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Walking Together: A Congregational Reflection on Biblical Church Discipline is a study of the biblical concept of church discipline. It seeks to show that church discipline, rightly understood, is a ministry of mercy and grace that will bless churches that return to it. Walking Together reveals that church discipline was a ministry that was very important to earlier believers, and that the modern church has abandoned it to her own detriment. It is a clarion call for individuals and churches to come back to this vital but long-neglected aspect of congregational and personal life. By doing so, churches can be healed and interpersonal relationships can be restored.

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E. Hammond Oglesby offers a new method of moral discourse that can speak to ongoing critical issues in the black community, such as the AIDS pandemic, an absence of young-adult participation in many black churches, and a continuing battle against racism. In Pressing Toward the Mark, he demonstrates that ordinary people of faith become ethical not by chance but by choice. He also helps readers understand the importance of Christian ethics in light of the deep spiritual and cultural roots of the black church in America. Through stories, theological reflection, and case studies meant to encourage small-group discussion, Oglesby builds a case that Christian ethics begins–in the rhythmic flux of the black religious experience–with a love of freedom, because no child of God can be fully Christian without being free (Galatians 5:1).

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This book will deepen your regard for the church's task of didache, the act of teaching Christians. The chapters explore what the writers believe are several key biblical texts and themes for teaching, select doctrines of the church that inform teaching as a ministry, and features of teaching in the Lutheran tradition and its current practice. We authors address these matters with deep commitment to our shared Lutheran tradition, yet also with profound respect for what the Holy Spirit has done across the centuries in other orthodox traditions of the Great Church. Welcome to our conversation, a conversation the church has shared–though not without dispute–for centuries (from Chapter 1).

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James Douglass's writings have been recognized as among the most challenging and inspiring explorations of nonviolence and Christian discipleship in the last century. Throughout his career, Douglass has argued forcefully for the integration of contemplation and resistance, theology and cultural critique, spirituality and prophetic involvement. His work has inspired many of the key figures in recent debates regarding just war, Christian nonviolence, and radical discipleship and continues to be highly relevant in our contemporary situation. In A Question of Being, the first book-length treatment published on Douglass's writings, Karin Holsinger Sherman provides an introduction to and engagement with this important body of work through an exploration into its contextual history, influences, and main themes. Moreover, the author argues that these themes work together to create an «ontology of nonviolence,» an ontology that integrates the forces of resistance and contemplation so important to Douglass. The book begins by examining Douglass's biography and three broad historical trajectories that give context to his thought: the fusion of Christianity and American nationalism in the early Cold War period; the emergence of cultural critique in the late fifties and early sixties, and the Catholic pacifist tradition; and the post-1972 period of disillusionment. Holsinger Sherman then considers the lives and thought of Dorothy Day, Mahatma Gandhi, and Thomas Merton, as well as their unique intellectual and exemplary influence on Douglass's ideas. After explicating the themes of the cross and the kingdom as they developed chronologically in Douglass's writing career, this book draws together Douglass's thought to reveal an «ontology of nonviolence.» In her conclusion, Holsinger Sherman argues that this ontology of nonviolence is the key to understanding Douglass's integral theology of contemplation and resistance.

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Are you without an answer to an important prayer? Do you pray until you feel you cannot pray anymore? Do you feel discouraged because you have tried to measure up to God's expectations and still nothing has changed? Do you want to be free from the hindrances that prevent God from answering your prayers? The Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) purely articulates teaching about God's role and our role in bringing about changes to our lives through prayer. Therkelsen emphasizes five deadly barriers to receiving God's transformation: 1) judgment and criticism, 2) lovelessness, 3) unforgiveness, 4) anger, and 5) desire for control. Remembering her mother's «prayer experiments» and drawing on her own prayer life, Therkelsen shares what the Holy Spirit has shown her about partnership with God and about processing God's answer through prayer.

