Leadership Journal and Hearts & Minds Books both honored a number of InterVarsity Press titles with awards for the best books of 2014. Visions of Vocation: Common Grace for the Common Good by Steven Garber made both lists, as the 2014 Book of the Year by Hearts & Minds Books and as one of four books to receive the 2014 Leadership Journal Book Award in the category of the Leader’s Outer Life.

“Through his writing, speaking and consulting, Steve Garber has had a remarkable and significant impact in the lives of students, pastors, Christian educators, organizational and international leaders for many years,” InterVarsity Press publisher Bob Fryling said. “Visions of Vocation fits into that rare category of a book that is not only beautifully written but also intellectually and spiritually profound in its insights and motivating power. IVP is proud to publish such a rich contribution to the church, and I am glad but not surprised by the recognition and honors it is receiving.”

Garber is the principal of the Washington Institute for Faith, Vocation & Culture, which is focused on reframing the way people understand life, especially the meaning of vocation and the common good. Visions of Vocation is written out of Garber’s decades of experience guiding people in working through critical questions of understanding the needs of the world and our calling to it.

“I’ve declared this the best, the most important, the most interesting, the most vital book, and my personal favorite book, of the last several years,” wrote Byron Borger, owner of Hearts & Minds Books.

“Garber fills in the fuzzy ideas about vocation and calling with stories of friends who have thoroughly and thoughtfully discerned how loving God’s world plays out in real life,” says David Swanson, a contributing editor at Leadership Journal. “As a preacher I benefited from this vision of vocation that extends to every person in the pew.”

Leadership Journal also gave an award in the category of the Leader’s Inner Life to Living in Christ’s Presence: Final Words on Heaven and the Kingdom of God by Dallas Willard. Leadership Journal contributing editor Lee Eclov said, “My soul grew reading this book. Or perhaps more precisely, my soul grew as this book read me.”

Hearts & Minds Books honored a number of other InterVarsity Press titles as well, including three in the category of Best Books About the Church in 2014. The IVP books included The New Parish: How Neighborhood Churches are Transforming the Mission, Discipleship and Community by Paul Sparks, Tim Soerens and Dwight J. Friesen, Slow Church: Cultivating Community in the Patient Way of Jesus by C. Christopher Smith and John Pattison, and Fail: Finding Hope and Grace in the Midst of Ministry Failure by J.R. Briggs.

“Their publication not only illustrates an important trend in Christian publishing, as it surely does, but illustrates some of the best insights and (dare I say it without violating these author’s resistance to technique and formula) best practices, for clergy, congregational leaders, church planters, and parish activists,” Borger said.

Hearts & Minds Books gave the award for the Best Book of Apologetics to True Paradox: How Christianity Makes Sense of Our Complex World by David Skeel. “I love that the back of this book states ‘Our complex world raises difficult questions’ without shying away. We’re not shy in affirming this is one of the Best Books of 2014,” Borger said.

Doing Good Without Giving Up: Sustaining Social Action in a World That’s Hard to Change by Ben Lowe received the honorable mention for the Most Valuable Resource for Social Justice Ministry. “This is a book I have longed for in years past, and one I want to share with anyone who wants to persevere when, as he says, ‘the novelty wears off and our enthusiasm runs out,’“ Borger said.

For more information about these awards visit heartsandmindbooks.com.

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