Audiobooks narrated by Kellye A. Saunders

A Radiant Birth: Advent Readings for a Bright Season

'In Advent we prepare for the coming of all Love.' -Madeleine L'Engle 'At the birth of Jesus, an event of cosmic significance by which we humans still mark our calendars, the invisible and visible worlds come together.' -Philip Yancey 'Help us to realize, as those who love and believe in you that we, too, are pregnant with Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit, and that day by day we are being enlarged.' -Luci Shaw The first Christmas sermon preserved in church history was preached by St. John Chrysostom in AD 386, in which he declared, 'Behold a new and wonderful mystery!' In this volume, the Christian literary writers of the Chrysostom Society reflect on Advent and Christmastide as a bright and meaningful season of anticipation and glory. Through forty-two readings from the first Sunday of Advent through Epiphany, contributors prepare us in watchful waiting for the coming of Jesus. We enter slowly so that the familiar can astonish us and become wondrous once again. Jesus is born in Bethlehem. But not only there. He is also born in us, that we might bear his presence and impart his goodness to the world.

Leslie Leyland Fields (Author), Kellye A. Saunders, William Sarris (Narrator)

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The Gift of the Outsider: What Living in the Margins Teaches Us About Faith

Embracing the Spiritual Lessons of Unbelonging Too often, cultural belonging becomes a battle, and its winners gain the world: access, comfort, safety, community. Yet for those on the margins-set apart from their culture by differences such as ethnicity, class, ability, and faith-God offers something even greater. The Gift of the Outsider celebrates the blessings found in unbelonging-and calls Christians of all backgrounds to love and listen to their community's outcasts. As a Christian, a Black American, a woman, and an expatriate, author Alicia J. Akins offers heartfelt reflections on her own experiences as an outsider. She illuminates how we can - cherish the unique gifts that God bestows on those who endure loneliness and adversity - encourage and humbly receive the invaluable insights outsiders of all kinds have to offer - delight in how the differences within God's people reflect his majesty-and how Christ's reign unifies all believers Compassionate and biblically grounded, The Gift of the Outsider enriches today's broader conversations surrounding diversity and inclusion, and is sure to encourage and challenge outsiders and insiders alike.

Alicia J. Akins (Author), Kellye A. Saunders (Narrator)

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Prophesy Deliverance!: An Afro-american Revolutionary Christianity: 40th Anniversary Expanded Editio

In this, his premiere work, Cornel West challenges African Americans to consider the incorporation of Marxism into their theological perspectives, thereby adopting the mindset that it is class more so than race that renders one powerless in America. His work reflects political and cultural perspectives borne out of his own formative life experiences. Decades later, his arguments continue to capture the theological imagination of many and influence the critical engagement of generations of scholars. In this fortieth anniversary edition, West invites six prominent scholars-whose respective work are grounded in various aspects of black political, cultural, and theological thought-into dialogue with this work, each writing one chapter plus a foreword by Jonathan Lee Walton. Continuing and expanding on the revolutionary discourses that West introduced in the first published work, each new essay provides nuanced lens for thinking about movements of liberation in today's African American communities.

Cornel West (Author), Diontae Black, Kellye A. Saunders (Narrator)

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Join the Resistance: Step into the Good Work of Kingdom Justice

An awakening has been happening across our society. People increasingly recognize how long-standing, systemic issues have prevented many from flourishing. But often Christians are not sure how best to engage. Does it help to march and hold signs? What can we do to contribute and not further complicate things? Faith-rooted justice advocate and activist Michelle Ferrigno Warren equips Christians to join Christ's restorative work in the world. In nearly three decades of experience, she left much of her privilege to work alongside the poor and marginalized in the restoration of individuals and communities, collaborating with community leaders, marching in streets, and meeting with and speaking truth to power. She says, 'How you show up is just as important as showing up.' From the grassroots to the grass tops, Warren invites us to understand our place in this moment and learn from those who have gone before: the poets and prophets who call us to resist oppression and injustice. Biblical, historical, and contemporary examples give us ways to walk in God's righteousness, truth, and peace. We can better understand our shared solidarity, persevere in the midst of struggle, bring people along, and remain rooted in joy as we continue the good work of kingdom justice.

