Whatever Happened to That "Free" Book You Promised?

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Founder & Teacher, desiringGod.org

It’s here. And I am excited about it. It’s called Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood: A Response to Evangelical Feminism. The book has 22 authors, 26 chapters and 566 pages. Wayne Grudem and I edited the book, and I contributed three of its chapters as well as a “Foreword for Single Men and Women.” We have been working on it for about three years.

In thanks to the church for letting me be away on study leave last year to work on this book, I want to provide every family or single person in the church with a copy.

Why is “free” in quotes? Looks fishy.

Almost all the royalties from my books are plowed back into the ministry through the church. The main account for handling this ministry is C.H.E.F.—“Christian Hedonism Expansion Fund”. All the royalties from Desiring God have gone into this account governed by the Council of Deacons. That is where the money has come from to pay for the 500 copies of Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood that we have on hand.

The book will sell in the book stores for $19.95. We will sell them from our shelf as a non-profit ministry for $10.00 (to cover postage and handling). The first 500 copies cost us $8.00 each. Which means C.H.E.F. must pay $4,000 for this order. But I stretched too far when I said we could afford to give a free copy to every one. We do not have that much in C.H.E.F.

So I went back to the Deacons and asked if we could put a coupon in the STAR worth $5 and ask people to make a $5.00 contribution for the book when you pick up your copy. This will not cover our costs, but it will enable C.H.E.F. to give you a gift and stay solvent.

Bottom line: We want every family in the church who wants a copy to have one. If you can afford it, we want you to contribute $5.00 when you pick up your copy with the coupon below. If you can’t afford $5.00, and still want a copy, we will take your word for it and give it to you free (but still bring the coupon).

The offer will be available for all members and regular attenders who get the STAR. It will be available for two Sundays, April 7 and 14. After that the book will be available for $10.

Bring the coupon and stop by the table outside the church office to get your copy.

With deep gratitude for freeing me to work on this last spring,

Pastor John