The message blew up on social-media, triggering an avalanche of responses running the gamut from encouraged to enraged.In Jesus > Religion, Bethke unpacks similar contrasts that he drew in the poem—highlighting the difference between teeth gritting and grace, law and love, performance and peace, despair and hope. With refreshing candor he delves into the motivation behind his message, beginning with the unvarnished tale of his own plunge from the pinnacle of a works-based, fake-smile existence that sapped his strength and led him down a path of destructive behavior.Bethke is quick to acknowledge that he’s not a pastor or theologian, but simply a regular, twenty-something who cried out for a life greater than the one for which he had settled. Along his journey, Bethke discovered the real Jesus, who beckoned him beyond the props of false religion.

    But the further he studied the Bible, the more he found himself confronted by questions that could neither be answered within the rigid framework of his religious instruction or accepted among the conservative evangelical community.Rejecting the increasingly complicated intellectual games used by conservative Christians to “protect” the Bible, Enns was conflicted. Is this what God really requires? How could God’s plan for divine inspiration mean ignoring what is really written in the Bible? These questions eventually cost Enns his job—but they also opened a new spiritual path for him to follow.The Bible Tells Me So chronicles Enns’s spiritual odyssey, how he came to see beyond restrictive doctrine and learned to embrace God’s Word as it is actually written. As he explores questions progressive evangelical readers of Scripture commonly face yet fear voicing, Enns reveals that they are the very questions that God wants us to consider—the essence of our spiritual study.

    Hell, judgment, and holy war are hot topics for the Christian faith that have a way of igniting fierce debate far and wide. These hard questions leave many wondering whether God is really good and can truly be trusted."The Skeletons in God's Closet" confronts our popular caricatures of these difficult topics with the beauty and power of the real thing. Josh Butler reveals that these subjects are consistent with, rather than contradictory to, the goodness of God. He explores Scripture to reveal the plotlines that make sense of these tough topics in light of God's goodness. From fresh angles, Josh deals powerfully with such difficult passages as:* The Lake of Fire* Lazarus and the Rich Man* The Slaughter of Canaanites in the Old TestamentUltimately, "The Skeletons in God's Closet" uses our toughest questions to provoke paradigm shifts in how we understand our faith as a whole. It pulls the "skeletons out of God's closet" to reveal they were never really skeletons at all.

    Here D. L. Moody tells the story of nine men. Some you know, Abraham, Moses, John the Baptist...some you may not know, Naaman, The Penitent Thief, Nehemiah. All had a role to fulfill and Moody tells their stories in a historical and enlightening manor. Men of the Bible includes stories of : Abraham's Four Surrenders, The Call of Moses, Naaman the Syrian, The Prophet Nehemiah, Herod and John the Baptis,t The Man Born Blind and Joseph of Arimathea and the Penitent Thief!

    We struggle so much, work so hard, and fail so often that we frequently sense something in the equation of life must be missing.Tullian Tchividjian argues that what we are missing is the gospel--a fuller, more powerful understanding of Jesus and what his finished work means for everyday life.During a year of great turmoil, Pastor Tchividjian discovered the power of the gospel in his own life. Sharing his story of how Jesus became more real to him, Tchividjian delves deeply into the fundamentals of the faith, explaining the implications of Christ's sufficiency--a revelation that sets us free and keeps us anchored through life's storms.Ultimately, Tchividjian reminds us that Jesus is the whole of the equation as he boldly proclaims that Jesus plus nothing really is everything.

    Many Christians have at least a few Bible verses committed to memory, but An Approach to Extended Memorization of Scripture encourages Christians to ramp up Scripture memorization. Daily procedures and techniques guide the reader through memorizing entire chapters and books of the Bible at one time. Author and pastor Dr. Andrew Davis has used these proven method to commit 35 books of the Bible to memory over the course of his ministry. "This very helpful little book inspired me to tackle the memorizing of Romans 1-8. By God's grace, I made it. Oh, how sweet and how terrible to live so intimately with the greatest truth in the world!" -John Piper Founder and Teacher, desiringGod.org; Chancellor, Bethlehem College & Seminary, Minneapolis, MN Dr. Andrew Davis has been Senior Pastor of First Baptist Church (FBC), Durham, NC, since 1998. He came to faith in Christ his junior year in college. In 1984, he graduated with a BSME from MIT, and worked for ten years as a mechanical engineer. Davis received his Master of Divinity degree from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in 1990 and his PhD in Church History from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in 1998. He was married to Christi in 1988, and they served together on the mission field in Japan for two years. They have five children. The central passion of Davis’s life is the glory of God as revealed perfectly in the written word of God.

