Letter from the President: Our Commitment to Gospel-Centered Publishing

Weak spot Is the Means

I just lately learn Dr. J. I. Packer’s ebook Weak spot Is the Means. It’s a wonderful little ebook containing an necessary reality that may solely be realized over time. Who higher than Packer to write down of God’s energy being made excellent by weak spot? Dr. Packer authored 22 Crossway books and served as the final editor for the ESV Bible. When he was simply seven years previous, he was struck by a bread truck, leaving him with a extreme head harm. The accident pressured him to spend a lot of his childhood indoors, main him to immerse himself in studying and writing. After the accident, Packer requested his dad and mom for a bicycle however obtained a typewriter as a substitute. In God’s windfall, the sudden present helped to ignite a ardour for writing and theology. All through his profession, Packer remained dedicated to his typewriter, by no means adapting to computer systems and insisting on using fax machines for communication. By means of his expertise of bodily weak spot, Packer developed a deep reliance on God as his supply of non secular energy. His life is an indication of God working powerfully by weak spot. J. I. Packer has had an outsized and lasting influence on God’s kingdom and Crossway.

In Weak spot Is the Means, Packer writes, “The best way of true non secular energy, resulting in actual fruitfulness in Christian life and repair, is the common-or-garden, self-distrustful method of consciously acknowledged weak spot in non secular issues.”¹ This reality has been deeply impressed upon me as we now have sought to steward all that the Lord has entrusted to us at Crossway. The publication of God’s phrase is a critical non secular matter and a weighty duty.

God’s energy working by our weak spot is a biblical reality and a theme that runs all through the ebook of two Corinthians, particularly chapter 4, which has nice bearing on our work. I’m more and more conscious that we now have been entrusted with the ministry of Crossway by God’s mercy, not due to our distinctive {qualifications} however solely due to God’s mercy (2 Cor. 4:1). As we publish the ESV Bible and gospel-centered assets, we should surrender “disgraceful, underhanded methods,” and “refuse to follow crafty or to tamper with God’s phrase, however by the open assertion of the reality we might commend ourselves to everybody’s conscience within the sight of God” (2 Cor. 4:2). I’m struck by the appliance of those verses to our work at Crossway, particularly in a world that grows more and more secular.

Devil has blinded the eyes of unbelievers. As Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 4:4, “Of their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to maintain them from seeing the sunshine of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who’s the picture of God.” However God has revealed himself to us by the gospel, and we’re referred to as to transmit the treasure of the gospel to a misplaced and dying world, proclaiming not ourselves however Jesus Christ as Lord with ourselves as his servants.

We are able to take consolation in realizing that he who raised the Lord Jesus may also increase us into his presence. The resurrection of Jesus was the firstfruits of a future resurrection that can happen when Jesus returns in glory, and we may have resurrected our bodies. Till then, we’re damaged vessels and jars of clay, entrusted with the gospel (2 Cor. 4:7).

The place There Is a Imaginative and prescient

Eighty-six years in the past, God gave my grandparents, Clyde and Muriel Dennis, a imaginative and prescient for publishing and sharing the excellent news of the gospel all over the world. And 46 years in the past, he gave my dad and mom, Lane and Ebeth Dennis, a imaginative and prescient for gospel-centered publishing by Crossway.

Within the ebook The place There Is a Imaginative and prescient, my dad mirrored on God’s faithfulness and the imaginative and prescient for Good Information Publishers, which started with Clyde and Muriel. Within the chapter titled “A Imaginative and prescient Recalled, A Imaginative and prescient Renewed,” my dad opened with the next query and reflection, “Can the imaginative and prescient of 1 technology be handed on efficiently to the subsequent? When a imaginative and prescient is handed on efficiently, it often includes two facets. First, there’s an unqualified dedication by the successors to recall and decide to the unique imaginative and prescient of the founders. Second, there’s a sense through which the imaginative and prescient itself turns into renewed and re-expressed in a method that meets the wants of a brand new technology.”

At present, we stay dedicated to my dad and mom’ unique imaginative and prescient of gospel-centered publishing, and I’d wish to share examples of how that imaginative and prescient is being re-expressed to fulfill the wants of a brand new technology. In some ways, we at the moment are reaping the harvest of seeds that have been planted in religion a few years in the past (1 Corinthians 3:6–7). Our job now’s to faithfully water what has been planted.

