Top Pick

The Chair

James L. Rubart

B&H Books

softcover, 400 pages, $14.99

978-1-433-67152-4

Fiction

 Rubart’s·The Chair·follows antiques dealer Corin Roscoe, a man struggling with his past and whose life is further unsettled when he takes possession of a unique chair.

When a mysterious woman walks into Corin’s shop and gives him the seat from “the greatest carpenter that ever lived,” he is beyond skeptical of his “chosen” status—until sitting in the chair heals a young boy. Intrigued, Corin sets out to discover all he can about the legendary artifact.·

But, he finds, he isn’t the only one trying to uncover the truth about the chair, making for a dangerous adventure when others, including a megachurch pastor who wants to use the chair to increase his following, will do anything to acquire it.

With its surprise ending,·The Chair·delivers not only mystery and suspense, but also a powerful message of restoration and forgiveness. Rubart will attract new readers with this unusual story, as well as fans of his previous works,·Rooms·and·Book of Days.·

—Adela Diaz

CHRISTIAN LIFE

Every Day a Friday

Joel Osteen

FaithWords

hardcover, 304 pages, $24.99

978-0-892-96991-3

Every Day a Friday: How to be Happier 7 Days a Week unpacks what it could look like to experience the joy of the Lord every day. Osteen, who tends to use joy and happiness interchangeably, reminds readers that every day is a gift from God, and that though happiness often appears to be a product of circumstances, a posture of joy and thankfulness is a choice available to all.

Known for smiling frequently himself, Osteen highlights the benefits of a simple smile—perhaps the first step in choosing happiness and not irritability. Anything from traffic to a lost relationship can chip away at a person’s attitude, but, he asserts, faith in an all-knowing, all-loving God allows joy to remain. He also shows how God removes obstacles for those who choose happiness.

Using scripture and anecdotes throughout, Osteen makes a convincing argument that a happy-all-the-time way of life is both possible and biblical. Every Day a Friday is a long-awaited book for fans of this popular TV evangelist and best-selling author.

—Bonnie Bruner

God’s Story, Your Story

Max Lucado

Zondervan

hardcover, 288 pages, $24.99

978-0-310-29403-0

Lucado, New York Times best-selling author and minister of preaching at San Antonio’s Oak Hills Church, shows readers that their sometimes mundane, humdrum lives are actually part of God’s grand saga. “Your story indwells God’s,” he writes in God’s Story, Your Story: When His Becomes Yours, part of Zondervan’s The Story campaign.

The goal of the book is to sift through the New Testament in search of God’s narrative, extracting promises of His orderly plan and timetable. “You are so much more than a few days between the womb and the tomb,” the author explains. 

Encouraging and inspiring, Lucado weaves in his trademark warmth, humor and powerful illustrations. For instance, he draws inspiration from the lives of South African President Nelson Mandela and the apostle Paul to show God “working all things together for good.”

Readers will grasp their own unique significance against the backdrop of God’s providence and sovereignty. They will comprehend that they are not puppets in the hands of fortune or fate. Instead, they are integral characters in the unfolding, purposeful tale of God’s redemption.

—Brian Smith McCallum

Power for Life

Matt Sorger

Charisma House

softcover, 224 pages, $14.99

978-1-616-38277-3

In Power for Life: Keys to a Life Marked by the Presence of God, minister Sorger challenges believers to live in God’s power and shows them how to continually walk in it.

Sorger presents time-tested biblical truths on how pursuing intimacy with God will bear spiritual fruit. He emphasizes that a life of purity, faith and integrity is crucial to unleashing God’s power. 

Perseverance, perspective, vision, truth and joy are some of the secret weapons he encourages believers to use in pushing through trials and defeating Satan and his minions. God uses this as training to move Christians into what He has called them to do. Sorger writes: “Don’t waste a good trial, and never let the enemy steal your praise!”

Using examples from his family and from influential leaders past and present, Sorger’s teaching is simple but key to the Christian life. He aims to teach readers how to stop looking at their circumstances and walk in love to activate God’s promises. Then, he says, God’s power will be released without limit.

—Nicole Anderson

Praying the News

Wendy Griffith & Craig von Buseck

Regal Books

softcover, 208 pages, $14.99

978-0-830-75926-2

Christian Broadcasting Network colleagues Griffith and von Buseck—she a television anchor, he a director of online ministry at Pat Robertson’s network—combine their efforts for an inspiring call to prayer fueled by an often-shunned source, the news media, in Praying the News: Your Prayers are More Powerful Than You Know.

Rather than turning their backs on the horrors of the headlines, the co-writers say, Christians should respond like the men of Issachar in 1 Chron. 12, whom the Bible says “understood the times,” and use the information to pray God’s will into situations.

In addition, Christians should intercede specifically for journalists because they play an important role in setting political, social and cultural agendas by what they cover, the writers point out. They draw on personal experiences and interviews with other media professionals.

The book includes examples of dramatic answers to prayer in history and modern-day accounts of Christians who have seen God’s hand in unfolding events as they have been stirred to pray by news reports.

—Andy Butcher

Sanctuary of the Soul

Richard J. Foster

Formatio/IVP Books (InterVarsity Press)

hardcover, 160 pages, $16

978-0-830-83555-3

Foster, author of Celebration of Discipline and Prayers From the Heart, among others, this time offers a practical approach to meditative prayer that describes “the witness of Scripture and the witness of the devotional masters.” Referring often to those whose lives were filled with prayer—Thomas à Kempis, Madame Jeanne Guyon, St. Cuthbert and others—he sets out to help today’s readers understand the whys and hows of the practice. 

Foster describes the three steps into meditative prayer (recollection, beholding the Lord, inward attentiveness), then offers readers useful help in facing the common difficulties of practicing meditative prayer and answers common questions. “We have noisy hearts,” he writes. 

Foster’s writing is lyrical, his advice sensible, his encouragement profound as he urges Christians to tap into the “listening side” of the “interactive communication that transpires between God and ourselves.” Those who follow Jesus can only benefit from Foster’s newest book.

—Ann E. Byle

FICTION

The Touch

Randall Wallace

Tyndale House Publishers

hardcover, 300 pages, $14.99

978-1-414-34366-2

Lara Blair—owner and CEO of a Chicago-based biomedical engineering firm—is on a mission: to find a surgeon who can do the delicate work on the human brain that even she has yet to accomplish. Andrew Jones, a highly gifted surgeon, shuns the scalpel after he fails to save his fiancée at the scene of their car accident. How the lives of Lara and Andrew mesh is the subject of The Touch, a novella byBraveheart screenwriter and Secretariat director Wallace.

Life for Andrew will never be the same after the accident, but he also is rejuvenated as he serves the poor at a mountain clinic. Lara, however, is singularly focused and seeks Andrew’s skilled help—but in an unusual plot twist, Wallace reveals the reason for her quest. The two fall in love, but also grow as individuals.

Unlike many Christian novelists, Wallace does not shy away from sex, offering a brief honeymoon lovemaking scene. This well-paced story will engage fans of contemporary fiction that teaches lessons without even trying.

—Christine D. Johnson