesus, Paul, the Trinity -in light of the Grudem/Ware eternal subordination of the Son nonsense)
Roger Olson (on church history, the current state of Evangelicalism, and an anti-Calvinism perspective)
Christopher Wright (on the Old Testament)
Craig Keener (on women in the church, the New Testament)
Tremper Longman III (on approaching the Bible as literature)
William Webb (on the redemptive-movement hermeneutic)
Kevin VanHoozer (on hermeneutics in a postmodern world)
Scot McKight (on the Kingdom)
Ben Witherington III (on women in the church, the New Testament, Jesus, Paul)
Gordon Fee (general exegesis and biblical overview, New Testament)
N. T. Wright (Jesus, Paul, whatever he decides to write about 
)
For the past few weeks, my pastor is making me and my friends read and study Basic Christianity by John Stott. Today I just found out that Stott is an evolutionary creationist. That is pretty cool to learn. I also think the book is pretty good.
Love me some Stott!
Richard Bauckham (esp. Jesus and the God of Israel. He brilliantly unpacks the NT Christological monotheism from its 2nd temple roots and well defends the assertion that the earliest Christology is the highest.)
Martin Chemnitz (esp. his Two Natures in Christ. Gotta love that Christology.)
Oswald Bayer(esp. Living by Faith,and anything of his in English. A short but substantive work on what it means to be Christian in the present milieu)
If you decide you want more John Stott, The Cross of Christ is cited by folks of all flavors and is considered a theological masterpiece by many.
Hi Thanh,
Like you and many of the participants here, I love to read and talk about books. “History, theology, and/or science” encompasses a really broad range of books! In line with how others have responded so far, I’ll relate some personal favorites as a start, and you can let us know if you are looking for recommendations on some more specific topics.
Probably my absolute favorite author is Philip Yancey. He’s a marvelous writer with an expansive base of reading and experiences to draw upon, and the types of questions he asks and the approaches he takes to them are fascinating. Disappointment with God is the best and most profound book on suffering I have read, The Jesus I Never Knew is the best book on Jesus I’ve ever read, and What’s so Amazing About Grace is the best book on grace I have ever read. Yancey writes a lot about pain and suffering, and I find he portrays better than anyone else the life of faith for those to whom faith doesn’t always come easily and for whom pat answers won’t do. He also wrote several excellent books with Paul Brand—a world-renowned hand surgeon who did groundbreaking and life-changing work on understanding and treating leprosy. While I wouldn’t call them “science books”, they weave discussions of and insights into human anatomy, medicine, and theology in a masterful way.
Andy Crouch is the other name that immediately comes to mind. Though I’ve only read one of his books so far, I’ve read a bunch of his essays, and he is a perceptive thinker and gifted writer. Culture Making is a brilliant book—perhaps the best I’ve read in the last few years.
Both Yancey and Crouch are featured on BioLogos’ endorsements page.
Since you mentioned history and Mark Noll, I’ll also put in a plug for Dr. Thomas Kidd—more because he is an old college buddy of mine than because I’ve read a bunch of his books. But he did study with Mark Noll while doing his Ph.D. at Notre Dame (I think he did anyway; he mostly worked with George Marsden, another powerhouse in the world of American religious history), and I did enjoy his biography of Patrick Henry. Dr. Kidd has become a very prolific writer, focusing mainly on Colonial American religious history.
Happy reading!!
Bruce
It’s been mentioned around here that maybe we do need a Yancey fan club! And I also join with you in appreciating Paul Brand’s contributions – his books (both of them that I’ve found and read – due to his co-authorship with Yancey) are still ones that I refer back to when I’m teaching. The book about his Leprosy work is “Pain: the Gift Nobody Wants”, and then his other: “Fearfully and Wonderfully Made”. He, like Yancey, is a wonderful story-teller. Thanks for bringing these books up (as well as the two you mentioned from Yancey which may be two of my favorites too.)
Yancey and Brand also co-authored a sequel of sorts to Fearfully and Wonderfully Made named In His Image; I actually have not yet read the former, but the latter was excellent and also described some of Dr. Brand’s work on leprosy.
Pain: The Gift Nobody Wants—which I’d describe as Dr. Brand’s memoirs and does focus largely on his work with leprosy patients—was re-published in 1997 as The Gift of Pain.
You’ve got excellent taste 
I had forgotten about “In His Image”. I know I’ve read it too, but all Brand’s writings run together in my mind – all of it good!
“Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.” -Colossians 4:6
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