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Christians and Muslims in Early Islamic Egypt (American Studies in Papyrology #56)
By Lajos Berkes. 2022
This volume collects studies exploring the relationship of Christians and Muslims in everyday life in Early Islamic Egypt (642–10th c.)…
focusing mainly, but not exclusively on administrative and social history. The contributions concentrate on the papyrological documentation preserved in Greek, Coptic, and Arabic. By doing so, this book transcends traditional disciplinary boundaries and offers results based on a holistic view of the documentary material. The articles of this volume discuss various aspects of change and continuity from Byzantine to Islamic Egypt and offer also the (re)edition of 23 papyrus documents in Greek, Coptic, and Arabic. The authors provide a showcase of recent papyrological research on this under-studied, but dynamically evolving field. After an introduction by the editor of the volume that outlines the most important trends and developments of the period, the first two essays shed light on Egypt as part of the Caliphate. The following six articles, the bulk of the volume, deal with the interaction and involvement of the Egyptian population with the new Muslim administrative apparatus. The last three studies of the volume focus on naming practices and language change.It can be hard to explain why you believe in God. But images and analogies can provide concrete handles for…
making the Christian faith more plausible. If someone claims that Christians make a "blind leap of faith," you can respond, "No, it's not a blind leap. Faith is like skydiving. You check out your parachute beforehand and make sure it's secure. You follow the safety instructions. And then you jump. It's a leap, but it's not a blind leap. It's an informed leap." Experienced evangelist and apologist Rick Mattson has collected dozens of easy-to-use images for explaining Christianity. God's amazing design of the world? It's like getting dealt a royal flush over and over again. Why is there evil and suffering in the world? Because it's a broken world, and things are not how they're supposed to be. With practical tips on how to interact with your skeptical friends, this book provides a handy toolkit of memorable and instantly usable images for conversation. Find yourself better equipped to give an answer to anyone who asks you about your faith.Unlost: Being Found by the One We Are Looking For
By Michael Hidalgo. 2014
Sentness: Six Postures of Missional Christians
By Kim Hammond, Darren Cronshaw. 2014
Ever wonder why people fall asleep in church? It happens. We?ve all seen it. We shuffle into rows of seats…
that grow more comfortable with every new fundraising campaign. We slouch down and settle in for an hour or so, as singers and storytellers and preachers and teachers take their turns filling our ears. And almost without fail, at least one of us nods off while listening to the greatest story ever told. The church was not meant to be like this. The church was meant to be on its feet, in the world, making all things new. The church was meant to be sent. Kim Hammond and Darren Cronshaw want to help us���all of us���rediscover our sentness. Dive into Sentness, and explore the six postures of a church that?s keeping pace with God?s work in the world. Rediscover the gospel that first quickened your pulse and got you up on your feet, ready to go wherever Jesus called you. Get Sentness, and prepare to get sent.Preaching in an Age of Distraction
By J. Ellsworth Kalas. 2014
Preaching's Top Books on Preaching Let your eyes look straight ahead; fix your gaze directly before you. Give careful thought…
to the paths for your feet and be steadfast in all your ways. ��� Proverbs 4:25-26 Preaching is difficult enough under the best of circumstances. But what are we to do when it seems that all of us���hearers and preachers alike���are constantly distracted? Veteran preacher and homiletics professor J. Ellsworth Kalas offers wise insights for effective preaching in an age of distraction. He examines how people have been distracted in every era and explores how God can meet people precisely at the point of their distraction. Regardless of whatever new technologies come our way, this call to pastoral attentiveness, creativity and excellence provides avenues for connecting with congregations with a countercultural clarity of focus. Rediscover how the proclamation of the Word still speaks profoundly to distracted hearers. Invite your congregation to a renewed attention to the things of God.Matthew 14-28 (Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture #Nt Volume 1b)
By Thomas C. Oden. 2002
The Gospel of Matthew stands out as a favorite biblical text among patristic commentators. The patristic commentary tradition on Matthew…
