Recommended Reading: From Abe Cho, Redeemer West Side

We asked Abe Cho, assistant pastor at Redeemer WS, to recommend a book on mercy & justice that's been important to him recently. Here's what he recommended to us:

Friendship at the Margins

by Chris Heuertz and Christine Pohl

Perhaps the most important element in engaging in ministries with the poor and marginalized is relationships. This book, more than any other, fleshed out for me why "friendships at the margins" is not just a nice bonus or dreamy ideal, but is in truth the very essence of that ministry.

Work with the poor can often perpetuate one-directional relationships where one person is placed permanently in the role of the giver and the other receiver. This kind of relationship can be deeply damaging to both people--creating paternalism in one and inferiority in the other.

Friendships, on the other hand, are marked by mutuality and the essence of the relationship is a bi-directional exchange. As both people give and receive, both are enriched by the other and transformed.

>> Get the book here