Favorite Reads of 2025

The best books I read this year. See previous years here: 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024.

The Holy Longing: The Search for a Christian Spirituality

by Ronald Rolheiser

I discovered Rolheiser's writings a few years ago and have found his sober outlook on faith refreshing. One of his most popular books, The Holy Longing, explains the fundamental tenets of the Christian faith, both philosophical and practical.

While unapologetically Catholic, Rolheiser writes first and foremost as a Christian. Yet his experience as a practicing Catholic priest brings a quiet realism about the challenges of a life of faith that I think is needed right now.

In a time where Christianity no longer has the cultural dominance it once did, the essentials of the Christian faith can be unclear and their importance harder and harder to articulate. This book helps color in the historical context behind the current state of Christianity and describes how a person can go about following Jesus in today's world.

Favorite quotes:

"Spirituality is, ultimately, about what we do with that desire. What we do with our longings, both in terms of handling the pain and the hope they bring us, that is our spirituality."

"Nobody doubts our generation’s sincerity. In terms of spirituality, our struggle is not with sincerity, but with direction. Our hearts are good, but it is our minds and feet that do not know which way to go."

A Burning in My Bones: The Authorized Biography of Eugene H. Peterson, Translator of The Message

by Winn Collier

I have long been familiar with The Message, so I enjoyed learning about its formation and the man who translated it. Early in his career, Peterson was an academic studying philosophy, theology, and Semitic languages. Originally he had planned to pursue academia as a profession, but there came a turning point in his late twenties when he felt more called to become a pastor. He and his wife went on to start a Presbyterian church in suburban Maryland. They would shepherd its congregation for nearly three decades before retiring.

Peterson's retirement was the end of his formal pastoral years but marked the beginning of what would become his most far-reaching work. Decades as a pastor living with and learning from "everyday" people combined with an early passion for ancient languages came together to birth The Message translation of the Bible.

Favorite quote (in response to criticism over trying to translate the Bible thought-for-thought rather than word-for-word):

"So I went outside the Bible and got the three or four most respected translations of the Iliad and the Odyssey. What both surprised and encouraged me was that none of them are at all literal, and the best ones were praised by Greek scholars as 'literary' not literal. That literal is almost always a bad translation—you can’t get one language into another by being literal. Interpretation is always involved. The task is to get the tone and meaning of the original into something equivalent in English."
-Eugene Peterson

Hearing God: Developing a Conversational Relationship with God

by Dallas Willard

This is one of the most thorough and useful books I've read on discerning God's voice. Much of it is about how we ought to think about and relate to God so we can be open to and understand his communication.

When our perception of God is warped, or we don't know how to relate to him, any communication we think we hear will be warped by our fears or misunderstandings as well. When we learn more about who he is and the relationship he has created us for, we are more keen and able to hear what he is saying. Rooted in friendship, speaking and listening become natural aspects of living in his presence.

Favorite quotes:

"We need accurate information about this because it isn’t enough to 'mean well.' We truly live at the mercy of our ideas; this is never more true than with our ideas about God."

"Our relationship with God is not a consumerist relationship; nor do Christians understand their faith to be a consumer religion. We don’t consume the merits of Christ or the services of the church. We are participants, not spectators. Accordingly, we seek to interact with God in a relationship of listening and speaking."

"First, we need to understand that God’s communications come to us in many forms. What we know about guidance and the divine-human encounter from the Bible and the lives of those who have gone before us shows us that. We should expect nothing else, for this variety is appropriate to the complexity of human personality and cultural history. And God in redeeming humanity is willing to reach out in whatever ways are suitable to its fallen and weakened condition."

The Return of the Prodigal Son

by Henri Nouwen

A hallmark of Nouwen's books is his willingness to be open about his interior struggles and revelations. It's a type of honesty that is humbling to witness as a reader. In The Return of the Prodigal Son, Nouwen lets the reader in on a journey of intense reflection over the famed parable of The Prodigal Son.

In the 1980s, Nouwen encountered Rembrandt's painting of the same name, and it stunned him. He was so taken by the piece of art that it would become an enduring object of his focus for years. In that painting, the parable he was so familiar came to life. In new ways, he could identify with the psychologies of the prodigal son, the elder son, and even the forgiving father. A beautiful book about a beautiful story.

Favorite Quotes:

"In the context of a compassionate embrace, our brokenness may appear beautiful, but our brokenness has no other beauty but the beauty that comes from the compassion that surrounds it."

"When I hear that voice, I know that I am home with God and have nothing to fear. As the Beloved of my heavenly Father, 'I can walk in the valley of darkness: no evil would I fear.' As the Beloved, I can 'cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out devils.' Having 'received without charge,' I can 'give without charge.' As the Beloved, I can confront, console, admonish, and encourage without fear of rejection or need for affirmation. As the Beloved, I can suffer persecution without desire for revenge and receive praise without using it as a proof of my goodness. As the Beloved, I can be tortured and killed without ever having to doubt that the love that is given to me is stronger than death. As the Beloved, I am free to live and give life, free also to die while giving life."

Also Good

A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L'Engle - I read for the first time this year and it was fun to return to the land of children's books where we're reminded the good guys still win in the end.

The Message Bible (audio) - I listened to bits and pieces of The Message this year. I typically prefer reading written words over listening to audio books, but found myself better able to connect with this text in audio.