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Since Jean Lipman-Blumen's The Allure of Toxic Leaders shook the corporate world in 2005, countless articles, books, and Internet blogs have appeared on the topic.
Despite such interest and response, no study of toxic leadership had appeared from a Christian point of view until this volume, Kenn Gangel's Surviving Toxic Leaders.
Gangel begins by showing that toxic leadership existed throughout biblical history. Making generous use not only of biblical materials but also of contemporary leadership literature, Gangel names the causes and cures of power abuse, cheating, bullying, laziness, and dictatorial behavior in today's leaders.
Readers will benefit from Gangel's leadership experience and expertise. He has been a pastor, a college dean (twice), and a college president. Gangel currently edits The Seal, a review of leadership literature.
Practical and personal, Surviving Toxic Leaders abounds with stories of real people and their situations. Everyone who has ever had «trouble at work» will benefit from Surviving Toxic Leaders.

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This study explores the theological presuppositions that have informed the major explanations of the work of Christ from the perspective of Wesleyan theology's commitment to the universality of the atonement and its provision for both justification and sanctification. The Whole Christ for the Whole World proposes a paradigm that the author describes as «personal-relational» for understanding the work of Christ. Dunning argues that this «personal-relational» paradigm more adequately captures the «whole tenor of Scripture» than do the legal paradigms that have dominated the Western church, and Dunning seeks to demonstrate that the Wesleyan understanding of the work of Christ has been significantly informed by the mentality of the Eastern church.

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On the sixth day of creation, God formed Adam from the dust of the earth. God then formed Eve from Adam's side. From this day forward man was to leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife. The two are joined together by God in a permanent one-flesh relationship.
After man fell, the sins of adultery, fornication, polygamy, and divorce altered God's intention for marriage. This was true of those both outside and inside God's covenant community. By the time the Lord Jesus Christ came in the flesh, the traditions of Judaism had either changed or nullified God's command for marriage. The Lord Jesus Christ came and stated God's original intent for marriage:
1. Permanence. The husband and wife are one flesh. They are permanently joined in a covenant relationship for life. No person has the legal or moral authority to end what God has joined together. No sin or legal document can dissolve the one-flesh bond.
2. Forgiveness. This is Christ's emphasis in dealing with sin. When one spouse fails, the love of Christ compels the other to forgive. Hardness of heart is the cause of unforgiveness and results in divorce.
Because of the biblical teachings of Jesus and Paul, the early church held to the permanence of marriage. Over the centuries, Christ's commands on the permanence of marriage have been either changed or nullified. They have been replaced with the traditions of men. In theory, Christians are taught that they may divorce and remarry if their spouse commits adultery or deserts them. In practice, many evangelical Christians are divorcing and remarrying for almost any reason.
The Lord Jesus Christ taught God's original intentions regarding forgiveness and divorce. The Word of God has not changed. «What God has joined together, let no man separate» (Mark 10:9).

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Do you ever find yourself confused about the war and violence that pervade our post-9/11 world? On the one hand, the Bible and Christ speak of loving enemies and self-sacrifice. On the other hand, the world around us teaches, and most Christians seem to simply accept, that violence is necessary in a world wrecked with sin.
Are Christians a people of peace? Does that peace have to be won through war? Should we fight for our convictions? Or die for them?
Jonathan and Derek invite you to come along with them as they explore the biblical teachings on war and violence and attempt to construct a solidly biblical and uniquely Christian view of war and violence.

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Praise is a hidden doorway in the world that enables us to see things outside of the universe. But it's a doorway that is easily missed; people walk past it, thinking nothing of it, not realizing the value of it. But God has placed it there for us to walk through and see where he lives.
This look at praise takes some surprising turns and gives us insight into heaven, hell, the world we live in, and our own souls. People praise all sorts of things. I find myself praising my wife–or praising children, footballers, or chefs. I even praise my dog. When we praise God, it is a natural extension of what we normally do every day. And praise isn't one way, because God praises us, too. When we are patient, praise will come our way from the most unexpected source, and it will come just when our enemies have turned up to see it. God intervenes on our behalf when we leave the task of being praised to him. Contrary to popular belief, praise comes to those who wait. We don't have to fish for it.

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