So look what showed up on my doorstep this morning!
We’re still about four weeks away from The Pietist Option hitting bookstore shelves, but getting author’s copies from InterVarsity Press made it feel so much closer. Even more so than when I wrote this kind of post two years ago, it’s hugely gratifying to see and hold actual copies of something that I’ve envisioned for so long: a general audience book on the contemporary relevance of Pietism that I can recommend to any of my family, friends, colleagues, and fellow church members.
And as with the higher ed book in 2015, finally holding this book in my hands filled me with gratitude for the people who inspired and shaped it. That starts with my co-author, but I’ll save a special post about Mark for later this month.
Tonight, I thought I’d just share the acknowledgments section of The Pietist Option, which flows out of the introduction:
…the content of this book has already been shaped by a kind of digital-age conventicle. Over the course of twelve podcast episodes in early 2016, we thought aloud through each chapter; on air we bounced ideas off each other and our friend Sam Mulberry, then solicited feedback from listeners via social media. Later Chris shared rough drafts of selected chapters on his blog to get some last-minute comments from potential readers before the manuscript shipped off to the publisher. Among our other acknowledgments, we’re grateful to Sam and all the other listeners and readers whose voices echoed in our ears while we were writing.
We were also in literal or figurative conversation with many other students of Pietism, some of whose words you’ll see quoted in the pages to come. Our errors in this work are our own, but our ideas have been shaped by scholars and pastors living and dead, including Phil Anderson, Jason Barnhart, Dale Brown, G. W. Carlson, Michelle Clifton-Soderstrom, Christian Collins Winn, Don Frisk, Jim Hawkinson, Carl Lundquist, Roger Olson, Karl Olsson, Steve Pitts, John Weborg, and Glen Wiberg. In addition, Susan Pattie helped her brother tell the story of the Armenian genocide in chapters two and five.
Both of us are deeply indebted to the congregation, leadership team, and staff of Salem Covenant Church for their encouragement and support throughout this project. And of course we are so very grateful for the efforts of two editors: David Congdon, who helped us get this project off the ground, and Jon Boyd, who saw it through to completion.
Finally, we can but begin to thank Donna, Lauren, Mark, Jonathan, Katie, Lena, Isaiah, and the rest of our families, who remind us daily that “the only thing that counts is faith working through love” (Gal 5:6).
The Pietist Schoolman 