By Dr. and Mrs. Howard Taylor; OMF International, 1918, 1996. Few have taken the Great Commission to proclaim the gospel more seriously than Hudson Taylor (1832–1905), a British doctor who arrived in Shanghai in 1854 ready to sacrifice anything for Jesus’ sake. While many missionaries clung to a European way of life, Taylor adopted local customs and dress and travel-ed into China’s isolated interior, founding the China Inland Mission. To newcomers who complained about the rigors that such mission demanded, Taylor responded: “The stamp of men and women we need is such as will put Jesus, China, [and] souls first and foremost in everything and at every time. Even life itself must be secondary.” Howard Taylor’s classic biography of his father, Hudson Taylor and the China Inland Mission, poses a challenge: Who will be Jesus’ messengers today? Get the book

By Pope Francis;  Image, 2014. This May, Pope Francis’s encyclical Laudato si’ addressed the impact of the environmental crisis on the poor, generating a buzz of controversy. By contrast, Francis’s 2013 exhortation Evangelii gaudium (“The Joy of the Gospel”) raised few eyebrows. Yet, if taken seriously, its message is just as radical. The pope’s unifying themes are renewal – awakening from our personal preoccupations and rediscovering our faith – and joy: “An evangelizer must never look like someone who has just come back from a funeral!” There’s much here to reflect on and put into practice. Get the book