begins with Origen's pioneering twenty-five-volume commentary on the First Gospel in the mid-third century. In the Latin-speaking West, where commentaries did not appear until about a century later, the first commentary on Matthew was written by Hilary of Poitiers in the mid-fourth century. From that point the First Gospel became one of the texts most frequently commented on in patristic exegesis. Outstanding examples are Jerome's four-volume commentary and the valuable but anonymous and incomplete Opus imperfectum in Matthaeum. Then there are the Greek catena fragments derived from commentaries by Theodore of Heraclea, Apollinaris of Laodicea, Theodore of Mopsuestia and Cyril of Alexandria. The ancient homilies also provide ample comment, including John Chrysostom's ninety homilies and Chromatius of Aquileia's fifty-nine homilies on the Gospel of Matthew. In addition, there are various Sunday and feast-day homilies from towering figures such as Augustine and Gregory the Great, as well as other fathers. This rich abundance of patristic comment, much of it presented here in English translation for the first time by editor Manlio Simonetti, provides a bountiful and varied feast of ancient interpretation of the First Gospel.The Gospel in the Marketplace of Ideas: Paul's Mars Hill Experience for Our Pluralistic World
By Paul Copan, Kenneth D. Litwak. 2014
Our world is multicultural, multireligious, multiphilosophical. It ranges from fundamental monotheism to do-it-yourself spirituality to strident atheism. How can Christians…
engage in communicating across worldviews in this pluralistic and often relativistic society? When Paul visited Athens, he found an equally multicultural and multireligious setting. From Jews to Gentiles, elite to poor, slaves to slave owners, from olive-skinned Gentiles to dark-skinned Ethiopians—the Greco-Roman world was a dynamic mix. Religious practices were also wide and varied, with the imperial cult of emperor worship being the most prominent. Many also frequented the temples for the traditional Greek pantheon, and participated in the secret rituals of the mystery religions. Seeking to embolden the church's witness in today's society, philosopher Paul Copan and New Testament scholar Kenneth Litwak show how Paul's speech to the Athenians (found in Acts 17) provides a practical model for Christians today. They uncover the cultural and religious background of this key episode in the apostle?s career and they encourage believers to winsomely challenge the idols of our time to point contemporary Athenians to Christ.How Civil Wars Start: And How to Stop Them
By Barbara F. Walter. 2022
A leading political scientist examines the dramatic rise in violent extremism around the globe and sounds the alarm on the…
increasing likelihood of a second civil war in the United States. Political violence rips apart several towns in southwest Texas. A far-right militia plots to kidnap the governor of Michigan and try her for treason. An armed mob of Trump supporters and conspiracy theorists storms the U.S. Capitol. Are these isolated incidents? Or is this the start of something bigger? Barbara F. Walter has spent her career studying civil conflict in places like Iraq and Sri Lanka, but now she has become increasingly worried about her own country. Perhaps surprisingly, both autocracies and healthy democracies are largely immune from civil war; it’s the countries in the middle ground that are most vulnerable. And this is where more and more countries, including the United States, are finding themselves today. Over the last two decades, the number of active civil wars around the world has almost doubled. Walter reveals the warning signs—where wars tend to start, who initiates them, what triggers them—and why some countries tip over into conflict while others remain stable. Drawing on the latest international research and lessons from over twenty countries, Walter identifies the crucial risk factors, from democratic backsliding to factionalization and the politics of resentment. A civil war today won’t look like America in the 1860s, Russia in the 1920s, or Spain in the 1930s. It will begin with sporadic acts of violence and terror, accelerated by social media. It will sneak up on us and leave us wondering how we could have been so blind. In this urgent and insightful book, Walter redefines civil war for a new age, providing the framework we need to confront the danger we now face—and the knowledge to stop it before it’s too late.Hate in the Homeland: The New Global Far Right
By Cynthia Miller-Idriss. 2020
A startling look at the unexpected places where violent hate groups recruit young peopleHate crimes. Misinformation and conspiracy theories. Foiled…
