Fierce Convictions: The Extraordinary Life of Hannah More—Poet, Reformer, Abolitionist


Karen Swallow Prior - 2014
    A woman without connections or status, More took the world of British letters by storm when she arrived in London from Bristol, becoming a best-selling author and acclaimed playwright and quickly befriending the author Samuel Johnson, the politician Horace Walpole, and the actor David Garrick. Yet she was also a leader in the Evangelical movement, using her cultural position and her pen to support the growth of education for the poor, the reform of morals and manners, and the abolition of Britain's slave trade."Fierce Convictions" weaves together world and personal history into a stirring story of life that intersected with Wesley and Whitefield's Great Awakening, the rise and influence of Evangelicalism, and convulsive effects of the French Revolution. A woman of exceptional intellectual gifts and literary talent, Hannah More was above all a person whose faith compelled her both to engage her culture and to transform it.

Rush of Heaven: One Woman’s Miraculous Encounter with Jesus


Ema McKinley - 2014
    Doctors diagnosed Ema with reflex sympathetic dystrophy (RSD), an extremely painful trauma-induced disease which led to Ema’s hand and foot deformities, painful sores, insomnia, gastrological distress, curvature of the neck and spine, heart and lung failure, and permanent confinement to a wheelchair.Once an athletic, powerhouse woman with multiple jobs and volunteer positions, Ema became a modern-day Job who lost everything except her faith and desire to trust God more fully. Ema wrestled with pain, anger, and unforgiveness, but now takes the reader on a healing miracle encounter of Biblical proportions.Rush of Heaven will ignite readers’ passion for Jesus and help them walk hand-in-hand with Him through life’s darkness. It will open hearts to embrace the impossible.“Jesus gave me this miracle for you too!” — Ema McKinley

Finding Calcutta: What Mother Teresa Taught Me about Meaningful Work and Service


Mary Poplin - 2008
    . . . You can find Calcutta all over the world, if you have the eyes to see. --Mother Teresa Lifelong educator Mary Poplin, after experiencing a newfound awakening to faith, sent a letter to Calcutta asking if she could visit Mother Teresa and volunteer with the Missionaries of Charity. She received a response saying, You are welcome to share in our works of love for the poorest of the poor. So in the spring of 1996, Poplin spent two months in Calcutta as a volunteer. There she observed Mother Teresa's life of work and service to the poor, participating in the community's commitments to simplicity and mercy. Mother Teresa's unabashedly religious work stands in countercultural contrast to the limitations of our secular age. Poplin's journey gives us an inside glimpse into one of the most influential lives of the twentieth century and the lessons Mother Teresa continues to offer. Upon Poplin's return, she soon discovered that God was calling her to serve the university world with the same kind of holistic service with which Mother Teresa served Calcutta. Not everyone can go to Calcutta. But all of us can find our own meaningful work and service. Come and answer the call to find your Calcutta!

The Devil in Pew Number Seven


Rebecca Nichols Alonzo - 2010
    In 1969, her father, Robert Nichols, moved to Sellerstown, North Carolina, to serve as a pastor. There he found a small community eager to welcome him--with one exception. Glaring at him from pew number seven was a man obsessed with controlling the church. Determined to get rid of anyone who stood in his way, he unleashed a plan of terror that was more devastating and violent than the Nichols family could have ever imagined. Refusing to be driven away by acts of intimidation, Rebecca's father stood his ground until one night when an armed man walked into the family's kitchen . . . And Rebecca's life was shattered. If anyone had a reason to harbor hatred and seek personal revenge, it would be Rebecca. Yet The Devil in Pew Number Seven tells a different story. It is the amazing true saga of relentless persecution, one family's faith and courage in the face of it, and a daughter whose parents taught her the power of forgiveness.

To Be Perfectly Honest: One Man's Year of Almost Living Truthfully Could Change Your Life. No Lie.


