There are a couple of things very close to my heart that I never seem to blog about. I'm not sure why that is. So here, I want to address one of them - writing. I come from a family of Christian writers. My dad, Lee Strobel, is well known in this area, but my sister is a Christian novelist and my brother-in-law writes children's books. It is just what we do. I have a deep love of writing, it feels like it is engrained in my DNA, but out of all of us, I am the least of a "writer." Let me explain.

Some people write because of the love of writing itself. I am not like that. I do love writing, but I can't just write anything. My writing is attached to my calling as a theologian. I write because I want to proclaim who God is. In this day and age, that can be difficult. I write in two realms, the academic and the popular. The academic world is easy. The audience does not drive the publishing nearly as much as in the popular realm. When the audience drives what is being published, it is often hard to speak deeply about something without being practical - when "practical" is taken to be "addressing the felt needs of your audience." The Bible is not practical in this sense. Our felt needs are the problem, so addressing those is a sure-fire way to make your work sub-Christian. I think audiences intuitively know this. Notice how well the Shack did. It was not practical in any specific sense, but its message that you have to walk through your pain to get beyond it is immensely helpful in the day to day reality in which we live. 

I hope to write more about my writing in the future. I do have a ton of writing projects going right now, some are just chapters, others are books, and I'm even working on editing some books right now. What I would like to know from you though, is what makes you buy a book? What is the main driving influence behind a book purchase? Is it the topic? The author? The cover? I would love to hear your thoughts.