white-supremacist plots. The signs of growing far-right extremism are all around us, and communities across America and around the globe are struggling to understand how so many people are being radicalized and why they are increasingly attracted to violent movements. Hate in the Homeland shows how tomorrow's far-right nationalists are being recruited in surprising places, from college campuses and mixed martial arts gyms to clothing stores, online gaming chat rooms, and YouTube cooking channels.Instead of focusing on the how and why of far-right radicalization, Cynthia Miller-Idriss seeks answers in the physical and virtual spaces where hate is cultivated. Where does the far right do its recruiting? When do young people encounter extremist messaging in their everyday lives? Miller-Idriss shows how far-right groups are swelling their ranks and developing their cultural, intellectual, and financial capacities in a variety of mainstream settings. She demonstrates how young people on the margins of our communities are targeted in these settings, and how the path to radicalization is a nuanced process of moving in and out of far-right scenes throughout adolescence and adulthood.Hate in the Homeland is essential for understanding the tactics and underlying ideas of modern far-right extremism. This eye-opening book takes readers into the mainstream places and spaces where today's far right is engaging and ensnaring young people, and reveals innovative strategies we can use to combat extremist radicalization.The Aspiring Leader's Guide to the Future: 9 Surprising Ways Leadership is Changing
By Clay Scroggins. 2022
Leadership is not what it used to be and not what it once was. Too many leaders today are calibrated…
for a world that no longer exists. And people are demanding something so much different in leaders of today. Like a new house outfitted with the greatest VHS system on the planet, too many leaders are addressing today's problems with the style and substance of yesterday's leadership.In The Aspiring Leader's Guide to the Future, author Clay Scroggins uncovers nine counterintuitive axioms of leadership that will help leaders adapt to the rate of change while becoming today's version of a leader worth following. For every principle of leadership, there is a counter principle that only those knee-deep in the mess of everyday life can understand. With the rapid nature of change happening today, these counter principles provide a new way forward for today's leaders.With disarming candor and simplicity, Clay dispels several age-old myths of what makes a great leader, showing why the old way needs updating. Today's leaders rarely feel ready to lead, don't always have the right people on the bus, and are more willing to be vulnerable even when they don't have the answers. The way forward requires an understanding of the past, a conviction of what's at stake today, and a vision for how different tomorrow will be.There is a moment coming in your life that will require great leadership. Whether or not you're able to rise to the occasion will be determined by how much you understand the substance and style of leadership required for today. Good news, though. You don't have to wait for tomorrow's leadership challenge to begin. As soon as you're ready to see it and accept it, leading like this and not like that can start today!Taking Down Backpage: Fighting the World’s Largest Sex Trafficker
By Maggy Krell. 2022
Insider details from the takedown of Backpage, the world’s largest sex trafficker, by the prosecutor who led the charge For…
almost a decade, Backpage.com was the world’s largest sex trafficking operation. Seven days a week, twenty-four hours a day, in 800 cities throughout the world, Backpage ran thousands of listings advertising the sale of vulnerable young people for sex. Reaping a cut off every transaction, the owners of the website raked in millions of dollars. But many of the people in the advertisements were children, as young as 12, and forced into the commercial sex trade through fear, violence and coercion. In Taking Down Backpage, veteran California prosecutor Maggy Krell tells the story of how she and her team battled against this sex trafficking monolith. Beginning with her early career as a young DA, she shares the evolution of the anti-human trafficking movement. Through a fascinating combination of memoir and legal insight, Krell reveals how she and her team started with the prosecution of street pimps and ultimately ended with the takedown of the largest purveyor of human trafficking in the world. She shares powerful stories of interviews with survivors, sting operations, court cases, and the personal struggles that were necessary to bring Backpage executives to justice. Finally, Krell examines the state of sex trafficking after Backpage and the crucial work that still remains. Taking Down Backpage is a gripping story of tragedy, overcoming adversity, and the pursuit of justice that gives insight into the fight against sex trafficking in the digital age.Returning evangelicalism to its core commitments Evangelicalism in the United States is fracturing along social, political, and ethical fault lines, to…