In God’s windfall, we work with greater than 300 ministry companions in over 230 international locations. We publish over 1,350 books by nearly 750 authors, most of which have been licensed for publication in over 150 languages. Crossway now has greater than 540 ESV Bible editions in print, and greater than 15 million copies of the ESV are distributed annually by Crossway and ministry companions, leading to over 300 million print Bibles distributed for the reason that ESV was first revealed in 2001. Most of these Bibles are given away freely by ministry companions. Every year, greater than 5.5 billion chapters of the ESV are accessed freely in digital textual content and audio codecs all over the world. Tracts proceed to be an important a part of our publishing ministry, as we distribute nearly 12 million tracts annually. We’ve additionally been capable of put money into many thrilling initiatives geared toward distributing the Bible and gospel assets all over the world, the place the necessity is best. All of that is by God’s grace and for his glory alone.

These investments align with our mission as a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit group. Crossway is a ministry first and a enterprise second. Our enterprise and gross sales help the ministry work of Crossway. As such, we now have allotted a good portion of our budgeted surplus subsequent 12 months towards translation work and the distribution of free assets all all over the world.

A particular instance of an thrilling ministry initiative is our One Million Bibles Initiative. Over the previous two years, we now have been amazed by the generosity of hundreds of donor companions from all over the world because the Lord has graciously supplied for the initiative. We’ve been significantly inspired by numerous tales of non secular transformation within the lives of our brothers and sisters in Christ, which has usually led to non secular renewal of their communities.

By God’s grace, donors to Crossway have supplied sufficient help for the distribution of practically 850,000 Bibles to believers in want all through the International South. 100% of all items have been used to position Bibles within the fingers of males, girls, and kids who wouldn’t in any other case have entry to Bibles of their very own. It’s not unusual for not-for-profit organizations to make use of a big portion of donations to pay for salaries and help the infrastructure of the group. Nevertheless, Crossway has a self-sustaining enterprise mannequin, permitting for donations for use particularly for the distribution of Bibles and gospel-centered assets. Lord prepared, by December thirty first, we hope to have raised sufficient funds to help the distribution of the ultimate 150,000 Bibles within the One Million Bibles Initiative. These Bibles are making an everlasting distinction within the lives of believers all over the world.

One ministry accomplice from India reported, “Receiving my first Bible was such a pleasure as a result of I had no Bible of my very own. All that I knew concerning the Bible was no matter I heard in church or what my mom had instructed me. However to have my very own Bible, to learn it, and to know what Jesus is telling me was such a blessing. [It’s amazing] to have your personal Bible and to really feel it in your hand and to learn it while you need to learn it.”

This instance and hundreds of others prefer it are why we do what we do. Crossway exists as a result of this sick and dying world wants the gospel. The world wants fantastically crafted, God-honoring, gospel-proclaiming books and Bibles. Crossway exists to publish content material and to prayerfully and humbly transmit the treasure of God’s phrase and the reality of the gospel, within the energy of the Spirit, with reality and sweetness, by all types of media, for the build up of the physique of Christ, to the ends of the earth, for God’s glory alone.

The ESV Bible is a treasure, and I’m more and more conscious of the large duty that has been entrusted to us. The Bible accommodates the very phrases of God and the life-transforming energy of the gospel. It is a sobering and awe-inspiring actuality, and it means we should method our work with humility and reverence, trying to the Lord for our energy and giving glory to God alone for all that he has achieved.

I started with Packer, and I’d like to finish by sharing once more a portion of a prayer Dr. J. I. Packer prayed for Crossway nearly precisely ten years in the past.

We ask that on this new section of Crossway’s ministry, to this subsequent technology and past, chances are you’ll outstrip all that you simply dropped at fruition prior to now—that the story could transfer from good to raised, from higher to finest, from a lot to extra and larger—at the same time as we rejoice in all that you’ve achieved prior to now.

We thanks for all of the knowledge of your phrase and for the large privilege of sharing within the publication of the ESV Bible and its worldwide ministry. Thanks, Lord. Grant your blessing, honor Christ, and advance your glory by all that Crossway does. Carry reward to your holy identify, life to your individuals, pleasure to Christian hearts, and power to Christians residing their each day lives on this world. And so, by Crossway, construct your kingdom, advance the church, and produce honor and glory to your holy identify. We bless you, we thanks, and we commit Crossway’s ministry to you.

Within the identify, and for the reward, of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior—by whom we pray now as your kids, and in whom we reside and rejoice on this day. Amen.

Crossway CEO and President,

To be taught extra about and get entangled with Crossway’s objective of offering a million Bibles to believers in want, please go to crossway.org/OneMillionBibles.