Michelle Ferrigno Warren (Author), Kellye A. Saunders (Narrator)

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The Point of It All

Tina Webb had given up her dreams of becoming a primo ballerina that pirouetted in front of an audience of hundreds of people long ago. Having a beau to share her life with was a lost cause too. So, she poured her heart and soul into her dance studio. Instructing young girls who still held onto their dreams, in hopes they could see them realized the way she hadn't. When she receives notification that she has to move her studio, and potentially lose all she worked hard for, she doesn't know who else to turn to but attorney Alex Simmons. He's shrewd, brilliant, and more handsome than any man had a right to be. He was also one of the most intolerable people she had ever gotten the pleasure to meet. And yet she needed him. Will sparks fly or will they explode?

Sean D. Young (Author), Kellye A. Saunders (Narrator)

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Carved in Ebony, Young Reader's Edition: Lessons from the Black Women Who Shape Us

A look at the inspirational lives of ten Black women of faith Do the names Elizabeth Freeman, Nannie Helen Burroughs, or Charlotte Forten Grimke ring any bells? Have you ever heard of Sarah Mapps Douglass, Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, or Maria Fearing? What about Sara Griffith Stanley, Amanda Berry Smith, Lucy Craft Laney, and Maria Stewart? While these names may not be familiar to you, these women lived faithful and influential lives in a world that was filled with injustice. They worked to change laws, built schools, spoke to thousands, and shared the Gospel all around the world. And while history books may have forgotten them, their stories can teach us so much about how we can live today.

Jasmine L. Holmes (Author), Kellye A. Saunders (Narrator)

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I'm Black I'm Christian I'm Methodist

It's uncertain that Howard Thurman made the remark often attributed to him, 'I have been writing this book all my life,' but there is little doubt that he was deeply immersed in reflection on the times that bear an uncanny resemblance to the present day, which give voice to the Black Lives Matter movement. Our 'life's book' is filled with sentence upon sentence of marginalization, pages of apartheid, chapters of separate and unequal. Now this season reveals volumes of violence against Blacks in America. Ten Black women and men explore life through the lens of compelling personal religious narratives. They are people and leaders whose lives are tangible demonstrations of the power of a divine purpose and evidence of what grace really means in face of hardship, disappointment, and determination. Each of the journeys intersect because of three central elements that are the focus of this book. We're Black. We're Christians. We're Methodists. Each starts with the fact, 'I'm Black,' but to resolve the conflict of being Christian and Methodist means confronting aspects of White theology, White supremacy, and White racism in order to ground an oppositional experience toward domination over four centuries in America.

Erin Beasley, F. Willis Johnson, Jevon Caldwell-Gross, Justin Coleman, Lilian C. Smith, Pamela R. Lightsey, Rodney Lorenzo Graves, Rudy Rasmus, Tori C. Butler, Vance P. Ross (Author), Calvin Robinson, Kellye A. Saunders (Narrator)

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The Seeker and the Monk: Everyday Conversations with Thomas Merton

What if we truly belong to each other? What if we are all walking around shining like the sun? Mystic, monk, and activist Thomas Merton asked those questions in the twentieth century. Writer Sophfronia Scott is asking them today. In The Seeker and the Monk, Scott mines the extensive private journals of one of the most influential contemplative thinkers of the past for guidance on how to live in these fraught times. As a Black woman who is not Catholic, Scott both learns from and pushes back against Merton, holding spirited, and intimate conversations on race, ambition, faith, activism, nature, prayer, friendship, and love. She asks: What is the connection between contemplation and action? Is there ever such a thing as a wrong answer to a spiritual question? How do we care about the brutality in the world while not becoming overwhelmed by it? By engaging in this lively discourse, listeners will gain a steady sense of how to dwell more deeply within-and even to love-this despairing and radiant world.

Sophfronia Scott (Author), Kellye A. Saunders (Narrator)

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Audiobooks Narrated by Kellye A. Saunders