In an increasingly polarized world, our collective ability to navigate friendships with people whose backgrounds, experiences, and views differ from our own has diminished. Along the way, valuing diversity has come to be seen by many Christians as a secular pursuit. However, we love and serve a diverse God (being three unique persons himself) who taught us to love those we tend to have a hard time loving: outsiders, enemies, foreigners, the poor, and the weak.

In Friendship Can Save the World, Carrie and Morgan Stephens offer an invigorating retelling of Ruth, Boaz, and Naomi to help us love people unlike us. Weaving in real life stories from their multiethnic, multigenerational, and socioeconomically diverse church, they highlight the power of unique friendships in God’s greater missional story. Readers will find inspiration to love and be loved more courageously as we all forge a path into a more redemptive future.

Carrie and Morgan Stephens are the lead pastors of Mosaic Church, a diverse multisite congregation in Austin and Fort Worth, Texas. Carrie is the author of Holy Guacamole (Shiloh, 2020) and Jesus, Love, & Tacos (Leafwood, 2022). She was a contributing author in The Christian Mama’s Guide to Having a Baby by Erin Macpherson (Guideposts, 2011) and contributed to Kathy Lipp’s Praying God’s Word Over Your Life (Revell, 2013). Morgan serves on the North American Leadership Team for Every Nation Churches. He received his MA in Intercultural Studies and is pursuing a doctorate in ministry, both from Asbury Theological Seminary. Morgan and Carrie live in Cedar Park, Texas, and have four incredible children.

“Morgan and Carrie Stephens have skillfully crafted a literary tapestry that intertwines everyday relational fibers with those of the iconic Old Testament saint Ruth. Every turn of the page encourages you to be more to those who need more.”

—Brett Fuller, Bishop, Grace Covenant Church, Washington Metropolitan Area and Chaplain, Washington Commanders

“Friendship Can Save the World brings us more into what it truly means to live together as brothers and sisters, and more into what Jesus meant when he offers the fullness of life. After reading you will leave with a refreshed view of the Father’s heart to see the dividing wall of hostility crumble and the part we play in seeing that happen.”

—Adrian Crawford, Founding Pastor of Engage Church Tallahassee, author of Mask Off: Unlocking Authenticity in an Age of Imposters