Allender and Tremper Longman III have together written this brief, simple and charming introduction to help couples build healthy and happy marriages. Their model follows the "leave, weave and cleave" imagery of the Bible: leave your parents, weave a life together and cleave to each other. This book is part of a kit that includes everything needed to mentor individual married couples or to lead a group discussion. It will be especially helpful for newlyweds or young married couples who are just beginning their new life together.

    Clif Christopher's nearly forty years in ministry as a pastor and President of Horizons Stewardship Company, he has witnessed the financial stewardship practices of thousands of churches. A few have exceptional records in acquiring and managing the necessary funds for mission and ministry, but the vast majority struggle every year to get by.In this important new work made even more relevant by our economic times, Christopher contrasts the traits of the most productive congregations with those who perennially fail to secure the funds to perform transformational ministry. Some churches practice the necessary financial habits that form the foundation of successful ministry, and others waste valuable resources and undermine ministry opportunities.Through Christopher's insight born out of years of experience and consultation, readers can assess the financial condition of their own churches.

    Worship consciously regulated by God's Word is a distinct characteristic of the Reformed church. Yet today many churches do not understand that both the Old and New Testaments have much to say about appropriate worship before God. Ligon Duncan lays the foundations of the regulative principle in worship, providing full biblical support as well as historical context. He also answers objections: Is this "right worship" essentially European? Is it flexible to different churches and contexts? Is it really still applicable today?

    According to Leonard Verduin, the American formula of a society in which no religion is designated as the right religion, is the result of pioneering done by the "stepchildren" of the Reformation. To them, rather than to the Reformers, do we owe the concept of separation of church and state. Taking the several terms of opprobrium that the Reformers hurled at these stepchildren, Verduin gives a penetrating historical analysis of each and shows how each term sets in focus an important phase of the master struggle, the struggle regarding the delineation of the church.

    Dr. Kelly organizes an ocean of material by outlining the development of each doctrine in its historical context. He lucidly summarizes the genesis of Chrisitian thought from the close of the apostolic age to the Council of Chalcedon in the fifth century--a time teeming with fresh and competing ideas. The doctrines of the Trinity, the authority of the Bible and tradition, the nature of Christ, salvation, original sin and grace, and the sacraments are all extensively treated in these pages.This revised edition of Early Christian Doctrines includes:Sweepingly updated early chaptersRevised and updated bibliographiesA completely new chapter on Mary and the saints

    It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure or nothing."To Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch, so much of how we have learned to experience and understand the faith has been divorced from the overarching adventure inherent in our God and in our calling. This book is a corrective to the dull, adventureless, risk-free phenomenon that describes so much of contemporary Christianity. It explores the nature of adventure, risk, and courage and the implications for church, discipleship, spirituality, and leadership.

    Title: The First Apology of Justin Martyr, Addressed to the Emperor Antoninus Pius: Prefaced by Some Account of the Writings and Opinions of Justin Martyr Publisher: London: Griffith, Farran, Okeden

    But God can become present to us in surprising ways through our everyday routines. Framed around one ordinary day, this book explores daily life through the lens of liturgy, small practices and habits that form us. Each chapter looks at something making the bed, brushing her teeth, losing her keys that the author does in the day. Drawing from the diversity of her life as a campus minister, Anglican priest, friend, wife, and mother, Tish Harrison Warren opens up a practical theology of the everyday. Each activity is related to a spiritual practice as well as an aspect of our Sunday worship. Come and discover the holiness of your every day."

    But if you’re looking for something different, something that . . . approaches leadership as an art as well as a scienceinspires hope and expectation in those of us who aren’t born leaderschallenges those with leadership roles to explore new possibilities. . . then Leonard Sweet wants to help you discover a very different kind of leadership vision. It’s one you hear if your ears are open, and it could summon you at any time. When you respond, the puzzle pieces of who you are will fit together into a leader others follow because you’ve answered a call, not trained for a position.“The church has it all wrong. It is trying to train leaders. Instead, it ought to train everyone to listen and to develop their own soundtrack.”Leaders don’t see a vision, says Sweet, they hear one. “Sound becomessight. Leaders hear life.”For a sonogram of “acoustic leadership,” Sweet takes us inside the incredible account of Sir Ernest Shackleton, the celebrated polar explorer who led his entire crew of twenty-seven from disaster in the Antarctic to safety. Called “the greatest leader that ever came on God’s earth, bar none,” Shackleton objectifies the goals of Sweet’s own exploration in search of wisdom for today and tomorrow’s truly compelling, voice-activated leaders.Right now, you may be leading many people or just yourself. But who knows what tomorrow—or a minute from now—will call forth in you. Are your ears open?

    Although Kathleen Norris’s best-selling Dakota: A Spiritual Geography has brought her to the attention of many thousands of readers, she is first and last a poet.  Like Robert Frost, another poet identified with a particular landscape, she can reveal the miraculous in the ordinary, and she writes with clarity, humor, and deep sympathy for her subjects.

    This accessible overview walks readers through centuries of creeds, councils, catechisms, and confessions---not with a dry focus on dates and places, but with an emphasis on the living tradition of Christian belief and why it matters for our lives today. As a part of the KNOW series, Know the Creeds and Councils is designed for personal study or classroom use, but also for small groups and Sunday schools wanting to more deeply understand the foundations of the faith. Each chapter covers a key statement of faith and includes a discussion of its historical context, a simple explanation of the statement's content and key points, reflections on contemporary and ongoing relevance, and discussion questions.

    Newman compared the early history of the Church to the opening chords of a symphony when the subjects that will later be brought out one