My birthday, my book's birthday, and my NEXT BOOK

Hey everyone! Today is my birthday! WOOHOO!

I’m not going to bore you with an over-earnest reflection on turning 35. Instead, I would just like to ask you, if you feel so inclined, to consider donating to a group that I care deeply about and with whom my household is intimately involved: The Sanctuary Supply Depot. These incredible folks do weekly pop-ups, outreach, and service-collaboration that keeps the most highly vulnerable unhoused folks in Minneapolis safe while we work for long-term systemic change. I can’t say enough about them, and it would honor me greatly if you would consider donating.

Donate at this link or consider buying supplies from their Amazon Wish List.

Something fun I get to enjoy forever is that my book’s birthday is so close to my own. My book released on August 8, 2022, meaning that on Thursday it turns TWO YEARS OLD!

To celebrate, I want to to offer a fun option for something I did recently that I was really cool. Someone reached out to essentially “sponsor” a book sent to a local church, who they hoped might catch a vision from it. I thought this was a really cool idea, so here’s what I’m thinking to celebrate my book’s second birthday:

Let’s send some books to some churches!

Here’s what I need from you:

1. Names/addresses of a church who you would want to receive a copy of my book

2. Sponsors willing to contribute $15 for the sending of said book. (Please note this is at cost for me.)

Ideally, the same people would do both—nominate and sponsor. But I also recognize that there might be some who can or want to only do one. If I end up with more churches than sponsors, I will add them to a list that I can work through gradually.

If you want to participate in either way, comment below or reply to this email and we’ll figure it out!

Last, but certainly not the least… I owe you all a preview of my NEXT BOOK!

A couple months back, I challenged you all to help my Substack reach some modest goals, and you delivered! So now it’s time to own up to my promise.

Before I do so, please note: this book has not been signed or contracted yet which means a lot of things can change. It could be that no publisher wants this book, and I have to scrap it entirely. I could end up signing a contract and, because any great book is a collaborative effort, it could change and morph in ways different than how I describe. Additionally, I’m uncertain about my current working title, so I’m going to hold back on that for now. (Titles almost always change.)

So here’s the pitch:

It’s a book about Gospel Rescue Missions. But also… it isn’t.

I don’t want to write a book only about how Christians get it wrong. Even though, as you well know, I think that 90% of Gospel Rescue Missions are really getting homelessness wrong and causing harm. There’s no way around it—and the book is going to talk about that, and it’s going to be honest.

But ultimately, the book is about what’s going right. Because over the last two years, I’ve been honored to hear about, dialogue with, and visit churches and faith-based organizations that are doing absolutely incredible, inspiring, and world-changing work around homelessness. These groups embody everything I wrote about in Grace Can Lead Us Home, and they do it from a deep faith-rootedness and a desire to honor God. And I want to tell their stories as a contrast to the Rescue Mission—disproving once and for all that there is only one Christian way to address homelessness.

I’m going to tell stories about Christians that have started national housing development corporations, built tiny homes on their church lawns, changed government policy, marched at State Capitols, sheltered people through harsh winters, thrown weekly karaoke parties on Skid Row… and so many more.

If this sounds like a book you’d want to read, let me know in the comments! (I sure hope so, because I’ve been working on it for a long time already!)

If everything goes according to plan (because of course it always does!) I will be pitching this book to publishers in the next couple months. Pray for me!

Thank you as always! And please, donate to the supply depot, nominate/sponsor a church to receive my book, and tell me if my next book will be on your future to-read list!