LITMIR.BIZ

The Psalms have long been the preferred prayer book of souls in quest of God's guidance and comfort. It has been a hymnbook for the soul and a trove for canticles and verses of the heart. The Psalms have served both Judaism and Christianity's religious communities as a favored source of rich and magnificent readings perfect for liturgical settings. Most significantly, they have nurtured the soul in its desperate times of brokenness and longing for God. This is true of both religions and of their various branches across the years. For that reason, the Psalter ranks among the noblest of spiritual masterpieces, cherished for its eloquent and poignant prayers that lift the heart to God even as they bring God down to mend the soul. We need such times of private and communal withdrawal into the sphere where God alone reins. Solitariness with God heals the heart's wounds, individually and communally. Alone with God, God sees us as we are and allows us to acknowledge ourselves as we are–at our best and worst, in our joy and folly. The Psalms remind us that God is inescapably present wherever we allow God in to renew, inspire, redeem, and fulfill the highest hopes of our human capacity. By the Waters of Babylon provides meditations on all 150 of the Psalter's hymns. They are written to speak to the heart as well as to the mind and soul in search of grace and consolation.

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"In the world, but not of the world"–this has been the motto of the Free Church tradition. But to what extent can freedom and independence from «the world» be realized in modernity, and how have these churches fared so far? These are the questions with which this book wrestles. The particular focus is Sweden, where a state-facilitated hypermodernity has created what some call «the most modern nation in the world.» The Swedish free churches have in many ways succumbed to the pressure of the modern welfare state and as a consequence lost their distinctive voice. The argument of this book is that the rediscovery of practices left behind might be a way for these churches to recover a solid, particular, and deeply Christian identity. In dialogue with William T. Cavanaugh, the authors argue for a return to concrete, social practices: asceticism, table grace, written prayers, a turn to tradition, and the Eucharist. Here are lost treasures that might prove invaluable for the modern church at large, with her dual citizenship in the modern nation-state and the kingdom of heaven.

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Could it be that we have lost touch with some basic human realities in our day of high-tech efficiency, frenetic competition, and ceaseless consumption? Have we turned from the moral, the spiritual, and even the physical realities that make our lives meaningful? These are metaphysical questions–questions about the nature of reality–but they are not abstract questions. These are very down to earth questions that concern power and the collective frameworks of belief and action governing our daily lives.
This book is an introduction to the history, theory, and application of Christian metaphysics. Yet this book is not just an introduction, it is also a passionately argued call for a profound change in the contemporary Christian mind. Paul Tyson argues that as Western culture's Christian Platonist understanding of reality was replaced by modern pragmatic realism, we turned not just from one outlook on reality to another, but away from reality itself. This book seeks to show that if we can recover this ancient Christian outlook on reality, reframed for our day, then we will be able to recover a way of life that is in harmony with human and divine truth.

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Inner Messiah, Divine Character encourages readers to deploy their imaginations in describing their lives as a confluence of narrative constructs to identify, analyze, and overcome obstacles and destructive patterns in both their personal and professional lives. The book promotes a three-point strategy to empower and to improve readers' attitudes about their personal and professional struggles. Drawing on the scholarship of Ancient Jewish mysticism and its influence on Freudian and Jungian analysis, Inner Messiah, Divine Character helps readers discover the «Be» within their «Being» to create new opportunities in the present, motivates readers to perceive «Beyond» their limitations and ordinary expectations, and encourages readers to strive for the superlative in their endeavors to achieve their «Best.»

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John Scottus Eriugena, the brilliant and controversial Irishman in the court of Charles the Bald (823-877), the grandson of Charlemagne, drew upon both the Latin and Greek patristic traditions in order to present a bold and original Christian vision. A philosopher, theologian, translator, poet, and mystic, he may be considered the ideal Carolingian Renaissance man. This volume examines his understanding of the Incarnation, the enfleshment of the Word. On the one hand, Eriugena's Christology creatively appropriates traditional categories in order to explain God's philanthropia in creating, sustaining, and restoring the cosmos. On the other hand, it also provides a guide for the believer's mystical participation in the life of Jesus and return to divine union. This brilliant intellectual from the so-called «Dark Ages» offers much to inspire, and perhaps even to startle, contemporary theologians, philosophers, and believers who ponder the mystery of the God-made-flesh.

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Theology is inherently theatrical, rooted in God's performance on the world stage and oriented toward faith seeking performative understanding in the theatre of everyday life. Following Hans Urs von Balthasar's magisterial, five-volume Theo-Drama, a growing number of theologians and pastors have been engaging more widely with theatre and drama, producing what has been recognized as a «theatrical turn» in theology. This volume includes thirteen essays from theologians and pastors who have contributed in distinct ways to this theatrical turn and who desire to deepen interdisciplinary dialogue between theology and theatre. The result is an unprecedented collection of essays that embodies and advances theatrical theology for the purpose of enriching theological reflection and edifying the church.

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Groundless Gods: The Theological Prospects of Post-Metaphysical Thought deals with possible interpretations of an emerging interest in contemporary theology: postmetaphysical theology. This book attempts to openly come to grips, not only with what metaphysics and postmetaphysics imply, but also with what it could mean to do or not do theology from the standpoint of the nonmetaphysician. The book asks, for instance, whether this world has any singular definition, and whether God is some being standing apart from the world or an experience within the world.

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The present volume is the second in a five-volume study of church doctrine. The multivolume set will cover the major parts of church doctrine: Canon, God, Creation, Reconciliation, and Redemption. The first volume (now in print) begins with an introduction to the entire project on why doctrine matters, which stresses the ecumenical, global, and above all biblical horizons of church doctrine as a primary expression of Christian witness.
The purpose of this second volume can be simply stated: to let God be God. In a world in which the God of the Christian witness is often confused with the tribal god of religion–a god who sets «us» against «them,» who divides humanity into nations, peoples, regions, races–the gospel proclaims the living God of the Bible who fashions a new humanity on the earth. This God in the freedom of his love elects to be for humanity, and calls all humanity to live for him. Church doctrine is not a luxury, but a necessity for the living community of faith, by which its witness in word and deed is tested against the one true measure of Christ the risen Lord.

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John Wesley (1703-91) was a unique character in history who left a disproportionately large imprint on the world. That imprint was a contagious passion for what he called real Christianity–the Good News of saving grace and scriptural holiness. This book examines Wesley's life and faith in order to better understand what it means to be a present-day participant in that legacy. The book begins with the story of Wesley's search for an authentic Christian experience. His steps are traced from his early days of struggle, through his conversion at Aldersgate, to his long years of remarkable ministry. The second part of the book outlines the basic Wesleyan understandings of sin, grace, redemption, new birth, sanctification, and perfection. A concluding exploration of some practical implications of the Wesleyan doctrine of holiness is found in the third part. This book celebrates the Wesleyan tradition, especially that branch known as the Holiness Movement. It is, however, not entirely uncritical. It seeks to provide an honest and sympathetic consideration of the heritage and faith of Wesley's lasting imprint.

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The Adam and Eve narrative in Genesis 2-3 has gripped not only biblical scholars, but also theologians, artists, philosophers, and almost everyone else. In this engaging study, a master of biblical interpretation provides a close reading of the Yahwist story. As in his other works, LaCocque makes wise use of the Pseudepigrapha and rabbinic interpretations, as well as the full range of modern interpretations. Every reader will be engaged by his insights.

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