October Reading

1. The Latin Letters of C. S. Lewis - C. S. Lewis & Don Giovanni Calabria
2. Murder on the Orient Express - Agatha Christie
3. All Hallows' Eve - Charles Williams
4. The Road Not Taken and Other Early Poems - Robert Frost
5. The Hound of the Baskervilles - Arthur Conan Doyle
6. The Murder of Roger Ackroyd - Agatha Christie
7. The Lair of the White Worm - Bram Stoker
8. The Golden Key - George MacDonald

June Reading

1. The Sacrament of Evangelism - Jerry Root & Stan Guthrie
2. Everyday Evangelism - Matt Queen
3. The Bookshop on the Corner - Jenny Colgan
4. The Uncommon Reader - Alan Bennett
5. Saint Francis of Assisi - G. K. Chesterton
6. Nighty-Nightmare - James Howe
7. Bunnicula Meets Edgar Allan Crow - James Howe
8. Runaway Ralph - Beverly Cleary
9. The Furious Flycycle - Jan Wahl
10. Smith of Wootton Major & Famer Giles of Ham - J. R. R. Tolkien
11. The Bookshop Book - Jen Campbell
12. C. S. Lewis: Christian and Storyteller - Beatrice Gormley
13. The Wife of Bath and Other Canterbury Tales - Geoffrey Chaucer (Translated by Nevill Coghill)
14. Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing - Judy Blume
15. Weird Things Customers Say in Bookstores - Jen Campbell
16. Parnassus On Wheels - Christopher Morley
17. The Flying Inn - G. K. Chesterton

May Reading

1. George MacDonald: An Anthology - C. S. Lewis
2. God in the Dock - C. S. Lewis
3. Living the Braveheart Life - Randall Wallace
4. The Rime of the Ancient Mariner - Samuel Taylor Coleridge
5. The Sacred Journey - Frederick Buechner
6. Church Elders - Jeramie Rinne
7. Song of the Sun - St. Francis of Assisi
8. Defiant Joy: The Remarkable Life of G. K. Chesterton - Kevin Belmonte
9. The Magician's Nephew - C. S. Lewis
10. The Return of the King - J. R. R. Tolkien
11. Clouds of Witness - Dorothy L. Sayers
12. The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
13. One for the Books - Joe Queenan
14. The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam - Edward Fitzgerald
15. Right Ho, Jeeves - P. G. Wodehouse
16. Unidentified Flying Oddball - Vic Crume

February Reading

1. C. S. Lewis: An Apologist For Education - Louis Markos
2. Dancing on the Head of a Pen - Robert Benson
3. Striding Folly - Dorothy L. Sayers
4. C. S. Lewis At The Breakfast Table - James T. Como
5. The Silver Chair - C. S. Lewis
6. The Song of Songs - Marcia Falk
7. The Laws of Marie de France - Robert Hanning & Joan Ferrante
8. Four Quartets - T. S. Eliot
9. The Pilgrim's Guide: C. S. Lewis and the Art of Witness - David Mills
10. The Ghost and the Dead Man's Library - Alice Kimberly (Cleo Coyle)
11. Letters to Heaven: Reaching Beyond the Great Divide - Calvin Miller
12. William Shakespeare's The Empire Striketh Back - Ian Doescher
13. Cupside Down - Terry Cliett

November Reading

• The Preaching Event - John R. Claypool
• C. S. Lewis on Faith - Lesley Walmsley
• The Abolition of Man - C. S. Lewis
• Tremendous Trifles - G. K. Chesterton
• Thoroughly Married - Dennis Guernsey
• Christian Reflections - C. S. Lewis
• Past Watchful Dragons - Walter Hooper
• Sir Gawain and the Green Knight - Jessie L. Weston
• The Great Divorce - C. S. Lewis
• Sonnets from the Portuguese - Elizabeth Barrett Browning
• Reflections on the Psalms - C. S. Lewis
• Shakespeare on Leadership - Frederick Talbott
• Who Moved My Pulpit? - Thom S. Rainer

October Reading

• The MacArthur New Testament Commentary: Philippians - John MacArthur
• Exploring Ephesians & Philippians: An Expository Commentary - John Phillips
• The Power and the Glory - Graham Greene
• Christ-Centered Exposition: Exalting Jesus in Philippians - Tony Merida & Francis Chan
• Be Joyful: Even When Things Go Wrong, You Can Have Joy - Warren W. Wiersbe
• The Monkey and the Fish: Liquid Leadership for a Third-Culture Church - Dave Gibbons
• Aslan's Call: Finding Our Way to Narnia - Mark Eddy Smith
• The Art of Preaching Old Testament Narrative - Steven D. Mathewson
• Of Other Worlds: Essays and Stories - C. S. Lewis
• The Quotable Chesterton - Kevin Belmonte
• The Visionary Christian - C. S. Lewis
• Perelandra - C. S. Lewis
• Mere Christianity - C. S. Lewis
• The Warden - Anthony Trollope
• Lessons from the Ladder - Neil Joiner
• The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe - C. S. Lewis
• Things That Cannot Be Shaken - K. Scott Oliphant & Rod Mays

