Grace. Christian Counseling. How do these fit together? In Christian theology sin and grace are intrinsically interconnected. Teacher and counselor Mark McMinn believes that Christian counseling, then, must also take account of both human sin and God's grace. For both sin and grace are distorted whenever one is emphasized without the other. McMinn, noting his own tendencies and the temptation to stereotype different Christian approaches to counseling along this theological divide, aims to help all those preparing for or currently serving in the helping professions. Expounding the proper relationship of sin and grace, McMinn shows how the full truth of the Christian gospel works itself out in the functional, structural and relational domains of an integrative model of psychotherapy.

    Now Wilkinson starts with the dramatic premise that everyone at all times is in need of a miracle, and that God is ready to meet those needs supernaturally through ordinary people who are willing to learn the protocol of heaven.

    We wrestle with questions such as... Why do bad things happen to good people? Why should we have to pay for Adam's sin? How can eternal judgment be fair? But what if the real problem doesn't start with God...but with us? Clay Jones, a professor of Christian apologetics at Biola University, examines what Scripture truly says about the nature of evil and why God allows it. Along the way, he'll help you discover the contrasting abundance of God's grace, the overwhelming joy of heaven, and the extraordinary destiny of believers.

    We are creatures of intense desire.  We emerge from the womb longing for touch and affection.  Desire pulsates within us every waking moment of our lives.  Our hearts are fueled by hungry yearnings for connection, for relationship, for a sense of belonging.  We plunge into life, giving ourselves away to him or her, to this or that, drinking in every promise of fulfillment.  And yet, we always emerge from the quest for love still feeling a persistent and insatiable desire for something more.  A God Named Desire is about that something more.  There are some books that speak with an unusual level of clarity to the deepest issues that press the human heart.  This is one of those rare books.  You will never see god, or yourself, the same after the insights of A God Named Desire are introduced into your mind.

    It is an ache for the homecoming. The Greeks called it nostalgia.  Post-modern man, homeless almost by definition, cannot understand nostalgia. If he is a progressive, dreaming of a utopia to come, he dismisses it contemptuously, eager to bury a past he despises. If he is a reactionary, he sentimentalizes it, dreaming of a lost golden age. In this profound reflection, Anthony Esolen explores the true meaning of nostalgia and its place in the human heart. Drawing on the great works of Western literature from the Odyssey to Flannery O'Connor, he traces the development of this fundamental longing from the pagan's desire for his earthly home, which most famously inspired Odysseys' heroic return to Ithaca, to its transformation under Christianity. The doctrine of the fall of man forestalls sentimental traditionalism by insisting that there has been no Eden since Eden. And the revelation of heaven as our true and final home, directing man's longing to the next world, paradoxically strengthens and ennobles the pilgrim's devotion to his home in this world. In our own day, Christian nostalgia stands in frank opposition to the secular usurpation of this longing. Looking for a city that does not exist, the progressive treats original sin, which afflicts everyone, as mere political error, which afflicts only his opponents. To him, history is a long tale of misery with nothing to teach us. Despising his fathers, he lives in a world without piety. Only the future, which no one can know, is real to him. It is an idol that justifies all manner of evil and folly. Nostalgia rightly understood is not an invitation to repeat the sins of the past or to repudiate what experience and reflection have taught us, but to hear the call of sanity and sweetness again. Perhaps we will shake our heads as if awaking from a bad and feverish dream and, coming to ourselves, resolve, like the Prodigal, to "arise and go to my father's house."

    This in-depth study of history, theology, and science unveils a testable creation model that can settle this raging dispute.

    These discoveries have caused a revolution in the world view of thousands of scientists as they were confronted with compelling new evidence that our universe must have been created by a Supernatural Mind. Grant Jeffrey's latest book, Creation, will challenge readers with fascinating new information that confirms the Bible's claim that "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth".Content Includes: -Deep space reveals mysteries of the first moments of creation-Wonders of the universe point to a Supernatural Creator-A revolution in our understanding of the universe's beginning-Astonishing evidence of the universe's intelligent design-Remarkable discoveries about the nature of the atom-The collapse of the Theory of Evolution -DNA- The language of God-Modern science discovers God

    Through fair, contextual use of the Qur'an as the primary source text, apologist James R. White presents Islamic beliefs about Christ, salvation, the Trinity, the afterlife, and other important topics. White shows how the sacred text of Islam differs from the teachings of the Bible in order to help Christians engage in open, honest discussions with Muslims.

