Editorial shortlist
Books that explain what Christians believe and why, for a group that includes someone new to the room. They are ordered roughly from the lightest reading load to the heaviest, so a leader can start where the group actually is.
15 studies below, drawn from 64 in the library that fit this list. Catalog facts last updated .
A guide qualifies when its topics include apologetics or faith and theology and its classification also marks it as a strong fit for small groups — a book about the foundations that a group can genuinely work through together, rather than a reference work.
by John Stott
Why it’s on this list
Stott starts from the claims of Jesus and works to a person's response, which is the order a new believer actually needs. Ten sessions, 71 questions, and no assumed vocabulary.
by Josh McDowell
Why it’s on this list
The chapters are short and each asks a single question a new Christian is likely to be asked — Lord, liar or lunatic; is the Bible reliable; what about the resurrection. Eleven sessions make a full term without a heavy reading load.
by Timothy Keller
Why it’s on this list
One parable, eight sessions, and a reading of it that catches long-time church members as much as newcomers. Nobody in the room needs prior knowledge to take part.
by Lee Strobel
Why it’s on this list
Strobel wrote it as an atheist journalist trying to disprove Christianity, and the sessions follow his investigation category by category. A new believer with unanswered questions gets to watch someone else ask them first.
by John Mark Comer
Why it’s on this list
Comer spends the whole book inside Exodus 34:6–8, taking one phrase per session: compassionate, gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. A slow, close look at one text, which teaches a new believer how to read Scripture as much as what to believe.
by Timothy Keller
Why it’s on this list
Keller works through Mark's gospel passage by passage across fourteen sessions, so the group reads a whole gospel while they read the book. Useful when a new believer has never read a book of the Bible start to finish.
by Lee Strobel
Why it’s on this list
Each session takes one objection — suffering, miracles, evolution, hell, exclusivity, church history, God's silence — and works through it. The right study when new believers are still carrying hard questions.
by Lee Strobel
Why it’s on this list
Nine sessions on the science questions: the big bang, fine-tuning, the origin of life, the fossil record, astronomy. This is the student edition, so the reading is lighter than the other Strobel titles here.
by Jen Wilkin
Why it’s on this list
Ten attributes that belong to God alone, one per session, closing on what it means that we are not God. Written plainly enough for someone who has never studied doctrine.
by J.I. Packer
Why it’s on this list
Packer moves through God's majesty, love, wrath, grace, wisdom and adoption, one or two chapters per session. Heavier going than the studies above it, and worth waiting for until a group has a term or two behind it.
by Dane Ortlund
Why it’s on this list
Ortlund stays on one theme — the heart of Christ for sinners and sufferers — for 22 sessions and 155 questions. Long, but the chapters are short, and the subject is the one a new believer most needs repeated.
by C.S. Lewis
Why it’s on this list
Lewis's four books, from the moral law to the doctrine of the Trinity, run to 29 sessions here — the longest study on this list. Take it one book at a time rather than as a single term.
by C.S. Lewis
Why it’s on this list
The guide for The Four Loves runs 8 sessions with 63 discussion questions, filed under Faith & Theology, Marriage & Relationships and Christian Living. It is on this list because its guide is an apologetics or faith-and-theology study also classified for small groups; Week 1 is free to read before you decide.
by Francis Chan
Why it’s on this list
The guide for Forgotten God runs 9 sessions with 64 discussion questions, filed under Faith & Theology and Spiritual Growth & Disciplines. It is on this list because its guide is an apologetics or faith-and-theology study also classified for small groups; Week 1 is free to read before you decide.
by R.C. Sproul
Why it’s on this list
The guide for The Holiness of God runs 9 sessions with 62 discussion questions, filed under Faith & Theology and Spiritual Growth & Disciplines. It is on this list because its guide is an apologetics or faith-and-theology study also classified for small groups; Week 1 is free to read before you decide.
Christian books for small groups
Titles a mixed adult group can study together, with session and question counts.
Women's Bible study books
Studies written for women's ministry, from Scripture studies to books on the thought life.
Men's Bible study books
Titles written to men, plus the leadership and apologetics studies men's groups pick up.
Marriage books for couples
Marriage and relationship studies, with a note on how candid each one gets.
Books on prayer
Studies on prayer and spiritual warfare, from a seven-session challenge to a full systematic term.
Books on grief and loss
Studies on grief, suffering and loss for care ministries and groups walking through a hard season.
Christian classics for book clubs
Devotional classics and true stories, with a note on how demanding the prose is.
Christian books on anxiety
Studies on anxiety, the thought life, burnout and boundaries, ordered from plainest to most clinical.