Prominent recent studies elevate the themes of 'Christoformity' and 'Cruciformity' in Paul, but few sufficiently account for how a believer is actually transformed into the image of Christ. Pneumaformity fills the gap in Pauline studies by surveying Paul's letters for teachings on the Spirit's agency in the life of God' people. This study aptly demonstrates that the Holy Spirit is the instrument through whom such radical living is possible. This study dives into Paul's teachings on the following aspects of the Spirit's agency and more:
● The Spirit's participation in conversion
● The Spirit's role in forming Christian character
● The Spirit's integrating work within the Christian community
● The Spirit and missional engagement
● The Spirit's place in the believer's final eschatological transformation
Keown shows how Paul infuses his christological language with pneumatological realities, offering listeners a fuller understanding of the Spirit's work in individuals, the church, and the world.
A respected and controversial scholar argues that the Crusades were a justified war waged against Muslim terror and aggression
This book takes on the current vogue in liberal thinking to argue that, in fact, the Crusades were not unprovoked. They were not the first round of European colonialism. They were not conducted for land, loot, or converts. The Crusaders were not barbarians who victimized the cultivated Muslims. They sincerely believed that they served in God’s Battalions.
In the wake of many recent books justifying Muslim holy wars by criticizing the historic use of violence by Christians, Stark presents the other side of the story. Drawing upon a wide variety of sources, Stark argues the facts and figures about why and how Christianity attempted to secure the Holy Lands and protect the safety of Christian pilgrims.
Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.
Reckoning with History confronts the histories of settler colonialism and slavery and illumines how these two devastating realities informed and ultimately deformed Protestant Christianity in the North American colonies and antebellum United States.
This book explains how Christians engaged the sinful realities of Indigenous land dispossession and Black enslavement, shaping American Christianity in distinctive and enduring ways. It further underscores how white Christians justified land theft and racial oppression against Indigenous and Black persons with scriptural interpretations and theological expositions that remade Christianity into an American religion that bolstered economic, political, and social interests. Along the way, Yoo also features inspiring accounts of resistance to the Indian Removal Act of 1830 and the westward expansion of slavery. A final chapter draws lessons from these histories for the possibilities of what ministries of racial justice could be in American churches today. Yoo integrates cogent historical analysis with contemporary lessons for Christians that make Reckoning with History a definitive resource for understanding racism and pursuing racial justice in the United States.
This Lent, ponder the themes of justice, poverty, freedom, and love.
The four New Testament Gospels aren't the same story, but they offer the same Resurrection hope. Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John devote most of their story detailing Jesus' last week in Jerusalem, all highlighting Jesus' triumphant entry into the city, the suffering and humiliation of the cross, and the empty tomb come Sunday morning, but the stories they tell aren't quite the same.
Each Gospel offers a different lens through which we understand Jesus' Passion. One portrait reveals Jesus to be in control, while another emphasizes his suffering. In one story Jesus offers hope to the thief on the cross, and in another Jesus only receives derision. These different perspectives aren't a reason to dismiss the Gospels; rather the reveal an abundant, diverse, and complementary picture of God's work in the suffering, death, and resurrection of Jesus.
From Pulitzer Prize winner Michael Hiltzik, a definitive new history of California—from the Spanish conquistadors to the Gold Rush to the state’s meteoric rise as a tech powerhouse and bulwark of progressivism—and of its indelible mark on the United States and the world.
California has long reigned as the land of plenty, a place where the sun always shines and opportunity beckons. Even prior to its statehood in 1850, it captured the world’s imagination. We think of bearded prospectors lured by the promise of gold; we imagine its early embrace of immigrant labor during the railroad boom as prologue to its diverse social fabric today. But what lies underneath the myth is far more complicated.
Thanks to extensive research by Michael Hiltzik, one of our longstanding voices on California, Golden State uncovers the unvarnished truth about the state we think we know well. From Spanish incursions into what became known as Alta California to the rise of Big Tech, the history of California is one of stark contradictions. In rich, previously overlooked detail, we see its earliest statesmen wreak havoc among native peoples while racing to draft their own constitution even ahead of statehood. Gold-hungry settlers venture into the Sierra foothills only to leave with little, while a handful of their suppliers turn themselves into millionaire railroad magnates. Wars erupt in the name of water as Los Angeles booms, and early efforts to tame the vast landscape create a haven for fossil fuel extraction and environmental conservation alike. Hollywood politicians stoke fear, contributing to a centuries-long tradition of anti-Asian violence, and, remarkably, legal redlining and free higher education take root together.
Golden State brings a fresh critical eye to the origins of the state against which the rest of the country measures itself. From its very start, Hiltzik shows, the story of the United States was written in California.
One of the most famous figures in Christian history, Francis of Assisi (1181/82–1226) was revered as a miracle worker during his life and quickly canonized after his death. He has inspired generations of Christians and other spiritual seekers, from medieval ascetics to 1960s hippies and modern environmentalists. The 'poverello' wrote poems praising the sun, moon, and stars, spoke to the birds, and—so the story goes—even tamed a wolf. But what do we know for sure about who he was, and what is simply legend?
