Book picks similar to
The Greatness of the Great Commission: The Christian Enterprise in a Fallen World by Kenneth L. Gentry Jr.
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The Abolition of Man
C.S. Lewis - 1943
Alternative cover for ISBN: 978-0060652944The Abolition of Man, Lewis uses his graceful prose, delightful humor, and keen understanding of the human mind to challenge our notions about how to best teach our children--and ourselves--not merely reading and writing, but also a sense of morality.
Christ and Culture
H. Richard Niebuhr - 1951
Marty, who regards this book as one of the most vital books of our time, as well as an introduction by the author never before included in the book, and a new preface by James Gustafson, the premier Christian ethicist who is considered Niebuhr’s contemporary successor, poses the challenge of being true to Christ in a materialistic age to an entirely new generation of Christian readers.
Mere Calvinism
Jim Scott Orrick - 2019
Written for those in high school and up, Jim Orrick's fresh, evangelistic explanation gets to the heart of the matter: the Bible teaches that God always does as he pleases and that he initiates, sustains, and completes the salvation of everyone who goes to heaven. This focus sets Calvinism apart from other views within Christianity‚"‚€‚"and has huge, positive implications for daily life. Calvinism is more than the "five points" for which it is known, but those five points make an excellent framework for understanding its teaching. Taking us back to the Bible, Orrick examines what we mean when we talk about total depravity, unconditional election, limited atonement, irresistible grace, and the perseverance of the saints‚"‚€‚"and why those ideas matter.
A Faith Worth Sharing: A Lifetime of Conversations about Christ
C. John Miller - 1999
In these warm reflections on his own growth as a witness to the faith, written in the final weeks of his life, Jack Miller tells how he learned to share Good News with others--and how you can too.
Woke Church: An Urgent Call for Christians in America to Confront Racism and Injustice
Eric Mason - 2018
They spoke hard words that often chafed and unsettled their listeners. Like the Old Testament prophets, and more recent prophetic voices like Frederick Douglass, Dr. Eric Mason calls the evangelical church to a much-needed reckoning. In a time when many feel confused, complacent, or even angry, he challenges the church to:Be Aware – to understand that the issue of justice is not a black issue, it’s a kingdom issue. To learn how the history of racism in America and in the church has tainted our witness to a watching world.Be Redemptive – to grieve and lament what we have lost and to regain our prophetic voice, calling the church to remember our gospel imperative to promote justice and mercy.Be Active – to move beyond polite, safe conversations about reconciliation and begin to set things aright for our soon-coming King, who will be looking for a WOKE CHURCH.
The Benedict Option: A Strategy for Christians in a Post-Christian Nation
Rod Dreher - 2017
The light of the Christian faith is flickering out all over the West, and only the willfully blind refuse to see it. From the outside, American churches are beset by challenges to religious liberty in a rapidly secularizing culture. From the inside, they are being hollowed out by the departure of young people and a watered-down pseudo-spirituality. Political solutions have failed, as the triumph of gay marriage and the self-destruction of the Republican Party indicate, and the future of religious freedom has never been in greater doubt. The center is not holding. The West, cut off from its Christian roots, is falling into a new Dark Age. The bad news is that the roots of religious decline run deeper than most Americans realize. The good news is that the blueprint for a time-tested Christian response to this decline is older still. In The Benedict Option, Dreher calls on traditional Christians to learn from the example of St. Benedict of Nursia, a sixth-century monk who turned from the chaos and decadence of the collapsing Roman Empire, and found a new way to live out the faith in community. For five difficult centuries, Benedict's monks kept the faith alive through the Dark Ages, and prepared the way for the rebirth of civilization. What do ordinary 21st century Christians -- Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox -- have to learn from the teaching and example of this great spiritual father? That they must read the signs of the times, abandon hope for a political solution to our civilization's problems, and turn their attention to creating resilient spiritual centers that can survive the coming storm. Whatever their Christian tradition, they must draw on the secrets of Benedictine wisdom to build up the local church, create countercultural schools based on the classical tradition, rebuild family life, thicken communal bonds, and develop survival strategies for doctors, teachers, and others on the front lines of persecution. Now is a time of testing, when believers will learn the difference between shallow optimism and Christian hope. However dark the shadow falling over the West, the light of Christianity need not flicker out. It will not be easy, but Christians who are brave enough to face the religious decline, reject trendy solutions, and return to ancient traditions will find the strength not only to survive, but to thrive joyfully in the post-Christian West. The Benedict Option shows believers how to build the resistance and resilience to face a hostile modern world with the confidence and fervor of the early church. Christians face a time of choosing, with the fate of Christianity in Western civilization hanging in the balance. In this powerful challenge to the complacency of contemporary Christianity, Dreher shows why those in all churches who fail to take the Benedict Option aren't going to make it.
