Five years after its publication by Signs Publishing, Following Jesus by Dr Peter Roennfeldt is being published for a larger audience by NavPress, a Christian publisher based in Colorado Springs, Colorado. The new edition of the book is being launched around the world next month under a licensing agreement with Signs Publishing.
“As a leading publisher of discipleship and disciple-making resources in the United States, we are always eager to know where the innovative thinking and best practices are showing up, and Peter’s well-earned reputation and disciplined research were appealing to us,” says David Zimmerman, Publisher at NavPress.
“Following Jesus is a rewarding experience for people who might happily affirm the concept of disciple-making but who need to cross over into the practice of it,” he adds. “Beyond that, we’re anticipating enthusiasm from churches who are looking for biblically grounded material to inform their evangelism and outreach.”t
The NavPress edition of the book largely replicates the original edition, including the foreword by South Pacific Division president Pastor Glenn Townend and the references to Messiah, the contemporary adaptation of The Desire of Ages by Ellen White. As Mr Zimmerman explains, this was “largely an aesthetic adaptation; people already well practiced with Signs’ edition will feel very comfortable interacting with people who might be using the NavPress edition.”
Author Dr Roennfeldt is pleased to see this new edition and its potential for a wider readership. “It has been a real pleasure working with the NavPress team, and at no point did the editors suggest any compromise in the content. They simple sought to make it more accessible in their culture,” he comments. “It is my hope that this new NavPress edition causes many more people to be captured by the profound simplicity of Jesus’ disciple-making method and His movement-building strategy.”
Dr Roennfeldt reports that Following Jesus has been used and studied together by small groups, church leadership groups, church-planting teams and other church-focused groups. But his book has also been used as a way of sharing and discovering Jesus. “It was first written and used to share Jesus with postmodernists who had no knowledge of Jesus,” he says, “—and in the last weeks I have heard of it still being used in the same way!”Following Jesus and other books by Dr Peter Roennfeldt are available from Adventist bookshops in Australia, New Zealand and across the South Pacific, or online.
