With this innovative guide, readers can enrich their study with fascinating insights into the Bible and the world in which it was written.The Baker Illustrated Bible Handbook offers the most up-to-date evangelical biblical scholarship in a format that is readable and easy to understand. This book-by-book guide brings the Bible to life with more than 1,100 full-color pages packed with illustrations, maps, and photos, and 112 in-depth articles on a wide range of topics important to students of the Bible. Readers will discover how each part of the Bible fits into and informs every other part, giving them a cohesive understanding of God's Word.No reference collection will be complete without this incredible new handbook to the Bible.

    Composers like Bach to theologians like Barth, botanists and saints all have written their thoughts directly in their Bibles. In doing so they engaged their fullest selves with our most significant text. Some people have lived with Scripture all their lives and yet feel estranged from it. This book inspires a new encounter with the living Word and jump-starts a deep, creative, and hands-on approach to reading Scripture. As you sit, with pencil, pen, crayon, or marker in hand and Bible in lap, at whatever edges of life you are living within, now that invitation is yours. The creative practice of writing in the margins creates a divine conversation that transforms and guides. Meet God in the margins. Let God shape your character from the living interaction on the pages of your Bible. "Writing in the Margins" is a book about making connections on the pages of your Bible and introduces a devotional and scriptural path of engagement that is life-changing."

    The book of Ephesians lays out this glorious vision, highlighting the coming of Christ's kingdom on earth--a kingdom that will soon arrive in full. In Alive in Him, Gloria Furman leads us deep into the biblical text, exploring the book's main themes and showing us how the blessings we have received in Christ empower us to walk in a new way. Designed to be read alongside the book of Ephesians, Alive in Him draws us into the plotline of Scripture, directing our gaze to the love of Jesus Christ--a love that has the power to transform how we live.

    The life of a woman today isn't really all that different from that of Mary and Martha in the New Testament. Like Mary, you long to sit at the Lord's feet...but the daily demands of a busy world just won't leave you alone. Like Martha, you love Jesus and really want to serve him...yet you struggle with weariness, resentment, and feelings of inadequacy. Then comes Jesus, right into the midst of your busy Mary/Martha life-and he extends the same invitation he issued long ago to the two sisters of Bethany. Tenderly he invites you to choose "the better part"-a joyful life of "living-room" intimacy with him that flows naturally into "kitchen service" for him. How can you make that choice? With her fresh approach to the familiar Bible story and its creative, practical strategies, Joanna shows how all of us -Marys and Marthas alike- can draw closer to our Lord, deepening our devotion, strengthening our service, and doing both with less stress and greater joy. This book includes a twelve-week Bible study. Also look for the ten-week DVD study pack companion product to this book, which includes three DVDs and a separate, revised and expanded study guide.

    He wants to be in a relationship with us, but for some reason we can’t seem to find the time. The time to pray, the time to read our Bibles, the time to sit and be still with God. In today’s fast-paced culture of instant downloads and drive-through lattes, we learn that faster is better, that slowing down is not an option. But if we look at Scripture carefully, we see that this is the exact opposite of how God has called us to live.Specialists say it takes 30 days to form a habit. It’s time we made being with God a habit – an unbreakable one. In 30 Words, you’ll find the encouragement to open your heart, mind, and soul to God. Each day you’ll focus on a single word about God and our relationship with him. Full of key verses to meditate on, as well as quotes and teachings from Christian leaders, 30 Words will help you make a habit of spiritual development—one that will transform you from the inside out.

    They've asked the same questions. Like you, sometimes they just don't want to believe in hell. But as they write, "We cannot afford to be wrong on this issue."This is not a book about who is saying what. It's a book about what God says. It's not a book about impersonal theological issues. It's a book about people who God loves. It's not a book about arguments, doctrine, or being right. It's a book about the character of God.Erasing Hell will immerse you in the truth of Scripture as, together with the authors, you find not only the truth but the courage to live it out.

    In the Gospels Jesus asks many more questions than he answers. To be precise, Jesus asks 307 questions. He is asked 183 of which he only answers 3. Asking questions was central to Jesus' life and teachings. In fact, for every question he answers directly he asks--literally--a hundred. Jesus is the Question considers the questions Jesus asks--what they tell us about Jesus and, more important, what our responses might say about what it means to follow Him. Through Jesus' questions, he modeled the struggle, the wondering, the thinking it through that helps us draw closer to God and better understand, not just the answer, but ourselves, our process and ultimately why questions are among Jesus' most profound gifts for a life of faith. A game-changer of a book.