Phil Callaway - 2011
    He has been laughed at—repeatedly—by large crowds of people from Halifax to Hong Kong. He fathered three children in three years, spent much of last year on airplanes built by the lowest bidder, and flipped an out-of-control ATV, which doesn’t mean he sold it for a profit. So who better than Phil Callaway to boldly accept a challenge that would make the average person run and hide?  Phil promised to tell the truth for an entire year, and he wasn’t joking. Twelve months later, his journal was crammed with successes, near-successes, and outright failures. During his year-long experiment with veracity, he made a disastrous financial investment, fielded hundreds of intrusive questions from friends and strangers, attended a thirty-year class reunion, and waded into possibly the most revealing—and hilarious—situations he has ever documented.  Find out what happens when a follower of Jesus does his level best to always tell the truth. There is no doubt you’ll be entertained. But don’t be surprised if you are left with a question: how might your life be changed if you sold out to the truth—with no exceptions?

Something Other than God: How I Passionately Sought Happiness and Accidentally Found It


Jennifer Fulwiler - 2014
    Why wouldn't she be? She made good money as a programmer at a hot tech start-up, had just married a guy with a stack of Ivy League degrees, and lived in a twenty-first-floor condo where she could sip sauvignon blanc while watching the sun set behind the hills of Austin. Raised in a happy, atheist home, Jennifer had the freedom to think for herself and play by her own rules. Yet a creeping darkness followed her all of her life. Finally, one winter night, it drove her to the edge of her balcony, making her ask once and for all why anything mattered. At that moment everything she knew and believed was shattered. Asking the unflinching questions about life and death, good and evil, led Jennifer to Christianity, the religion she had reviled since she was an awkward, sceptical child growing up in the Bible Belt. Mortified by this turn of events, she hid her quest from everyone except her husband, concealing religious books in opaque bags as if they were porn and locking herself in public bathroom stalls to read the Bible. Just when Jennifer had a profound epiphany that gave her the courage to convert, she was diagnosed with a life-threatening medical condition--and the only treatment was directly at odds with the doctrines of her new-found faith. Something Other Than God is a poignant, profound and often funny tale of one woman who set out to find the meaning of life and discovered that true happiness sometimes requires losing it all.

The Blood of Lambs: A Former Terrorist's Memoir of Death and Redemption


Kamal Saleem - 2009
    Though his ties with terrorism were severed more than twenty years ago, it was not until 9/11, when radical Muslims rained terror on American shores, that Kamal Saleem stepped out of the shadows and revealed his true identity. Today, he is a different kind of warrior. He now stands on the wall and shouts to America, "Open your eyes and fight the danger that lives among you." As the terrible fruit of Kamal's early life in jihad screams from today's headlines, he courageously puts his life on the line to defend America, the country he now calls home.

I Married Adventure


Luci Swindoll - 2003
    The classic, artful design and intriguing stories highlight Luci's unique insight and perspective that transform otherwise regular days and occurrences to experiences worth living.With the challenge to stop saying "if only" and "why me" and start asking "what if" and "why not," Luci encourages everyone to lead truly adventurous lives that yield countless blessings, lessons and inspiration. Never before has anyone modeled the joy and adventures of the journey with such clarity and insight.Readers will be drawn to "I Married Adventure" as it is Luci's first full-length book in over 10 years and is a personal tour of her unique approach to squeezing the most out of a life led by Christ.

Story of a Soul: The Autobiography of St. Thérèse of Lisieux


Thérèse de Lisieux - 1898
    John Clarke's acclaimed translation, first published in 1975, is now accepted as the standard throughout the English-speaking world.

Under the Overpass: A Journey of Faith on the Streets of America


Mike Yankoski - 2005
    By his own choice, Mike's life went from upper-middle class plush to scum-of-the-earth repulsive overnight. With only a backpack, a sleeping bag and a guitar, Mike and his traveling companion, Sam, set out to experience life on the streets in six different cities—from Washington D.C. to San Diego— and they put themselves to the test.    For more than five months the pair experienced firsthand the extreme pains of hunger, the constant uncertainty and danger of living on the streets, exhaustion, depression, and social rejection—and all of this by their own choice. They wanted to find out if their faith was real, if they could actually be the Christians they said they were apart from the comforts they’d always known…to discover first hand what it means to be homeless in America.   Mike and Sam's story is gritty, challenging, and utterly captivating. What you encounter in these pages will radically alter how you see your world—and may even change your life.

