One of my favorite twentieth-century writers is A.W. Tozer. This May will mark fifty years since Aiden Wilson Tozer went to be with his Lord and Savior. Tozer was born on April 21, 1897. He grew up in a small farming community in Pennsylvania. Tozer was converted as a teenager, and at the age of 22, having no theological education, he took his first pastoral position. This was the beginning of over forty years of faithful ministry. In the course of his life, Tozer wrote dozens of books. Perhaps my favorite one is a little work entitled The Knowledge of the Holy. In this book, Tozer discusses the attributes of God: God’s holiness, His love, His wisdom, etc. Tozer wrote this book because, as he looked at the Church of his day, he felt that Christians had surrendered their once lofty concept of God. The Church, he said, had lost sight of the greatness of God. As a result, the worship of the Church was cold and the witness of the church was weak. Here are a few powerful lines from the opening chapter of the book:
“What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us. The history of mankind will probably show that no people has ever risen above its religion, and man’s spiritual history will positively demonstrate that no religion has ever been greater than its idea of God. Worship is pure or base as the worshiper entertains high or low thoughts of God. For this reason the gravest question before the Church is always God Himself, and the most portentous fact about any man is not what he at a given time may say or do, but what he in his deep heart conceives God to be like. We tend by a secret law of the soul to move toward our mental image of God. This is true not only of the individual Christian, but of the company of Christians that composes the Church. Always the most revealing thing about the Church is her idea of God, just as her most significant message is what she says about Him or leaves unsaid, for her silence is often more eloquent than her speech… Were we able to extract from any man a complete answer to the question, “What comes into your mind when you think about God?” we might predict with certainty the spiritual future of that man. Were we able to know exactly what our most influential religious leaders think of God today, we might be able with some precision to foretell where the Church will stand tomorrow. Without doubt, the mightiest thought the mind can entertain is the thought of God, and the weightiest word in any language is its word for God.”
Having previously commented on my top five commentaries on the Pastoral Epistles, I would like now to introduce two more. These fall into the category of “honorable mention,” because they are specifically written for pastors (and so are user-friendly and ministry-sensitive) and because they take a very unique approach (and so offer something that no other commentary on the Pastorals offers).
Attention parents and grandparents: there’s still time to pick up a few more Christmas presents for the kids, so let me recommend two great gifts that require no assembly, no grooming, and that make no noise!
Most pastors are on a pretty tight budget, and commentaries can be quite expensive. Plus, there are hundreds of commentaries to choose from, so pastors with a limited book budget need to know which commentaries are the best. I’m in the process of writing a thesis on 1 and 2 Timothy, and over the course of the last year or so I’ve read a lot of commentaries on the Pastoral Epistles. Some have been good. Some bad. Some just ugly. Here are the current top five commentaries I would recommend for pastors.
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I spent the day reading David Hackett Fischer’s excellent work, Historians’ Fallacies. He’s a fantastic writer, and he makes some great methodological points. Here are a few gems from the introduction. I found them funny and freeing:
I’m back from a brief hiatus with great news of cheap books! The Desiring God store will be completely renovated in the days ahead and Piper’s books will no longer be sold on the site. To help DG get rid of all their inventory, all books are on sale right now for just $5. Go 
As per usual, Mark Driscoll has people talking. I’m not even going to take the time to read Real Marriage and write a review of it. I’ve read and heard enough of Driscoll’s stuff to know what’s coming. He’s a broken record. If you haven’t read the book yet, I would urge you not to–not if you are looking for a great book that will help you have a godly marriage. I’m not saying the book is terrible (again, I haven’t bothered to read it). I’m not even saying the book isn’t decent (which it might be). I’m just saying that life is too short to read a bunch of substandard stuff, so go with something like Kostenberger’s 
You may want to do some theological fencing with him, but Douglas Wilson is an excellent writer–the best in the Evangelical world, in my view. I just picked up his newest book, 
We all work with certain tools, tools that are appropriate for our craft. A mechanic needs his wrench, a doctor needs his stethoscope, and a pastor needs his books. Here are fifteen reference books that, in my view, every pastor should have in his toolbox (Side note: a great knowledge of the original languages is not required to use these works).
