LITMIR.BIZ

On the Road to Siangyang tells the story of a Swedish immigrant church in America undertaking, soon after its organization, a mission to central China that would last nearly sixty years, from 1890 to 1949, when Christian missionaries had to leave the Chinese Mainland upon the establishment of the People's Republic. Covenant missionary work was carried on along broad lines: preaching and evangelism; medical and benevolence work; and education for boys, girls, and adults. Missionaries labored amid turbulent years: through the Boxer Rebellion (1900), the fall of the Manchu dynasty (1911), ongoing civil war, and more than a decade of Japanese occupation (1931-1949). Three Covenant missionaries were kidnapped by the communists and held for ransom, and another three were murdered on the road from Siangyang to Kingchow. But the mission work has borne fruit, and a final chapter reports the Christian work being carried on today throughout Hubei Province.

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How do we care justly when selves suffer because of the identities that they inhabit? Pastoral theologian Katharine Lassiter approaches this interdisciplinary question from a feminist perspective in order to understand how suffering, subject formation, and social injustice are interconnected. Reflecting on tensions in her own experiences of caring for selves, Lassiter identifies the challenges of identity in developing a pastoral theological anthropology. Drawing from theories of recognition, she argues that doing just care requires recognizing the need for recognition as well as understanding the impediments to receiving interpersonal, social, and theological recognition. Bringing together resources from pastoral theology and social theory, she develops a feminist pastoral theology and praxis of encounter in order to advance a care that does justice. Scholars, social justice practitioners, and pastoral caregivers will be able to use this resource to understand not only how and why recognition affects human development but also how we might implement a liberative theological praxis attentive to the role of recognition in subject formation.

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Henry D. Rack is one of the most profound historians of the Methodist movement in modern times. He has spent a lifetime researching and writing about the rise and significance of John Wesley and his Methodist followers in the eighteenth century and has also uncovered the historical significance of the Methodist Church in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Collected here in this volume are thirteen essays honoring the life and scholarship of Dr. Rack from a host of international scholars in the field. The topics range from Wesley's view of grace in the eighteenth century to the dynamic intersection of the Methodist and Tractarian movements in the nineteenth century. A bibliographical essay of Rack's most prominent publications in the field of Methodist studies is also provided. In the end, the collection of essays offered here in honor of Dr. Rack will be engaging and provocative for considering Methodist Studies in the present and future generations.

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How does one summarize the thirty-nine books of the Old Testament? How might one determine the message of the Old Testament with others? This book attempts an answer to these questions. The answer is taken from a single Scripture passage, Exodus 5:22-6:8, which is here considered a theological «Table of Contents» for the Old Testament. In addition to such topics as Deliverance, Community, and Experiencing God, the book has an extended discussion on «Land,» a subject which deals with a wide range of interests but which only rarely receives attention in books on biblical theology. The current edition features reflections and a set of discussion questions following each of the seventeen chapters–a boon for university and seminary teachers and students, and of large help for church study groups.

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In recent years, a number of works have appeared with important implications for the age-old question of the existence of a god. These writings, many of which are not by theologians, strengthen the rational case for the existence of a god, even as this god may not be exactly the Christian God of history. This book brings together for the first time such recent diverse contributions from fields such as physics, the philosophy of human consciousness, evolutionary biology, mathematics, the history of religion, and theology. Based on such new materials as well as older ones from the twentieth century, it develops five rational arguments that point strongly to the (very probable) existence of a god. They do not make use of the scientific method, which is inapplicable to the question of a god. Rather, they are in an older tradition of rational argument dating back at least to the ancient Greeks. For those who are already believers, the book will offer additional rational reasons that may strengthen their belief. Those who do not believe in the existence of a god at present will encounter new rational arguments that may cause them to reconsider their opinion.