March Reading

1. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - J. K. Rowling
2. Jesus Swagger: Break Free from Poser Christianity - Jarrid Wilson
3. Pastors in the Classics - Leland Ryken, Philip Ryken, & Todd Wilson
4. C. S. Lewis & Mere Christianity: The Crisis that Created a Classic - Paul McCusker
5. C. S. Lewis: Letters to Children - Lyle W. Dorsett & Marjorie Lamp Mead
6. Till We Have Faces - C. S. Lewis
7. The New American Commentary: Leviticus - Mark F. Rooker
8. Be Holy: Becoming "Set Apart" For God - Warren W. Wiersbe
9. Christ-Centered Exposition: Exalting Jesus in Leviticus - Allan Moseley
10. The Princess and Curdie - George MacDonald
11. Murder in the Cathedral - T. S. Eliot
12. Electra - Sophocles (translated by George Young)
13. Reading Between the Lines - Gene Edward Veith, Jr.
14. The Gospel According to Matthew - Leon Morris
15. Exploring the Gospel of Matthew - John Phillips
16. The New American Commentary: Matthew - Craig L. Blomberg
17. Layman's Bible Book Commentary: Matthew - Clair M. Crissey
18. Studies in Matthew: The King and the Kingdom - Roland Q. Leavell
19. Matthew (Vol. II) - J. Vernon McGee
20. Holman New Testament Commentary: Matthew - Stuart K. Weber
21. A Room with a View - E. M. Forster
22. The NIV Application Commentary: Matthew - Michael J. Wilkins
23. The MacArthur New Testament Commentary: Matthew 24-28 - John MacArthur
24. Christ-Centered Exposition: Exalting Jesus in Matthew - David Platt
25. Mere Christianity - C. S. Lewis

Top 20 Books Read for 2015

1. Evangelism: How the Whole Church Speaks of Jesus - J. Mack Stiles
2. The Pastor As Public Theologian: Reclaiming a Lost Vision - Kevin J. Vanhoozer & Owen Strachan
3. Mere Humanity: G. K. Chesterton, C. S. Lewis, and J. R. R. Tolkien on the Human Condition - Donald Williams
4. The Collected Letters of C. S. Lewis Volume II: Books, Broadcasts, and the War 1931-1949 - Walter Hooper, Editor
5. Tolkien: How an Obscure Oxford Professor Wrote the Hobbit and Became the Most Beloved Author of the Century - Devin Brown
6. Why Church Matters - Joshua Harris
7. The Spiritual World of the Hobbit - James Stuart Bell
8. The Princess and the Goblin - George MacDonald
9. On the Incarnation - Athanasius
10. Preach: Theology Meets Practice - Mark Dever & Greg Gilbert
11. Bedeviled: Lewis, Tolkien and the Shadow of Evil - Colin Duriez
12. How to Be Rich - Andy Stanley
13. The Knowledge of the Holy - A. W. Tozer
14. Literature: A Student's Guide - Louis Markos
15. Psalms: The Prayer Book of the Bible - Dietrich Bonhoeffer
16. Gorgias - Plato
17. Four Faultless Felons - G. K. Chesterton
18. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
19. Credo: Believing in Something to Die For - Ray Pritchard
20. Strange Fire - John MacArthur

This list of 20 books was compiled after reading 68 books this year.  As always, if you're only going to read one book, make sure it is the Bible.

October Reading

1. Why Not Just Be Christians? - Vance Havner
2. The Spiritual World of the Hobbit - James Stuart Bell
3. Father Brown: The Essential Tales - G. K. Chesterton
4. Case Closed?: Nine Mysteries Unlocked by Modern Science - Susan Hughes
5. More Than A Queen: The Story of Josephine Bonaparte - Frances Mossiker
6. Selected Poems and Four Plays - William Butler Yeats
7. Literature: A Student's Guide - Louis Markos
8. The Princess and the Goblin - George MacDonald
9. The Secret of Pirate's Hill - Franklin W. Dixon
10. The House of Hades - Rick Riordan
11. SPLASH: Show People Love And Share Him - Ken & Paula Hemphill
12. The Pilgrim's Regress - C. S. Lewis

Fear

I picked up the paper this past Wednesday, and found the Opinion page.  After reading four articles, I realized they all had a common theme: fear.  Four fears in four articles: fear of pain leading up to death, fear of shattering comfort zones, fear of racism, and fear over ebola.  Was this a deliberate grouping by the newspaper?  I don't know, but it really matters not.
Some fears are worked for evil (such as demonstrated in the racism article I read).  Other fears are used for good and are useful for life.
Where does fear come from?  Is it caught or taught?  I can only answer "both".
G. K. Chesteron wrote the following in Tremendous Trifles:

"Fairy tales, then, are not responsible for producing in children fear, or any of the shapes of fear; fairy tales do not give the child the idea of the evil or the ugly; that is in the child already, because it is in the world already.  Fairy tales do not give the child his first idea of bogey.  What fairy tales give the child is his first clear idea of the possible defeat of bogey.  The baby has known the dragon intimately ever since he had an imagination.  What the fairy tale provides for his is a St. George to kill the dragon."

So, how do you help young children to grow and develop in this fear-filled world?  How to you teach them to overcome their fears?  Allow me to offer a few suggestions.

1. Read to them, and don't stick only to the soft, pansy children's literature.  Read the classic fairy tales from the Grimms.  If you're really daring, find a copy of Roald Dahl's book of fairy tales.  Read The Chronicles of Narnia, the Harry Potter series, or even St. George and the Dragon.  As you read, you will have the opportunity to teach them when (not if) they ask questions.
2. Let them watch good movies, like the three from The Chronicles of Narnia.  Watch Percy Jackson.  "Oh, that's too scary for my kids."  Are you sure it is not too scary for you?  Watch it with them so you can be a good parent and guide, commending the good, pointing out the bad.
3. Read the Bible to them.  Teach them a whole different fear, and not a bad one at that--the fear of the Lord.  "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge" (Proverbs 1:7).
4. Teach them to know Jesus.  As the old saying goes, "No God, know fear; know God, no fear."

Fear is a reality--the good, the bad, and the ugly.  Don't run from them; face them in the strength of the Lord.