I acquired a copy of a little booklet entitled “Building a Theological Library” by Daniel L. Akin (the current president of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary).  Akin wrote this little booklet to help ministers build a good, solid theological library.  I think this a cool idea since I personally believe that a minister or pastor should never stop learning.  A pastor should have a large library that helps him continually refresh his mind and thoughts.  He lists over 1000 books that should be acquired to begin a library.  Yes, 1000 books just starts your library.  Yikes!

This little booklet is both good and bad for me.  It’s good because it gives me a goal to reach.  I would like to build my already growing library and this makes an excellent guide to creating a balanced, helpful theological book collection.  It’s bad for me because I am a bit OCD.  I have this thing about starting things and having to finish.  I can’t just buy a few books… if I start a collection I have to buy the whole thing, even if I don’t like or want some of the collection.  I have a hard time buying sporadically. It’s so bad sometimes that find myself needing to start from the beginning, go down the list and not acquire the next item until the first one is purchased.  Giving me a booklet that lists 1000’s books for me to read in order is like saying “here is a project for you to start, get to it.”  Then my OCD kicks in and says “you have to purchase everything…go sell your car and buy books!”  It’s hard living this way.

I think maybe the true purpose is not for someone to own all of the books, but for a pastor to have at least some of the books in each category or genre that is listed.  Each of the lists are fairly extensive.  While I do have many of the books already, I am not even close to having at least one book in each category.

My new goal is to buy at least one new book out of this collection every month or two, read it, and then purchase the next one. Worthy goal. Will it happen? Probably not.