    

    We measure our worth by what others think of us. We compare and strive, existing mostly for the approval of others. Pressure rises, anxiety creeps in and we hustle to keep up.Jesus whispers, I gave my life to set you free. I gave you purpose. I called you to live in freedom in that purpose. Yet we still hobble through life, afraid to confess all the ways we push against this truth, because we can’t even believe it. We continue to grasp for the approval of anyone that will offer it: whether strangers, friends, or community.Christ doesn’t say you can be or may be or will be free. He says you are free. Dare you believe it?In You Are Free, Rebekah invites you to:• Overcome the exhaustion of trying to meet the expectations of others and rest in the joy God’s freedom brings.• Release stress, anxiety and worry, to uncover the peace that comes from abiding in His presence.• Find permission to grieve past experiences, confess areas of brokenness, and receive strength in your journey towards healing.• Throw off self-condemnation, burn superficial masks and step boldly into what our good God has for you.• Discover the courage to begin again and use your newfound freedom to set others free.Freedom is for everyone who wants it—the lost, the wounded, and those weary from all of the striving. It’s for those who gave up trying years ago. It’s for those angry and hurt, brilliant and burnt by the Christian song and dance. You are the church, the people of God. You were meant to be free.

    This book gives you the keys to yielding to His power and trusting His ways above your own.The Always-Present One says, "So, I will teach those who make idols. Right now I will teach them about My power and My strength. Then they will know that My Name is The Always-Present One (Jeremiah 16:21 PEB).You are the salt of the earth, the beacon in a dark world, the refreshing stream for a thirsty land-plug into the Source of all power today!

    We hardly ever think of it as world-changing--and neither does society. Yet this is exactly what the first-century ekklesia was.In these vital, eye-opening pages, bestselling author Ed Silvoso takes you back to the first days of the church. Digging into Scripture, he shows how the New Testament church--devoid of buildings, professional clergy, and religious freedom--was able to transform the hostile, pagan places into which it was born and set in motion a process that changed the world forever.Even more, Silvoso offers a roadmap back to becoming the ekklesia Jesus called his church to be. In the midst of the social, economic, political, and moral chaos in our world today, we possess the hope that people and nations so desperately need--and we can become the revolutionary, transformational, life-giving voice Jesus called us to be.A new, in-depth curriculum kit--which features a DVD with 12 brand-new teaching sessions, a group guide for both leaders and participants, and a copy of the book--is also available. Expounding on the book's dynamic teachings, each kit contains everything you need to equip your group to transform the world around them.

    Armed with only six passages in the Bible often known as the clobber passages the conservative Christian position has been one that stands against the full inclusion of our LGBT brothers and sisters. Unclobber reexamines each of those frequently quoted passages of Scripture, alternating with author Colby Martin's own story of being fired from an evangelical megachurch when they discovered his stance on sexuality.UnClobber reexamines what the Bible says (and does not say) about homosexuality in such a way that breathes fresh life into outdated and inaccurate assumptions and interpretations.

    The Holy Spirit is not just about speaking in tongues, spiritual gifts or “fruits”—but also about our deepest breath and our highest human aspirations. Popular teacher Jack Levison brings a scholar’s knowledge of this complicated biblical topic to a wide audience that crosses all denominational boundaries. His new book aims to do nothing less than clarify 2,000 years of confusion on the topic of who the Holy Spirit is, and why it matters. Provocative and life-changing, Fresh Air combines moving personal anecdotes, rich biblical studies, and practical strategies for experiencing the daily presence of the Holy Spirit. In brief chapters, the book finds the presence of the Holy Spirit where we least expect it—in human breathing, in social transformation, in community, in hostile situations, and in serious learning. Fresh Air will unsettle and invigorate readers poised for a fresh experience of an ancient, confusing topic.

    Jay Dennis has unlocked the secret in The Jesus Habits. The author presents the disciplines that shaped Jesus’ life. They were his priority and the touchstone to the rhythm of his day. They have been practiced for centuries by mystics, monks, and saints, but they can often be overlooked and undervalued in our fast-paced, hurried-and-harried modern lives. These habits are for everyone—the busy executive to the stay-at-home mom. These Jesus habits form distinguishable patterns in the life of Jesus that can become a reality in the life of any Christian.

    Though commonly feared and avoided, these feelings of uncertainty can be your greatest assets on this journey because it is in uncertainty that we probe, question, and discover. According to the ancients, you don't need to be a saint or spiritual master to experience profound awakening and live with God's presence and guidance. You need only to wander.In clear and lucid prose that combines the heart of a mystic, the soul of a poet, and the mind of a biblical scholar, Dr. Eric Elnes demystifies the seven gifts bestowed in the Dark Wood: the gifts of uncertainty, emptiness, being thunderstruck, getting lost, temptation, disappearing, and the gift of misfits.This is a book for anyone who feels awkward in their search for God, anyone who seeks to find holiness amid their holy mess, and anyone who prefers practicality to piety when it comes to finding their place in this world.