Beautiful Resistance: The Joy of Conviction in a Culture of Compromise
Jon Tyson - 2020
Radical shifts in the areas of sexuality, ethics, technology, secular ideologies, and religion have caused the once-familiar landscape of a generation ago to be virtually unrecognizable.Yet rather than shine as a beacon of light, the church often is silent or accommodating. This isn't a new phenomenon. During World War II, pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer was deeply troubled by the compromise in the German church. Their capitulation to the Nazi party brought shame and dishonor to the gospel. In response, he helped create an underground movement of churches that trained disciples and ultimately sought to renew the church and culture of the day.In our compromised church, we need new underground movements of discipleship and resistance. Widely respected New York pastor Jon Tyson unveils a revived vision for faithful discipleship--one that dares to renew culture, restore credibility, and replace compromise with conviction.For all who have felt this conflict in the soul between who we are and who God calls us to be, Beautiful Resistance is a bold invitation to reclaim what's been lost--regardless of the cost.Praise for Beautiful Resistance"Beautiful Resistance is one of the most compelling and defiant books I've read in a long time. I love Jon's radical, no-messing vision of the church as a prophetic community. This is a wake-up call for us all from the heart of a man who lives his message, loves his city, and serves his Lord with a passion and intelligence destined to become less rare."--Pete Greig, founder of the 24-7 Prayer movement
The Liturgy of Politics: Spiritual Formation for the Sake of Our Neighbor
Kaitlyn Schiess - 2020
Kaitlyn Schiess grew up in this landscape, and understands it from the inside.Spiritual formation, and particularly a focus on formative practices, are experiencing a renaissance in Christian thinking―but these ideas are not often applied to the political sphere. In The Liturgy of Politics, Schiess shows that the church's politics are shaped by its habits and practices even when it's unaware of them. Schiess insists that the way out of our political morass is first to recognize the formative power of the political forces all around us, and then to recover historic Christian practices that shape us according to the truth of the gospel.
Remember Death: The Surprising Path to Living Hope
Matthew McCullough - 2018
And because of modern medicine, many of us don't often see death up close. That makes it easy to live as if death is someone else's problem. It isn't.Ignoring the certainty of death doesn't protect us from feeling its effects throughout the lives we're living now. But this avoidance can hold us back from experiencing the powerful, everyday relevance of Jesus's promises to us. So long as death remains remote and unreal, Jesus's promises will too.But honesty about death brings hope to life. That's the ironic claim at the heart of this book. Cultivating "death-awareness" helps us bring the promises of Jesus from the hazy clouds of some other world into the everyday problems of our world--where they belong.
Gay Girl, Good God: The Story of Who I Was and Who God Has Always Been
Jackie Hill Perry - 2018
Jackie grew up fatherless, experienced gender confusion, and embraced both masculinity and homosexuality with every fiber of her being. She knew that Christians had a lot to say about all of the above. But was she supposed to change herself? How was she supposed to stop loving women, when homosexuality felt more natural to her than heterosexuality ever could?At age nineteen, Jackie came face-to-face with what it meant to be made new. And not in a church, or through contact with Christians. God broke in and turned her heart toward Him right in her own bedroom in light of His gospel.Read in order to understand. Read in order to hope. Or read in order, like Jackie, to be made new.