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This is the first extensive examination of the life of Ken Sumrall and his firm belief in the modern-day apostolic restoration movement. It presents Sumrall's journey from his Baptist beginnings, through his experience of the baptism of the Holy Spirit, through his learning struggles with Liberty Fellowship of Churches and Ministers, and into his birthing of Church Foundational Network. It represents Sumrall in his own light, while dealing with his paradigm changes concerning church government the heart of which revolved around the restoration of modern-day apostles. Godly government was grounded in godly relationships with one's apostle, whom Sumrall understood as a «spiritual father.» For Sumrall, the best biblical government for the New Testament church today is a theocracy. Instead of a centralized, hierarchical church government, Sumrall advanced a decentralized network of churches connected relationally.
This volume contains the major influences upon Sumrall's thinking and the progress of his comprehension of the life of the church as «family.» Moreover, it engages some of the apprehensions that have surfaced over the present-day apostolic movement and provides insights of the direction and survivability of the movement.

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How does teaching Christianly differ from other forms of teaching? How might a Christian teach, in a biblical way, some commonplace set of facts from a mandated secular curriculum? This book considers what a biblical approach to teaching may involve as it emerges from a biblically grounded life and what that might look like in the classroom. Rather than speaking of integration of faith and learning, it starts from a foundation of Christ, the Truth and Lord of all, and moves to the development of a framework for classroom practice that includes a need to try to see things from God's perspective.
All truly Christian education is seen, therefore, as a profoundly biblical pursuit leading to the revelation of God. To do this, the book explores the underlying theology and principles out of which our education should flow. These principles then allow us to examine such areas as the consideration of a Christian way to teach subjects such as geography and mathematics, or even what might be distinctive about the way a Christian teacher may do something as mundane as picking up a pencil.

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Myriad works discuss forgiveness, but few address it in the prison context. For most people, prisoners exist «out of sight and out of mind.» Their stories are often reduced to a few short lines in news articles at the time of arrest or conviction.
But what happened before in the lives of the convicted? What has happened after? How have people in prison dealt with the harm they have caused and the harm they have suffered? What does forgiveness mean to them? What can we outsiders learn about the nature of forgiveness and prison from individuals who have both dealt and endured some of life's most painful experiences?
Expanding on his MPhil dissertation Echoes from Exile (with Distinction) from Trinity College Dublin, Michael McRay's important new book brings the perspectives and stories of fourteen Tennessee prisoners into public awareness. Weaving these narratives into a survey of forgiveness literature, McRay offers a map of the forgiveness topography. At once storytelling, academic, activism, and cartography, McRay's book is as necessary as it is accessible.
There is a whole demographic we have essentially ignored when it comes to conversations on forgiveness. What would we learn if we listened?

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Is the human will in bondage to sinful motives, to the point that people cannot make truly free decisions? Daniel D. Whedon, a prominent nineteenth-century Wesleyan theologian, takes aim at this central thesis of the famed theologian Jonathan Edwards. In this new edition of his widely admired 1864 work, Whedon offers a step-by-step examination of Edwards's positions and finds them lacking in Biblical and logical support. Within his position against Edwards, he argues that the difference between natural ability and moral ability is meaningless, that Edwards's deterministic «necessitarian» argument makes God the author of sin, and that people frequently act against their strongest motives. He concludes that, without a free will, «there can be no justice, no satisfying the moral sense, no moral Government of which the creature can be the rightful subject, and no God the righteous administrator.»

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Does the Bible provide a construct for marriage that is relevant for a confused world? This book reflects a pastor's conviction that biblical revelation culminating in Christ does speak to the issues and potentials for marriage in such a world. By focusing on what the biblical vocabulary of marriage, from Genesis to Revelation, may reveal of the Creator-Redeemer's intent for marriage, Ernest D. Martin develops a Christological paradigm for marriage that is consistent and applicable. Pastors, teachers, and counselors will find biblical faith perspectives useful in responding to the challenges and opportunities they face in the several phases of marital relationships. This short book will greatly benefit anyone seriously concerned with what the Bible says about marriage.

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