January Reading Log

This is going to be a weird year for this log, I can already tell. Thanks to several of my 2025 New Year's resolutions, I'm currently reading 8 books according to Goodreads, most of which I'll still be plowing through well into the spring. My reading each day is less "read one book for an hour" and more "read 5 books for 10 minutes apiece."

Nevertheless, I managed to finish off six books in January. Take a look!

I WILL by Thom S. Rainer

This book's chapters are serving as the outline for my current sermon series (I gifted a copy of the book to every family in the congregation). Each chapter is a different call to commitment for church members, with topics like "I Will Worship," "I Will Serve," "I Will Give," etc. The idea is for the book to encourage its readers to abandon a consumerist, me-me-me understanding of church in favor of one where they are looking for ways to better serve the Lord and his kingdom.

Like most Thom Rainer books, this is a concise, snappy little book that still manages to pack a punch. For my pastor friends, it's not necessarily breaking a lot of new ground, but it would get the attention of most church members. A good resource, and one my members seemed happy to receive (of the 50 copies I purchased for the church, only 1 is left!)

THE CHURCH REVITALIZATION CHECKLIST by Sam Rainer

I read this book as part of my cohort with PAVE, Texas Baptists' ministry for church health and revitalization. As the name suggests, it's something of a how-to guide for revitalization, from figuring out where your church stands to getting where you need to go.

It's a little more technical than the kinds of books Sam Rainer's dad Thom writes—this isn't a literal manual by any means, but neither is it as reader-friendly as I Will. With that being said, this is a useful resource for pastors, and Sam Rainer manages to toe his dad's company line while also offering some insights of his own. Furthermore, he is currently a pastor himself, so he has some boots-on-the-ground experience that his consultant father does not. This book is a helpful guide for church revitalization, if not necessarily the Holy Grail its title makes it out to be.

LETTER FROM BIRMINGHAM JAIL by Martin Luther King, Jr.

My review from January 2023:

I make a point to read this American epistle every MLK Day, and this year was no exception. Addressed to a collection of white, moderate pastors who were concerned with Dr. King's protest-centered approach to social change, its central theme can be summarized by its most famous quote: "injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."

Drawing from Scripture, American history, and outright common sense, King systematically dismantles the concerns of his fellow pastors, showing how both his faith and his heritage demand that he remain outspoken on the subject of civil rights, and how the methodology of the movement is not only effective, but moral. Furthermore, King respectfully but forcefully decries the caution of his fellow pastors, convincingly arguing that there are times when God calls his children to boldness, not moderation.

For someone who proudly identifies as a moderate on social and political issues, Letter from Birmingham Jail challenges me on an annual basis. I consider it to be right up there with the Gettysburg Address among the greatest works of American political writing—if you've never taken the time to read it in its entirety, do it now.

MATILDA by Roald Dahl

I had been putting this one off as me, Andrew, and Katherine made our way through the works of Roald Dahl, worried that its antagonist would be too scary for Katherine. But Andrew wore me down—I'd made the mistake of telling him that this was one of my favorites—and we gave it a try in January.

It was a roaring success, because Matilda remains an amazing children's book.

For those who never had the pleasure to read this book or see the 1996 movie (or, for that matter, the musical whose filmed adaptation hit Netflix in 2022), Matilda is the story of a gifted little girl who learns that her unusual brainpower not only enables her to read the collected works of Charles Dickens before kindergarten, but also gives her the telekinetic ability to move objects with her mind. When she starts school and runs afoul of the vile headmaster Mrs. Trunchbull, it's only a matter of time before she has to figure out how to use her powers to take on the brutish principal.

While most critics consider Charlie and the Chocolate Factory to be Roald Dahl's best book, Matilda was always my favorite as a child, and that was only reinforced after reading it to my kids. Maybe it's the protagonist, a sweet child who loves books. Maybe it's the villainous Trunchbull, a frightening caricature of every child's fears about authority figures. Maybe it's the tightness of the story—like Charlie, this one has no wasted chapters.

Whatever it is, me and the kids loved reading through Matilda this January. I can't recommend this book highly enough.

THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING by J.R.R. Tolkien

I first read The Lord of the Rings in middle school, when the films were coming out one by one every December from 2001-2003. At the time, I thought it was a transcendent fantasy masterpiece, on another level from any other book in the genre. But as time went by, that reputation crystallized so much that I was a little worried to pick it up and reread it. What if, as a grown-up, I didn't like it anymore?

Nevertheless, I decided to plunge back into the waters of Middle Earth at the beginning of this year, reading about a chapter a day of The Fellowship of the Ring. And thankfully, that world was as comfortable and familiar as a warm blanket, and as much of a joy as I remembered.

For those who've been living under a rock, The Lord of the Rings is the story of a hobbit named Frodo who, having been entrusted with a magical, sinister golden ring, must journey to the fearsome Mount Doom to cast it into the fire from which it was forged. Journeying with him is a crew including other hobbits, a wizard, two men, an elf, and a dwarf. The Fellowship of the Ring, the first two books of six, sets up the story and sees the formation and dissolution of the group.

J.R.R. Tolkien, an Oxford philologist by trade, intricately created the world of Middle Earth before he wrote this story, and it shows. The book is filled with songs and legends that don't tie directly into the story, but which nevertheless give the world depth. Before "world building" was a thing, Tolkien was doing it.

That love for the world, however, is what makes the book occasionally feel like a slog—Tolkien offers a lot of descriptions of Middle Earth's natural features, and never met an Elven name he didn't want to put to paper. But these are minor quibbles, not true criticisms. The Lord of the Rings, starting with this book, is a classic for a reason. I'll try to finish it next month!

ESSENTIAL X-MEN VOL. 7 by  Chris Claremont, Marc Silvestri, Jon Bogdanove, Alan Davis, Barry Windsor-Smith, et al.

Following the Mutant Massacre, when a group of serial killers laid waste to the Morlocks and severely injured several X-Men along the way, the team simultaneously seems to be running in place and rapidly changing. On the one hand, the roster is almost unrecognizable to the casual fan—Colossus, Nightcrawler, and Shadowcat are all sidelined by injury; Storm is still team leader but powerless; and the original X-Men (Cyclops, Jean Grey, Beast, Angel, and Iceman) are their own team in X-Factor. This leaves only Wolverine and Rogue as familiar faces on a team otherwise occupied by newbies like Psylocke, Dazzler, and Longshot.

Despite all this turnover, however, the book seems a bit aimless during this volume. There are a lot of side quests, like when Dazzler foolishly takes on Juggernaut singlehanded and when Storm goes searching for Forge to regain her powers. What's missing is the propulsiveness that writer Chris Claremont once specialized in. Thankfully, that page does seem turned in the final story of this volume, "The Fall of the Mutants," which starts the so-called "Outback Era"—the X-Men are believed dead by the world, Storm's powers are back, and they establish a new base of operations in Australia, where they work in secret.

The highlight of this volume is the arrival of Marc Silvestri on art, whose exaggerated, sketchy style would define the book until Jim Lee ultimately surpassed him in the early 1990s. All in all, this is an entertaining enough collection, but mostly picks up the pieces from volume 6 and sets the table for volume 8.