Unlikely: What Happens When We Set Aside Our Differences to Live Out the Gospel

In 2007, a dozen evangelical pastors wanted to meet with Sam Adams, the gay, newly elected mayor of Portland, Ore., one of America’s most liberal cities. “I assumed most evangelicals were judgmental... and unwelcoming,” Adams writes in the foreword to Palau’s first book. What follows is a beautiful unlikely friendship. No foot soldiers in the Christian culture wars, instead these pastors asked, “How can we better serve the city?” The slightly shocked mayor, facing deep cuts to his city’s budget, was not shy: he asked for their help with schools, hunger, health care, and the foster-care system, to start. By August 2008, more than 27,000 volunteers from hundreds of churches became involved—and CityServe was launched, developing a church-civic partnership to provide community service. Palau, son of the internationally known evangelist Luis Palau, tells engaging stories in a simple, unpretentious way. With funny asides about the IFC show Portlandia, Palau sketches his search for a model of evangelism different from the barn-storming crusades of his father. CityServe became that model. The goal, says Palau, is not to “fix” Portland, but through “visible unity... humble leadership, [and] sustained effort,” to serve neighbors at the points of their need in the name of Jesus, a formula as old as Christianity itself. (June)