the extent that the very meaning of &“evangelicalism&” is in dispute. Having surrendered its theological character and missional heritage to partisan political activism and cultural conservatism, the movement has lost its unifying identity and undermined its own testimony in an increasingly diverse society. Mark Young believes a revitalization of the evangelical movement must happen in our seminaries, where the shepherds of the next evangelicalism are being formed. Young argues that if these leaders of tomorrow are instilled with true gospel values, they will go on to form churches and missional organizations that offer a credible and compelling Christlike witness for the sake of the world. The Hope of the Gospel takes readers through the history of evangelicalism and back to the present to make the case for how this can happen through a renewed vision of theological education.When God Stops Fighting: How Religious Violence Ends
By Mark Juergensmeyer. 2022
A gripping study of how religiously motivated violence and militant movements end, from the perspectives of those most deeply involved.…
Mark Juergensmeyer is arguably the globe’s leading expert on religious violence, and for decades his books have helped us understand the worlds and worldviews of those who take up arms in the name of their faith. But even the most violent of movements, characterized by grand religious visions of holy warfare, eventually come to an end. Juergensmeyer takes readers into the minds of religiously motivated militants associated with the Islamic State (ISIS) in Iraq, the Sikh Khalistan movement in India’s Punjab, and the Moro movement for a Muslim Mindanao in the Philippines to understand what leads to drastic changes in the attitudes of those once devoted to all-out ideological war. When God Stops Fighting reveals how the transformation of religious violence manifests for those who once promoted it as the only answer.Global Calvinism: Conversion and Commerce in the Dutch Empire, 1600-1800
By Charles H. Parker. 2022
A comprehensive study of the connection between Calvinist missions and Dutch imperial expansion during the early modern period &“A tour…
de force offering the reader the best study of global Calvinism in the realms of the Dutch East India Company.&”—Ronnie Po-Chia Hsia, editor, Calvinism and Religious Toleration in the Dutch Golden Age Calvinism went global in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, as close to a thousand Dutch Reformed ministers, along with hundreds of lay chaplains, attached themselves to the Dutch East India and West India companies. Across Asia, Africa, and the Americas where the trading companies set up operation, Dutch ministers sought to convert &“pagans,&” &“Moors,&” Jews, and Catholics and to spread the cultural influence of Protestant Christianity. As Dutch ministers labored under the auspices of the trading companies, the missionary project coalesced, sometimes grudgingly but often readily, with empire building and mercantile capitalism. Simultaneously, Calvinism became entangled with societies around the world as encounters with indigenous societies shaped the development of European religious and intellectual history. Though historians have traditionally treated the Protestant and European expansion as unrelated developments, the global reach of Dutch Calvinism offers a unique opportunity to understand the intermingling of a Protestant faith, commerce, and empire.Sh!thouse: A Memoir
By Lauren Dollie Duke. 2022
Sh!thouse: A Memoir is a story of brutal girlhood. Lauren was seven when she helped her step-father boost rum bottles…
from the local liquor store. The next year, her biological father took her to a hotel room and shot up heroin in the bathroom. The next day he robbed a bank with a finger gun! When he was released from prison, he moved into Lauren’s basement. They spent the weekends smoking cartons of cigarettes, diving into dumpsters and swindling used cars. Lauren’s upbringing provided her with only one lens through which she saw herself – shame. And that shame overflowed into every aspect of her life. In this compassionate and gritty real-life fairytale the author, Lauren Dollie Duke, shows how it’s possible for good people to do bad things and what it takes to create peace with where you come from in order to find true happiness. This raw and humorous account about trauma, transcendence and resilience challenges the binary of good vs. evil. It lays out the evolution of shame psychology and intergenerational trauma seeking to answer the question of how we unravel ourselves from the history and patterns of our families. Sh!thouse will make you want to investigate your own historical patterns, examine all of your relationships, and forgive everyone, including yourself. It’s a tether to our shared humanity which reminds us there is belonging in the world no matter how horrific it was to start. It is a beautifully written map that draws back to the personal root of where sabotaging behavior, shame and limitation is born.Foundations of Spiritual Formation: A Community Approach to Becoming Like Christ