Good Faith: Being a Christian When Society Thinks You're Irrelevant and Extreme
David Kinnaman - 2016
Politics, marriage, sexuality, religious freedom--with an ever-growing list of contentious issues, believers find it harder than ever to hold on to their convictions while treating their friends, neighbors, coworkers, and even family members who disagree with respect and compassion. This isn't just a problem that affects individual Christians; if left unaddressed, the growing gap between the faithful and society's tolerance for public faith will have lasting consequences for the church in America. Now the bestselling authors of "unChristian" turn their data-driven insights toward the thorny question of how Christians talk with people they know and love about the most toxic issues of our day. They help today's disciples understand what they believe and why, and how to keep believing it without being judgmental and defensive. Readers will discover the most significant trends that offer both obstacles and opportunities to God's people, and how not only to challenge culture but to create and renew it for the common good. Perhaps most importantly, David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons invite fellow Christians to understand the heart behind opposing views and show them how to be loving, life-giving friends despite profound differences. This will be the go-to book for young adult and older believers who don't want to hide from culture but to engage and restore it.
Orthodoxy and the Kingdom of Satan
Spyridon Bailey - 2017
Assessing the evidence of a corrupt world, Father Spyridon, a Greek Orthodox priest, draws together the different strands that reveal how the institutions and international organisations are preparing humanity for the end. The first half of the book deals with the United Nations, the arms industries, banking, the Freemasons, and the various secret elite groups hat control our world. He then gives a clear explanation of the means by which we are being attacked and manipulated through television, education, culture and philosophy.Finally he presents the prophecies of various Orthodox saints who told us what else we should expect. Father Spyridon's warnings will comfort some and anger others, This is a book that many will try to dismiss, while others will find in it comfort and confirmation of what they already suspected was happening. Written in a sober style, Orthodoxy And The Kingdom of Satan is a wake up call for all those who believe that time is running out. "It's Later than you think" we once heard, and the hour may be later than we dared imagine.
Can I Really Trust the Bible?
Barry Cooper - 2014
But do those claims stand up? Aren't the stories just legends? Hasn't the information been corrupted over time? Isn't the Bible full of mistakes? And isn't it culturally outdated?In this absorbing little book, Barry Cooper explores these questions - and many others - with warmth, wit and integrity.
No Place for Truth: or Whatever Happened to Evangelical Theology?
David F. Wells - 1993
Western culture as a whole, argues Wells, has been transformed by modernity, and the church has simply gone with the flow. The new environment in which we live, with its huge cities, triumphant capitalism, invasive technology, and pervasive amusements, has vanquished and homogenized the entire world. While the modern world has produced astonishing abundance, it has also taken a toll on the human spirit, emptying it of enduring meaning and morality.Seeking respite from the acids of modernity, people today have increasingly turned to religions and therapies centered on the self. And, whether consciously or not, evangelicals have taken the same path, refashioning their faith into a religion of the self. They have been coopted by modernity, have sold their soul for a mess of pottage. According to Wells, they have lost the truth that God stands outside all human experience, that he still summons sinners to repentance and belief regardless of their self-image, and that he calls his church to stand fast in his truth against the blandishments of a godless world.The first of three volumes meant to encourage renewal in evangelical theology (the other two to be written by Cornelius Plantinga Jr. and Mark Noll), No Place for Truth is a contemporary jeremiad, a clarion call to all evangelicals to note well what a pass they have come to in capitulating to modernity, what a risk they are running by abandoning historic orthodoxy. It is provocative reading for scholars, ministers, seminary students, and all theologically concerned individuals.
Letters from a Skeptic: A Son Wrestles with His Father's Questions about Christianity
Gregory A. Boyd - 1993
I've got enough time on my hands...You invited me to raise whatever objections come to mind, so I'll jump right in. Here's one I've wondered about a lot: how could an all-powerful and all-loving God allow the church to do so much harm to humanity for so long? Isn't this supposed to be His true church, His representation on earth?...To my mind, this alone is quite enough to prove that the church does not possess any true philosophy...Well, you wanted an objection; you've got one. I look forward to your response...Love always, DadIn Letters from a Skeptic Dr. Gregory Boyd and his father Edward Boyd "debate" many other objections to Christianity, the church, and the Bible.• Why is the world so full of suffering? • Does God know the future? • How can you believe that a man rose from the dead? • Why do you think the Bible is inspired? • Do all non-Christians go to hell? • How can I be holy and sinful at the same time?Greg Boyd initiated this correspondence with his father in the hope that his father would eventually come to know Christ. After three years, 30 letters, and numerous phone calls, Edward K. Boyd did just that.Letters from a Skeptic will help you wrestle with the rational foundation of your own faith. It will also help you know how to share that faith with the skeptics you love.