Second Edition of From The Garden to the City in the works

One of the first books I often recommend to anyone thinking about Christian faith and technology is John Dyer’s From the Garden to the City. It was hugely helpful to me when I was just beginning to get my head into thinking about the intersection between faith and tech, and is still one of several books that I keep to hand for quick reference!

This week on his twitter feed John teased a second edition of his book is in the works:

Glad to hear you find the book helpful. Fun fact: my publisher just asked me to do an update, so I'll get to refresh the examples and add some things about AI, transhumanism, etc. Also, my kids helped me make a potential cover redesign with the original subtitle pic.twitter.com/5ippl8vHGJ

— Jᴏʜɴ Dʏᴇʀ (@johndyer) August 14, 2020

As well as enjoying a mockup of the cover artwork thanks to the Dyer children, John’s tweet says that the examples that he uses throughout the book are going to be brought up to date with technology that is in front of our public conversation, including artificial intelligence and transhumanism.

John is a professor at Dallas Theological Seminary and a software developer (his experiments with worship songs and Markov Chains are both excellent and challenging), and his book From the Garden to the City is one of the best primers to start thinking about thinking about technology through the lens of Christian faith. The book takes readers on a Biblical overview, stopping of at key points where we see technology, culture, and faith interacting in the narrative.

There’s no word on when the second edition will be finished and ready for release, so if you can’t wait for an indeterminate amount of time… 10ofthose.com are selling the first edition for £4.50. I couldn’t recommend it highly enough!

The second edition of From The Garden to the City joins Tony Reinke’s upcoming book, as two books to help us think about how we engage with technology well as Christians, that I can’t wait to hit the shelves.