Ajith Fernando , Teaching Director, Youth for Christ, Sri Lanka
In my formative years as a young Christian, I was acutely aware of the fact that I faced many challenges to Christian thinking and behaviour. Few writers helped me to understand how I should respond to these challenges and think and live as a Christian as much as John Stott did. The challenges of faithfulness to God’s way are more acute and complex today than when I was a young Christian. In these little books, you find the essence of Stott’s thinking about the Christian life; it is refreshing to read this material again and see how relevant and health-giving it is for today. I’m grateful to Inter-Varsity Press and to Tim Chester for making Stott’s thinking accessible to a new generation.
Ajith Fernando, Teaching Director, Youth for Christ, Sri Lanka
Technology has enabled more voices to clamour for our attention than ever before, while, at the same time, people’s ability to listen carefully seems to have deteriorated as never before. John Stott’s speaking and writing was renowned for two things in particular: he taught us how to listen attentively to God in order to live faithfully for God; and he modelled how to listen to the world sensitively in order to communicate God’s purposes intelligibly. He taught us to listen. That is why it is such a thrill to see The Contemporary Christian carefully revived in a new format as a series for a new generation of readers. As we read, may we listen well!
Mark Meynell, Director (Europe and Caribbean) Langham Preaching, Langham Partnership and author of Cross-Examined and When Darkness Seems My Closest Friend
It is always refreshing, enlightening and challenging reading from the pen of John Stott. I am totally delighted that one of his most significant works will continue to be available, hopefully for more decades to come. The way Stott strives to be faithful to the Word of God and relevant to his world – secularized Western society – as the locus for the drama of God’s action, is exemplary, especially for those of us ordained to the service of the church in our diverse contexts. I highly commend The Contemporary Christian series to all who share the same pursuit – listening intently to God’s Word and God’s world, hearing and obeying God.
David Zac Niringiye, author of The Church: God’s Pilgrim People
I am delighted that a new generation will now be able to benefit from this rich teaching, which so helped me when it first appeared. As always with John Stott, there is a wonderful blend of faithful exposition of the Bible, rigorous engagement with the world and challenging applications for our lives.
Vaughan Roberts, Rector, St Ebbe’s Church, Oxford, and author of a number of books, including God’s Big Picture (IVP)
Imagine being like a child overwhelmed by hundreds of jigsaw puzzle pieces – you just can’t put them together! And then imagine that a kindly old uncle comes along and helps you to assemble the whole thing, piece by piece. That is what it felt like reading John Stott’s book The Contemporary Christian. For those of us who feel we can’t get our heads around our Bibles, let alone our world, he comes along and, with his staggering gifts of clarity and insight, helps us, step by step, to work out what it means to understand our world through biblical lenses. It’s then a great blessing to have Tim Chester’s questions at the end of each chapter, which help us to think through and internalize each step.
Rico Tice, Senior Minister for Evangelism, All Souls, Langham Place, London, and co-author of Christianity Explored
I have long benefited from the work of John Stott because of the way he combines rigorous engagement of the biblical text and careful engagement with the culture of his day. The Contemporary Christian series presents Stott at his very best. It displays his commitment to biblical authority, his zeal for the mission of the church and his call to faithful witness in the world. Stott’s reflections here are a must-read for church leaders today.
Trevin Wax, Director of Bibles and Reference, LifeWay Christian Resources, and author of This Is Our Time and Eschatological Discipleship