First, confession time. I am not 100% confident that I have read all his more than 100 books. Most of them to be sure, many of them when they were in manuscript form. Like most people I too delight over my father’s capacity to make complex things clear. I too find his style engaging. I too come away from all his books the better for it. Which doesn’t mean I don’t prefer some over others.
I typically divide my father’s books into two categories- those he couldn’t not write, and those his publishers persuaded him to write. They’re all good, but there is something special about a book that came out of his own internal zeal. Not A Chance, for instance, grew directly, though not exclusively, out of a Christmas present I helped my mother pick out for him. She gave him a telescope. The joy he took in that led to reading widely on the philosophy of science and, coupled with his pre-existent penchant for piercing logic, out came the book. It is among my favorites. Faith Alone was another that burned inside him and had to come out.
Among my favorites, certainly in my top 5, are two that are not as well known. If There’s a God, Why Are There Atheists? and The Soul’s Quest for God. The former was one of his earliest books, having been released in 1974 as The Psychology of Atheism. He was still developing both his voice and his ideas, and that’s part of the pleasure. You can see The Holiness of God in its larva stage in its pages. The Soul’s Quest for God I love for its subject matter. My father’s skill at explaining things is only a small part of his gift. He could also, when he wanted to, move us with what he informed us of. Too many look to my father as a source of good arguments for good theology. This book demonstrates he was a good goad to a closer walk with Jesus.
My favorite, however, may be the most obscure of all the books he wrote. It is the one I could not put down. It is the one I was most eager to share with others (which explains why I don’t even have a copy anymore.) It spent not very long in print, either as a hardback or a paperback. It’s original title, Johnny Come Home. In paperback it was Thy Brother’s Keeper. It’s a novel, a virtual roman a clef. It tells the story of two young men, best friends who encounter Jesus. One leaves Jesus behind, the other goes on to have a national ministry. And it is very good.
With this book my father let himself free as he wrote. The beauty that undergirds the gospel is its foundation. The characters are real and well-developed, the story-line compelling. What I love about it most, however, is all that it showed me about him. The façade of a novel opened the door for my father to reveal himself as he did nowhere else. It was, as I read it in manuscript form as a teenager, the first time I realized that my dad wasn’t perfect, that he wasn’t as self-assured as he seemed. It revealed also, however, that in his humanity he was a beautiful man, redeemed by a beautiful Savior. I miss him. Not the charming teacher of theology. Him.