It can no longer be assumed that most people - or even most Christians - have a basic working knowledge of the Bible. In fourteen chapters, D. A. Carson takes the reader through the big story of Scripture: the God who made and sustains everything, the human rebellion, God's covenant dealings with Israel, the coming of Christ, his death and resurrection, the new community, and the end toward which the whole account is moving.

The book grew out of a series Carson gave for people with little or no church background, and it keeps that audience in view: nothing is assumed, and the Bible's own sequence carries the argument rather than a list of doctrines to be accepted. Useful to hand to an enquiring friend, useful for a seeker's study group, and useful to longstanding Christians who know their favorite passages but have never seen how the whole fits together.