Surprised by Grace by Tullian Tchividjian

Tullian is the grandson of Billy Graham and he pastors a church in Florida. His book Surprised by Grace has the subtitle God’s relentless pursuit of rebels.

He seeks to show the wonder of grace in the gospel. So he says “Real spiritual growth happens only as we continually rediscover the gospel.”

Then he seeks to show us the gospel, grace from the story of Jonah. The book is effectively a sermon series on Jonah that he did for his church during a particularly difficult period in the life of the church. It is very helpful as he takes one through the story continually applying the gospel and grace to our lives, cleverly shows how actually there is a bit of Jonah in all of us and how the gospel of grace transforms rebels like us. Often we don’t think of ourselves as rebels in fact I doubt Jonah did but God pursues smug self-righteous sons and daughters as well as violent pagan kings.

Tchividjian seeks to show three main things:

1. The expansiveness of our sin
2. The expansiveness of God’s grace
3. The expansiveness of God’s mission

If you want to understand more of God’s grace and how to apply the gospel to your life everyday – this book is for you. OR if you just want a really good book on Jonah this book is for you. I highly recommend it for every Christian and non-Christian here. I could imagine that you might use it as part of your morning quiet times, you might just read it through straight or every Sunday afternoon after lunch reading through one chapter. But however you might do it – read this book!

Normally they retail on Amazon at around £12. We have on our bookstall for £9.

We also are recommending another great book by Tullian, Jesus + Nothing = Everything

Below is a video where the author talks a little about his experiences.