Book 2 Released - Of Intense Brightness

Alas, Book 2--Of Intense Brightness: The Spirituality of Uncommon Christian James Brainerd Taylor--is released.

168 pages. 41 photos/halftones. Map. Index. Historical chronology and select bibliography (James Brainerd Taylor). Recommended reading list (Evangelical Protestant spirituality). 17 international endorsements.

Foreword by Canada's James M. Houston (M.A., Edinburgh; D.Phil., Oxford). Epilogue ("A special word to university and seminary students") by Australia's Peter Adam (Ph.D., Durham).

From the UCM website, you can read excerpts, a summary of its contents and its 17 international endorsements.

To view the book's page on the publisher's website (University Press of America [Lanham, Maryland]), click here.

For purchase options in U.S., Canada or overseas, click here.

A special THANKS to all those who partnered with me in this second publishing effort to preserve and reintroduce the Princeton University and Yale Seminary student-evangelist James Brainerd Taylor (1801-1829) and his Bible-based Uncommon Christianity--"eminently holy, self-denying, cross-bearing, Bible, everyday" Christianity--to the 21st-century global church, seminary and university.

Canada's James Houston . . . Book Tour Update

Along with James Houston--author of the Foreword to Of Intense Brightness: The Spirituality of Uncommon Christian James Brainerd Taylor (read excerpt here)--a book signing and PowerPoint presentation is set for Tuesday, October 7, 2008, 9:00 a.m. to 12:00 noon at Western Seminary in Portland, Oregon. I am a current, non-residential Doctor of Ministry student at Western and Dr. Houston has spoken there once before. Western Seminary's new/12th president, Dr. Randall Roberts, will introduce us both.

I will give a presentation on my two James Brainerd Taylor books and Dr. Houston will speak on his latest book Joyful Exiles: Life in Christ on the Dangerous Edge of Things (IVP, 2006), winner of the World Guild Best Leadership/Theoretical Book. Read here a review of Joyful Exiles in "Christianity Today" magazine.

Dr. Houston (M.A., Edinburgh; D.Phil., Oxford) is the founding principal of Regent College: An International Graduate School of Christian Studies (est. 1968) in Vancouver, B.C., Canada. He has authored or edited over 40 books on evangelical Protestant spirituality and currently serves as the Board of Governors' Professor of Spiritual Theology at Regent. It was the British-born Houston who was the primary instrument in influencing his fellow Englishman, theologian, and Knowing God (1973) author, J. I. Packer (D.Phil., Oxford), to come to Canada and teach at Regent (1979- ). Bruce Hindmarsh (D.Phil., Oxford) is the current James M. Houston Professor of Spiritual Theology at Regent.

As of now, this October 7 date is the only scheduled book signing/presentation event for 2008. My ambitious idea of a November mini-book tour to entities associated with James Brainerd Taylor (in Conn., N.J., N.Y., Virg.) is postponed due to time and financial factors. However, if my submitted paper is accepted, then I hope to give a talk on Taylor at the 60th annual Evangelical Theological Society (ETS) meeting in Providence, R.I., November 19-21. Stay tuned.

UPDATE (Sept. 15, 2008): The October 7 event with Dr. Houston in Portland, Ore., has been cancelled. I am set to deliver a paper/talk on J. B. Taylor on November 20 at the national ETS meeting in R.I.