    Because of the cultural distance between the biblical world and our contemporary setting, we often bring modern Western biases to the text. For example:When Western readers hear Paul exhorting women to "dress modestly," we automatically think in terms of sexual modesty. But most women in that culture would never wear racy clothing. The context suggests that Paul is likely more concerned about economic modesty--that Christian women not flaunt their wealth through expensive clothes, braided hair and gold jewelry.Some readers might assume that Moses married "below himself" because his wife was a dark-skinned Cushite. Actually, Hebrews were the slave race, not the Cushites, who were highly respected. Aaron and Miriam probably thought Moses was being presumptuous by marrying "above himselfWestern individualism leads us to assume that Mary and Joseph traveled alone to Bethlehem. What went without saying was that they were likely accompanied by a large entourage of extended family.Biblical scholars Brandon O'Brien and Randy Richards shed light on the ways that Western readers often misunderstand the cultural dynamics of the Bible. They identify nine key areas where modern Westerners have significantly different assumptions about what might be going on in a text. Drawing on their own crosscultural experience in global mission, O'Brien and Richards show how better self-awareness and understanding of cultural differences in language, time and social mores allow us to see the Bible in fresh and unexpected ways. Getting beyond our own cultural assumptions is increasingly important for being Christians in our interconnected and globalized world. Learn to read Scripture as a member of the global body of Christ.

    Randy Alcorn has the answers.In the most comprehensive and definitive book on Heaven to date, Randy invites you to picture Heaven the way Scripture describes it-- a bright, vibrant, and physical New Earth, free from sin, suffering, and death, and brimming with Christ's presence, wondrous natural beauty, and the richness of human culture as God intended it. God has put eternity in our hearts. Now, Randy Alcorn brings eternity to light in a way that will surprise you, spark your imagination, and change how you live life today. If you've always thought of Heaven as a realm of disembodied spirits, clouds, and eternal harp strumming, you're in for a wonderful surprise. This is a book about real people with real bodies enjoying close relationships with God and each other, eating, drinking, working, playing, traveling, worshiping, and discovering on a New Earth. Earth as God created it. Earth as he intended it to be. And the next time you hear someone say, "We cant begin to imagine what Heaven will be like," you'll be able to tell them, "I can."

    A worldwide bestseller published in countless sizes and bindings, translations and languages. Sworn by in court, fought over by religious people, quoted in arguments. The Bible is clearly no ordinary book. How can you begin to read and understand it as a whole? In this excellent overview, Vaughan Roberts gives you the big picture—showing how the different parts of the Bible fit together under the theme of the kingdom of God. He provides both the encouragement and the tools to help you read the Bible with confidence and understanding. And he points you to the Bible's supreme subject, Jesus Christ, and the salvation God offers through him.

    The plague of our day, terrorism, begins with the word "terror." Fear, it seems, has taken up a hundred-year lease on the building next door and set up shop. Oversized and rude, fear herds us into a prison of unlocked doors. Wouldn't it be great to walk out?Imagine your life, wholly untouched by angst. What if faith, not fear, was your default reaction to threats? If you could hover a fear magnet over your heart and extract every last shaving of dread, insecurity, or doubt, what would remain? Envision a day, just one day, where you could trust more and fear less.Can you imagine your life without fear?

    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.