Drawing on centuries of scholarship, Volker Leppin pieces together fragments of Francis's life story to find a seeker who never reached his destination, a man whose extraordinary charisma drew others in yet who was uncomfortable in the spotlight. Amazingly, Francis stayed within the fold of the church while offering a new and radical vision of Christianity that proved wildly popular.
Leppin's Francis of Assisi sets Francis's inner emotional and spiritual world against a broader historical background to show how the message of this inspiring and often vexing medieval saint continues to resonate in our contemporary world.
Much has been written about the life, ministry, and theology of the apostle Paul. But what about Paul specifically as a preacher? How did he understand his commission from the risen Lord Jesus to preach the gospel, and how did he put it into practice? Further, what lessons can contemporary preachers learn from Paul about the theology and practice of preaching to help them be more faithful messengers of God's Word?
As a leading Pauline scholar and practicing pastor, Frank Matera has considered these questions, and he offers this short, accessible book to pastors and students as wise and helpful guidance. Matera explores a Pauline theology of preaching, focusing on three main questions: Why did Paul preach? What did he preach? And how did he preach? He also explores Paul's preaching as the ministry of the new covenant. He identifies and explores seven themes of Paul's preaching, which in turn offer key practical insights for preaching in a Pauline way. Listeners are encouraged to 'preach from the cross,' making the crucified Christ their focus and their model, demonstrating what they preach by their own cruciform lives.
With an uninterrupted printing history since it was first published in 1939, this classic interpretation of the book of Revelation has served as a solid resource and source of inspiration for generations. Using sound principles of interpretation, William Hendriksen unfolds the mysteries of the apocalypse gradually, always with the purpose of showing that 'we are more than conquerors through Christ.' Both beginning and advanced students of the Scriptures will find here the inspiration to face a restless and confusing world with a joyful, confident spirit, secure in the knowledge that God reigns and is coming again soon.
Robert Barron is one of the Catholic Church's premier theologians and author of the influential The Priority of Christ. In this volume, Barron sets forth a thoroughgoing vision for an evangelical catholic theology that is steeped in the tradition and engaged with the contemporary world. Striking a balance between academic rigor and accessibility, the book covers issues of perennial interest in the twenty-first-century church: who God is, how to rightly worship him, and how his followers engage contemporary culture. Topics include the doctrine of God, Catholic theology, philosophy, liturgy, and evangelizing the culture. This work will be of special interest to listeners concerned about the so-called 'new atheism.'
The world wants to make us into its image. The cares and pleasures of this life demand our hearts' devotion. We are always in the process of being transformed. We become like what we worship—which means we will find true rest only as we worship Christ and become more like him. In his revised devotional work, Kris Lundgaard invites us to forsake unfulfilling idols and set our hearts on adoring Christ instead. Drawn by the wisdom of Puritan John Owen, this book is a profound call to contemplate Christ—his person, work, and love—in new and deeper ways, so that you are challenged and changed. Readers praise The Glorious Christ (formerly Through the Looking Glass) as a useful resource for group study as well as private meditation. Discover the eternal value of beholding the glorious Christ, who is worthy of all our worship.
Skid Road tells the story of Seattle 'from the bottom up,' offering an informal and engaging portrait of the Emerald City's first century, as seen through the lives of some of its most colorful citizens. With his trademark combination of deep local knowledge, precision, and wit, Murray Morgan traces the city's history from its earliest days as a hacked-from-the-wilderness timber town, touching on local tribes, settlers, the lumber and railroad industries, the great fire of 1889, the Alaska gold rush, flourishing dens of vice, the 1919 general strike, the 1962 World's Fair, and the stuttering growth of the 1970s and '80s. Through it all, Morgan shows us that Seattle's one constant is change and that its penchant for reinvention has always been fueled by creative, if sometimes unorthodox, residents.
With a new introduction by Pulitzer Prize-winning book critic Mary Ann Gwinn, this redesigned edition of Murray Morgan's classic work is a must for those interested in how Seattle got to where it is today.
With the same ability to make personalities and events come alive that characterizes his classic Skid Road, Murray Morgan here tells the colorful story of Tacoma, 'the City of Destiny,' and southern Puget Sound, where many major events of Washington's history took place. Drawing upon original journals and reports, Morgan builds Puget's Sound around individuals, interweaving portraits of well-known historical figures with a raucous parade of saloonkeepers, politicians, union organizers, schemers, and swindlers. His account begins with the landing of Captain Vancouver in Puget Sound in 1792 and ends with the founding of Fort Lewis in 1916. Between are the arrival of the transcontinental railroad, the boom-and-bust of lumber mills, the anti-Chinese riots of 1885, and more distinctive Northwest history that will intrigue both new arrivals and longtime residents.
With a new introduction by historian and historic preservationist Michael Sean Sullivan, this redesigned edition of Puget's Sound brings new life to Morgan's landmark history.
