Tim Keller book tour

Today’s the release date of Pastor Tim Keller‘s new book, The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism. Even an author who is reluctant to talk to the press will pretty much have to mention and promote his book, because that is a big part of how a book sells. Word of mouth, advertising, and book placement will take the book sales even farther. And that’s the way the publishing industry works — they publish a book because it has the potential to sell many copies. That may not be why an author writes a book, but it is why a publisher publishes. [update 2] The Reason for God official website [ht: setsnservice]

Here’s the unofficial Tim Keller book tour info — book signings, Q&A discussions, media junkets, what have you (constantly updated):

• February 26 – MIT in Boston, MA
• February 27 – Georgetown University in Washington, DC
• March 2 – Open Forum at Hunter College in New York City
• March 3 – NYU in New York City
• March 4 – Reformed University Fellowship at UC Berkeley [ht: redeemercommunity]
• March 5 – Stanford
• March 6 – Northwestern
• March 7 – University of Chicago
• March 11 – 10:10am at Westminster Theological Seminary + 7:30pm at Penn Museum at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia [ht: WTSbooks, abcpastor]
• March 13 – 7:00pm at Barnes & Noble in Charlotte, NC
• March 17 – 7:00pm at Ravenna Third Place Books in Seattle, Washington *new*
• March 18 – Borders in Portland, Oregon [ht: Nathan Lewis]
• May 22 – 7:30 pm at Carnegie Music Hall, Pittsburgh, PA [ht: jonahs411]
• full book tour info @ official book website

7 sermons related to the book that Keller preached at Redeemer is now available for free download. Westminster Bookstore will be carrying an audio book version of The Reason for God (abridged). [ht: alexchediak]

Not sure if Keller will do a blog book tour, but Justin Taylor did get this (short) interview with Keller about his new book.

Keller’s book, The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism, answers persistent questions like: Why is there suffering in the world? How could a loving God send people to Hell? Why isn’t Christianity more inclusive? Shouldn’t the Christian God be a god of love? How can one religion be “right” and the rest “wrong”? Why have so many wars been fought in the name of God?

Someone who got a pre-release quoted this excerpt (I didn’t get one):

The purpose of Jesus’ coming is to put the whole world right, to renew and restore the creation, not to escape it. It is not just to bring personal forgiveness and peace, but also justice and shalom to the world. …

[update] also see Dr. Warren Bird’s early comments on this book — Tim Keller Follows in the Footsteps of C.S. Lewis + Tim Challie’s review over at amazon.com