Dominic Roser et al., "All the Lives You Can Change: Effective Altruism for Christians" (Eerdmans, 2026)

August 5, 2026

AI Summary

5 min read

In 2024, it costs about $4,000 to prevent a death from malaria through an evidence-backed charity. The average American earning $80,000 a year who donates 10% of their income to such a charity would, in a single year, prevent two children from dying of a preventable disease. Over a 40- or 50-year working life, that adds up to roughly 80 or 100 lives saved—"multiple busloads of kids and families." That concrete calculation is the engine of All the Lives You Can Change, a book by Dominic Roser, David Zong, and J.D. Baumann that argues Christians have a moral obligation to be far more thoughtful about how they do good.

The problem of well-intentioned waste

The book emerged from a "dissatisfaction with how churches and charities around us were going about changing the world." Baumann, the author interviewed here, tells the story of a co-author who did homeless outreach at Oxford and began asking harder questions: Why do the same people keep showing up? What would it take to help them not need help in the first place? The problem, the authors argue, is not merely that many charitable efforts have little impact—it is that they can have negative impact. The flagship example is PlayPumps, a charity that installed colorful merry-go-round pumps in dry African villages, promising that children's play would pull water from the ground. Laura Bush, the Clinton Foundation, and Jay

Continue reading the full summary in the app — free to try.

Read Full Summary →

Free • No credit card required

Listen to Audio Summary Open in App

Never miss an episode of New Books in Christian Studies

Get every new episode summarized in your inbox — free, ~5 minutes to read.

No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.

What you'll learn

1 (00:00) **Introduction and Guest Welcome** - Host Angela Marie Hutchinson introduces the book *All the Lives You Can Change* and co-author J.D. Baumann.
2 (04:07) **The PlayPumps Failure** - A cautionary tale of a well-meaning but ineffective charity that wasted millions.
3 (05:56) **Maximizing Charitable Donations** - How everyday people can find the most effective charities.
4 (07:43) **Effectiveness Over Amount** - Where you give matters more than how much you give.
5 (08:28) **The ITN Framework** - A tool for comparing global problems by Importance, Tractability, and Neglectedness.
6 (10:20) **Who Is My Neighbor?** - Expanding the circle of moral concern beyond the familiar.
7 (16:31) **Overcoming the "Drop in the Ocean" Feeling** - Small, consistent giving adds up to massive impact.

+ Full timestamped outline available in the app

Show Notes

All the Lives You Can Change: Effective Altruism for Christians (William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2026) is a practical guide for Christians who want their compassion, generosity and service to create meaningful change in the world. The book asks readers to look beyond good intentions and consider which choices can make the greatest difference in the lives of others.

The authors introduce effective altruism, an evidence-based approach to doing the most good, through a Christian framework. They connect careful reasoning, measurable outcomes and thoughtful stewardship with the biblical commands to love God and love our neighbors.

Drawing from Scripture, research and nonprofit experience, the book explores how Christians can give more wisely, choose careers with greater impact and direct their time, money and influence toward urgent global needs. It also encourages readers to expand their understanding of who counts as a neighbor, including people who may be distant, unfamiliar or easy to overlook.

Key Ideas:

Good intentions matter, but Christians should also consider the real outcomes of their efforts.
Loving our neighbor requires radical empathy that extends beyond the people and needs closest to us.
Every person has equal worth, but different causes and charitable approaches can have very different levels of impact.
Evidence, reason and data can serve as instruments of love when they help us understand what people truly need.
Giving to effective causes can sometimes accomplish far more than simply giving more.
Money, careers and influence are all forms of stewardship that can be used to address pressing and neglected global problems.
An impact-driven life is not about solving every problem. It is about faithfully focusing on the lives we genuinely can change.

One of the strongest ideas from the conversation is that Christian love should be centered on the person receiving help, not only on the intentions of the person giving it. Careful reasoning can help Christians become wiser stewards while taking Jesus’s command to love our neighbors seriously. If you read the book, you’ll learn practical ways to move beyond feeling overwhelmed with giving of your resources and focus on where your choices can create genuine change.

Angela Marie Hutchinson is the author of “Create Your Yes! When You Keep Hearing No,” named a Forbes No. 4 book to advance your career. She is a podcast host for New Books Network, where she leads conversations for the neuroscience and Christianity channels. Hutchinson is also a talent and intellectual property executive, former social media professor and BBC commentator. She resides in Los Angeles with her husband and three children.

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megap