    It’s more than just a personal relationship with God or a source of moral teaching.Christianity is a picture of reality.It explains why the world is the way it is. When the pieces of this puzzle are properly assembled, we see the big picture clearly. Christianity is a true story of how the world began, why the world is the way it is, what role humans play in the drama, and how all the plotlines of the story are resolved in the end.In The Story of Reality, best-selling author and host of Stand to Reason, Gregory Koukl, explains the five words that form the narrative backbone of the Christian story. He identifies the most important things that happen in the story in the order they take place:GodManJesusCrossResurrectionOur story begins with God. He created everything, but something went terribly wrong. So God initiated a rescue plan and entered the world that he had made by becoming like us in Jesus Christ. Jesus saved us from the wrongness in ourselves and in the world through his death on a cross. And how people respond to what he did will determine what their future will be at the final event of history: the resurrection.If you are already a Christian, this is your story. Do you know it? If you are not a Christian, this is still your story, because it explains the world in a way that nothing else will. It is a true story—the real story behind every other story we hear.

    

    I ask of every promising new title, 'Are you the one who is to come, or shall I look for another?' Ward's book may be the one. Words of Life rightly roots its thinking about Scripture in the doctrine of God, and that means trinitarian theology. His central insight: God's word is something that God does. The Bible is not simply an object to be studied but the principal means by which the Lord engages his people and administers his covenant. Highly recommended!"In Words of Life Timothy Ward examines why, in order to worship God faithfully, we need to pay close attention to the Bible; why, in order to be faithful disciples of Jesus-the Word-made-flesh-we need to base our lives on the words of the Bible; and why, in order to keep in step with the Holy Spirit, we need to trust and obey what the Bible says.

    In this concise book, respected apologist Rebecca McLaughlin outlines the evidence that Jesus was a real person, explaining the reliability of the Bible's accounts of his life and why believing in a virgin birth is not as ridiculous as it might sound.This book shows that there is a rational basis for the belief that the world's most famous story is fact, not fantasy--and how those events in history can infuse our lives today with meaning and joy.

    People abandon faith because they think they're not allowed to have doubts." Too often, our honest questions about faith are met with cold confidence and easy answers. But false certitude doesn't result in strong faith—it results in disillusionment, or worse, in a dogmatic, overweening faith unable to see itself or its object clearly. Even as a pastor, Austin Fischer has experienced the shadows of doubt and disillusionment. In Faith in the Shadows, he leans into perennial questions about Christianity with raw and fearless integrity. He addresses contemporary science, the problem of evil, hell, God's silence, and other issues, offering not only fresh treatments of these questions but also a fresh paradigm for thinking about doubt itself. Doubt, Fischer contends, is no reason to leave the faith. Instead, it's an invitation to a more honest faith—a faith that's not in control, but that trusts more fully in its Lord.

    

    Michael Morales examines the key elements of three major redemption movements in Scripture: the exodus out of Egypt, the second exodus foretold by the prophets, and the new exodus accomplished by Jesus Christ. We discover how the blood of a Passover lamb helps us grasp the significance of Jesus' death on the cross, how the Lord's defeat of Pharaoh foreshadowed Jesus' victory over Satan, how Israel's exodus out of Egypt unfolds the meaning of the resurrection, and much more.The second volume in the ESBT series, Exodus Old and New reveals how Old Testament stories of salvation provide insight into the accomplishments of Jesus and the unity of God's purposes across history.Essential Studies in Biblical Theology (ESBT), edited by Benjamin L. Gladd, explore the central or essential themes of the Bible's grand storyline. Taking cues from Genesis 1-3, authors trace the presence of these themes throughout the entire sweep of redemption history. Written for students, church leaders, and laypeople, the ESBT offers an introduction to biblical theology.