Here at Rooted we celebrate the writing of good books! Through our annual book awards, we recommend new titles that encourage God’s people to experience his steadfast love and walk with him in obedience. What better way to encourage teenagers to love great books than to give them hard copies of those books to hold in their hands? (Ok, we’d certainly be thrilled for these titles to end up on teenager’s e-readers too!) However you do it, give a teenager you love some great books this Christmas.
Here are our favorite titles for teenagers published in 2024.
Honorable Mentions
The Heart of Jesus: How He Really Feels About You by Dane Ortlund (Crossway Press)
How often have I wondered how God really feels about me, especially in moments in which I felt unlovable, distant, or alone? Dane Ortlund’s The Heart of Jesus asks teenagers to wonder how God feels about them, and it points to the way we can know his answer: Jesus, God incarnate. A condensed version of Ortlund’s book Gentle and Lowly, The Heart of Jesus walks with readers through key moments in Jesus’s life on earth, which are meant to reveal the heart of God–the center of who he is. This book is an excellent scriptural resource for teens who are familiar with the gospel story but may not have connected in an embodied way with God’s love for them. This quote from the second chapter captures the beautiful simplicity of Ortlund’s message: “The English preacher Thomas Goodwin said, ‘Christ is love covered over in flesh.’ Picture it. If compassion clothed itself in a human body and went walking around this earth, what would it look like? We don’t have to wonder.”
New Morning Mercies for Teens: A Daily Gospel Devotional by Paul David Tripp (Crossway Press)
A special edition of his best-selling devotional New Morning Mercies, Paul David Tripp’s New Morning Mercies for Teens is an accessible, structured pathway for teenagers to engage God’s word daily. Following the same one-page-per-day format of the original, New Morning Mercies for Teens is packed with Scripture and truth that connects with ordinary, daily life experienced in a year. Specifically aimed at teenagers’ developmental stage, Tripp offers gospel comfort while challenging students to thoughtfully consider how their faith impacts practical choices day by day. At the end of each day’s reading and Scripture, Tripp provides reflection questions that invite teens to take stock of the “self” they are bringing to the Word–what thoughts, emotions, and questions come up? In a world that prioritizes information transfer over embodied being, New Morning Mercies for Teens offers teenagers refreshment and daily grace.
Winner
More to the Story: Deep Answers to Real Questions on Attraction, Identity, and Relationships by Jennifer M. Kvamme (The Good Book Company)
If not purity culture, then what? Jennifer Kvamme’s More to the Story invites teenagers to honestly engage complex topics of sexuality, identity, and relationships from a biblical perspective. Instead of giving students a clean list of “dos and don’ts,” Kvamme’s approach starts and ends with the gospel, situating our body, identity, gender, and desires within the redemptive narrative God is writing. In God’s story, these things were made good, are now broken, but are promised redemption. Within this context, each chapter unpacks questions like, “How do I figure out what really makes me me?” and “Why does God care what I do with my body (if I’m not hurting anyone)?” With each question, Kvamme confronts the real messiness in our lived experiences, and she offers life-giving truth and practical advice in light of the gospel.
What drew me to More to the Story was not only Kvamme’s commitment to Scripture as the basis for understanding who God is and what human beings are made for, but also her tone of compassion, honesty, and non-anxiousness. Kvamme honors the diversity of experiences teens bring to the table when asking these tough questions, and her writing reflects a trust that God really does satisfy all our deepest longings. Teenagers who read More to the Story will leave with both a view of our sexuality, bodies, and identities as purposed gifts from God and a sense of his deep love.
“There’s little doubt, even from a purely scientific look at our physical design, that our bodies were made for intimacy with another…even if the details of who and when and how have less agreement. What we’re about to see is that all of this is good. It’s by design. God made our bodies and our hearts to crave intimacy and togetherness…But what we’re also going to see is why God designed us that way. Spoiler alert: your sexuality was intended to show you how intensely he loves you” (p. 14).
Rooted’s 2024 Book Awards team includes Chelsea Kingston Erickson, Tim Franks, Natalie Lett, and Tracy Yi.
In 2024, Rooted had the honor of publishing three new books for teenagers: The Jesus I Wish I Knew in High School, Asian American Edition (by Rooted authors); Longing for Christmas (Rooted authors), and Identity: Discovering Who You Are in Christ by Lindsey Carlson.