Praying for Strangers: An Adventure of the Human Spirit


River Jordan - 2011
    Her sons were both about to go off to war and all she could do was pray for their safety and hope to maintain her strength, until she unexpectedly came upon the perfect New Year's resolution-one that focused on others instead of herself. She would pray for a complete stranger every single day for a year.In "Praying for Strangers," River Jordan tells of her amazing personal journey of uncovering the needs of the human heart as she prayed her way through the year for people she had never met before. The discovery that Jordan made along the journey was not simply that her prayers touched the lives of these strangers, but that the unexpected connections she made with other people would be a profound experience that would change her life forever. Watch a Video

This I Believe: The Personal Philosophies of Remarkable Men and Women


Jay Allison - 2006
    Each piece compels readers to rethink not only how they have arrived at their own personal beliefs but also the extent to which they share them with others. Featuring a well-known list of contributors--including Isabel Allende, Colin Powell, Gloria Steinem, William F. Buckley Jr., Penn Jillette, Bill Gates, and John Updike--the collection also contains essays by a Brooklyn lawyer; a part-time hospital clerk from Rehoboth, Massachusetts; a woman who sells Yellow Pages advertising in Fort Worth, Texas; and a man who serves on the state of Rhode Island's parole board. The result is a stirring and provocative trip inside the minds and hearts of a diverse group of people whose beliefs--and the incredibly varied ways in which they choose to express them--reveal the American spirit at its best.

Living the Cross Centered Life: Keeping the Gospel the Main Thing


C.J. Mahaney - 2002
    J. Mahaney strip away the nonessentials and bring you back to the simplest, most fundamental reason for your faith: Jesus Christ. Chapters include "Breaking the Rules of Legalism," "The Cross Centered Day," and "Assurance and Joy." His Gift, Your Hope Do you desire more passion for Jesus Christ? Return to the very essence of your faith--the cross of Christ. Here, the deepest truths of Calvary will stir your passion for Him into an unquenchable fire.

Out of a Far Country: A Gay Son's Journey to God, a Broken Mother's Search for Hope


Christopher Yuan - 2011
    "'Christopher, you must choose! You must choose the family or choose homosexuality.' He looked at me and said, 'It's not something I can choose. I am gay. If you can't accept me, then I have no other choice but to leave.'" Christopher Yuan, the son of Chinese immigrants, discovered at an early age that he was different. He was attracted to other boys. As he grew into adulthood, his mother, Angela, hoped to control the situation. Instead, she found that her son and her life were spiraling out of control, and her own personal demons were determined to defeat her. Years of heartbreak, confusion, and prayer followed before the Yuans found a place of complete surrender, which is God's desire for all families. Their amazing story, told from the perspectives of both mother and son, offers hope for anyone affected by homosexuality. God calls all who are lost to come home to him, and he wants everyone to pursue holy sexuality. Out of a Far Country speaks to prodigals, parents of prodigals, and those wanting to minister to the gay community. "But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him." - Luke 15:20

Girl Meets God


Lauren F. Winner - 2002
    Winner chose to become an Orthodox Jew. But even as she was observing Sabbath rituals and studying Jewish law, Lauren was increasingly drawn to Christianity. Courageously leaving what she loved, she eventually converted. In Girl Meets God, this appealing woman takes us through a year in her Christian life as she attempts to reconcile both sides of her religious identity.Here readers will find a new literary voice: a spiritual seeker who is both an unconventional thinker and a devoted Christian. The twists and turns of Winner’s journey make her the perfect guide to exploring true faith in today’s complicated world.