*I started this list in response to a query on my church's message board. Please enoy. -s*

I loathe having to narrow this down to a finite list because so many books have influenced me.

Perelandra by CS Lewis (F). Middle volume in the Lewis Sci-fi Trilogy. A re-exploration of the Garden of Eden, post-Jesus. Which I find to be one of the most fun but intructive playgrounds in which to enjoy the provision of God and learn of the nature of man. Is anyone else curious about what would have happened if Eve had eaten the fruit of The Tree of Life before the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil? This book doesn't actually include that, but lots of other amazing stuff. If you have theories, though, I'd love to hear them.

A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving (F). Sometimes artists (like Irving) see to the heart of things, they glimpse Truth, from a vantage point that Christians miss or avoid.

A Severe Mercy by Sheldon Vanauken (NF). God designed all loves to be subservient to His love, but to be like it as well. I hate to call this a love story, because it evokes images of dime-store romance novels. It's more like an adventure story, where two people are minding their business, living life to the full, unaware that the "hound of heaven" (a phrase from a letter that CS Lewis wrote to the author) was after them.

Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller (NF). This book was the main catalyst to get me to LA. Anne LaMott-esque wit and honesty, but Don grew up in the church, in the south, which helped me see the forest for the trees. Whitewashed tombs have no need for the light. A gluttonous church needs no salt. Light is antidote to the darkness, salt gives flavor to the food for the hungry. LA is unabashed in its darkness, anything but lukewarm.

Son of Laughter by Fredrick Buechner (F). This is a fictionalized treatment of the Jacob Saga. Earthy and beautiful story of a morally flawed man with a deep, abiding faith, whose infamous, "I will not let go until you bless me..." haunts my life.

Prayer by Richard Foster (NF). This book opened up my concept of prayer from being a necessary chore to a language that God and I share, even in my driest seasons. "Even prayerlessness is a form of prayer. Our desire to want to pray is a gift from God, and is the seed the grows into prayer itself." Or something like that.

The Word Is Very Near You by Martin Smith (NF). Chapter 2 changed my life. God IS a Conversation. The weight of having to generate all the initiative in prayer was lifted from my shoulders. We have been told that prayer is a conversation, but this book suggests that this is too limited a picture and warps the nature of prayer. Would you stand for it if a friend required you to call first EVERY time? And then might or might not answer you directly? You would find that person either insane, cold, or, at best, too busy to invest in the friendship. And of course we aren't allowed to atribute these traits to God, so we take the burden on ourselves, along with a quiet, growing resentment. But what if we herein NOT worshipping the creator, but an idol of our own construction? What if we are invited into a conversation that is already going on, without our help? This starts with this premise, but gets into the real nuts-and-bolts of meditative prayer.

The Cloister Walk by Kathleen Norris (NF). A memoir of her time as lay oblate in a monastic order. She remained a "civilian" but participated in parts of the worship and prayer lives of an order.

Addicted to Mediocrity by Frankie Schaffer (NF). A fantastic treatment of the intersection of Art and Faith. He writes great fiction, too. He is the son of theologian Francis Schaffer.

The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver. Amazing.

I almost forgot Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard (NF). In a poetic and incisive way, Annie Dillard holed up for 3 days in a rustic cottage in coastal Washington State, resolving to record what happened in that time. Stirring. Gorgeous.

Very recently, I've started reading Marilynne Robinson and Paulo Koelho. From very different angles, their fiction instructs me in a faith-ful observation of the world and people. And what's there to be discovered is quite stunning and beautiful.

Nods to Anne LaMotte, Traveling Mercies; Into the Wild, Jon Krakauer; Of course Lord of the Rings. My faves for lighter reading: Robert Jordan, Frank Herbert (and his son's continuation of the Dune series).

I'll probably add more as time permits, but this is a start ...

-Scott