    A major reason is because it is not arranged in chronological order. Paul's letters, for example, are arranged by size rather than chronologically. This makes the New Testament a bit like a Chinese puzzle! For this reason, one famous Bible scholar said that reading the New Testament letters is like hearing one end of a phone conversation. The book you hold in your hands reconstructs the other end so that you can understand virtually every word."The Untold Story of the New Testament Church" is a unique Bible handbook that weaves Acts and the Epistles together chronologically . . . creating one fluid story. This epic volume gives readers a first-hand account of the New Testament drama that is riveting and enlightening. It includes dates, maps, and background information about the people, the cities, and the events of the first-century church using a "you-are-there" approach.Get up-close and personal with apostles Paul, Peter, James and John and learn of their personal struggles. Understand the circumstances behind each inspired letter they penned. Watch the chaotic swirl of first-century people and events fall into place before your very eyes. Discover what Paul's "thorn in the flesh" really was. Learn what happened to all the apostles after the book of Acts was finished. Be ushered into the living, breathing atmosphere of the first century and uncover the hidden riches found in God's Word.

    Sometimes the words on the pages seem so distant from reality. In this practical and accessible book, Matthew Harmon trains believers to ask the right questions when reading their Bibles so that they see how it can transform their lives--even the passages that at first glance might seem irrelevant or disconnected from the modern world. Harmon explains the overall structure of Scripture, highlighting techniques we can use when reading to make the connection between the text and our hearts, ensuring that God's Word has its intended effect: growing us in godliness.

    After that, you have to grow up! Many problems in our lives are caused by spiritual immaturity. God wants us to grow up, not just grow old. And He has given us the formula for maturity in the Epistle of James.In discussing Christian maturity, Dr. Wiersbe shows you: • How to learn to be patient • How to overcome temptation • How to practice what the Bible teaches • How to learn to control the tongue • How to make peace rather than trouble • How to pray and get resultsIt's all in BE MATURE

    Read the Bible for Life aims to improve biblical literacy in the culture and the church by simultaneously moving readers toward greater skill in reading the Bible well and toward a deeper commitment to applying Scripture to everyday life. Through a series of down-to-earth conversations with some of today’s brightest scholars, author George Guthrie discusses the basic tools and attitudes needed to read the Bible more effectively. Chapters focus on the various types of literature in Scripture and how to read them well. For instance, how should we read a psalm differently than we read a parable? How should we read a story of the Old Testament differently than we read a letter from Paul? How can we engage these various parts of Scripture in a way that is truly life-changing? The book also discusses issues such as reading the Bible in context, choosing and reading a Bible translation, reading in times of sorrow or suffering, and reading the Bible with your family. As we better understand how to read the Bible skillfully, we begin to see how every person of the Bible, every psalm, and every teaching fits into the Bible’s powerful, overarching story, and we begin to realize our place in the story God is still writing in the world. Endorsements "In the church's dry desert of biblical illiteracy, this book is a drink of cold, refreshing water. With pastoral sensitivity and practical skill, George Guthrie is equipping us to know, understand, and apply the treasures of God's Word in a way that will transform our lives and our communities for the glory of our God. I wholeheartedly recommend Read the Bible For Life for every Christian and every leader in the church." —David Platt, New York Times best-selling author of Radical "In a culture where biblical illiteracy continues to spread like the proverbial plague, George Guthrie has introduced a healing medicine in the form of Read the Bible for Life. This overview of the Bible's nature and content will be welcomed in churches intent on developing biblically grounded followers of Christ. The book's conversational approach provides an easy entry for a generation that tends to read only headlines. With fresh insights for the long time student of God's Word and accessible material for the new student, it is a resource I recommend for all believers."—Ed Stetzer, coauthor, Transformational Church "The genuine give and take of conversation is key to the Christian community's deeper grasp of the Scriptures. Read the Bible for Life is a celebration of biblical conversation between friends who really love the Word. Hopefully, lots of people will join in." —Michael Card, award-winning musician and author George H. Guthrie is the Benjamin W. Perry Professor of Bible at Union University in Jackson, Tennessee. He helped establish and is now a Senior Fellow at Union’s Ryan Center for Biblical Studies, which is committed to promoting sound Bible reading, study, and interpretation at the grassroots level of the church. Guthrie has also participated in developing or revising several popular Bible translations including the HCSB, English Standard Version, and New Living Translation.