By Paul Pettit. 2008
Foundations of Spiritual Formation takes a unique approach to its subject, arguing that we become like Christ in the context…
of authentic, Christian community. Without undermining individual Bible study, private prayer, and meditation, the authors emphasize these pursuits for the purpose of both personal and community enrichment-that the whole body, as well as the individual, may be built up. Part 1 lays the groundwork of spiritual formation. Jonathan Morrow develops a distinctively evangelical theology, while Richard Averbeck writes about worship. Then Gordon Johnston and Darrell Bock delve into the text of Scripture, grounding the pursuit of spiritual formation in revealed truth. Part 2 focuses on functional aspects of spiritual formation. Klaus Issler emphasizes the importance of the heart in spiritual formation, while Reid Kisling illustrates the vital connection between character development and spiritual formation. Bill Miller explores love's role as the motivation for spiritual formation. Andrew Seidel examines servant leadership, and George Hillman extends the discussion to include the significance of calling. Gail Seidel discusses personal narrative as a catalyst for spiritual formation, and in closing, Harry Shields advocates the public preaching of the Word as a tool for spiritual formation.Reformed and Evangelical across Four Centuries: The Presbyterian Story in America
By Garth M. Rosell, Kenneth J. Stewart, Nathan Feldmeth, S. Donald Fortson III. 2022
A definitive history of evangelical Presbyterianism in America Reformed and Evangelical across Four Centuries tells the story of the Presbyterian church in…
the United States, beginning with its British foundations and extending to its present-day expression in multiple American Presbyterian denominations. This account emphasizes the role of the evangelical movement in shaping various Presbyterian bodies in America, especially in the twentieth century amid increasing departures from traditional Calvinism, historic orthodoxy, and a focus on biblical authority. Particular attention is also given to crucial elements of diversity in the Presbyterian story, with increasing numbers of African American, Latino/a, and Korean American Presbyterians—among others—in the twenty-first century. Overall, this book will be a bountiful resource to anyone curious about what it means to be Presbyterian in the multidimensional American context, as well as to anyone looking to understand this piece of the larger history of Christianity in the United States.Evangelisch für Dummies (Für Dummies)
By Marco Kranjc. 2022
Als Martin Luther am 31.10.1517 seine 95 Thesen an das Portal der Kirche zu Wittenberg schlug, begann eine Bewegung, die…
die Spaltung der christlichen Kirche bewirkte: die Reformation. Marco Kranjc zeichnet die Ereignisse nach, die zur Trennung der Kirche führten. Spannend wie ein Krimi liest sich die Auseinandersetzung um Glaube, Recht und Ordnung, die Diskussion über Freiheit und Gewissen. Außerdem schildert dieses Buch die heutige Glaubenspraxis evangelischer Christen, die Rolle des Gebets und der Bibel darin und das Gemeindeleben in den unterschiedlichen evangelischen Kirchen.The Message of the Church: Assemble The People Before Me (The bible Speaks Today Bible Themes Ser.)
By Christopher Green. 2013
Greek East and Latin West: The Church AD 681-1071
By Andrew Louth. 2007
This volume gives an account of the Church in the period from the end of the Sixth Ecumenical Synod in…
681 to the Battle of Manzikert in 1071. Although 'Greek East' and 'Latin West' are becoming distinct entities during this expanse of time, the author treats them in parallel, observing the points at which their destinies coincide or conflict and noting developments within the whole of the Church rather than striving simply, or even primarily, to explain the eventual schism between Eastern and Western Christendom. Covering events both unique to each part (the Iconoclastic controversy in the East and the rise of the Carolingian Empire in the West) and common to each part (monastic reform, renaissance, and mission) the author skillfully portrays two Christian civilizations that share much in common yet become increasingly incomprehensible to one another. Despite curious synchronisms between East and West, the author demonstrates how two paths diverged from a once common route, and how eventually Byzantine Orthodoxy defined the Greek East over against the Latin West in theological, religious, cultural, and political terms.