LITMIR.BIZ

The church in the United States faces a dilemma: How is it possible for Christ's followers to worship faithfully in a nationalistic environment where religion and politics enjoy a vigorous affiliation while the separation of church and state is celebrated as the standard for the relationship between nation and faith? When nationalism propagates itself through a cross-pollination of the stories, symbols, and celebrations of the nation-state and religious groups, the stage is set for a national history bearing the character of sanctified legend. Such resulting civil religious activity is likely to create dissonance for Christ's followers between what they understand to be biblically faithful and what nationalistic practices may endorse as religiously valid. Worship Beyond Nationalism explores faithful worship as a political act by which Christians declare their allegiance to God in Christ rather than to worldly empires, enabling congregations to enact the reality of God's kingdom and embody the gospel for the glory of God and for the sake of the world.

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Jesus Christ for Contemporary Life is an understanding of Jesus as the Word of God, grounded in what can be known historically of Jesus and informed by subsequent reflection upon him, which hopes to help shape a Christian identity characterized by «bounded openness.» In Jesus Christ for Contemporary Life, Don Schweitzer explores the significance of the person, work, and relationships of Jesus Christ for contemporary life. He moves from the historical Jesus to the present in three parts. In the first part Schweitzer develops an understanding of Jesus as the Word of God, who became incarnate to give the goodness and beauty of God further expression in time and space. Second, he explores how various atonement theories articulate ways in which Jesus empowers people to further express this beauty and goodness in their own lives. And finally, Schweitzer explores how Jesus relates to people in the church, to the events and movements in history, to other religions, and to Christians in their dialogue with God in prayer.

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Praying–with the Saints–to God Our Mother celebrates the feminine characteristics of God by uncovering a treasury of texts that have been overlooked for centuries. Over 150 scriptural passages, both from the original biblical languages and other ancient translations, radiate the warmth and vitality of the maternal face of God. Additionally, passages from five Ecumenical Councils, all thirty-three Doctors of the Church, another thirty-six Fathers, and a total of seventy-one saints from every century reveal a vast richness of feminine images of God. Stramara's in-depth scholarship, presented in a format of prayer and meditation, makes this book inviting for all readers. Praying-with the Saints-to God Our Mother will be the standard reference for Christians of any tradition for years to come.

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In recent decades few Christian themes have attracted as much attention as that of eschatology, or Christian hope. Resurrection, Apocalypse, and the Kingdom of Christ explores the meaning of this theme for Thomas F. Torrance, one of the twentieth-century's leading theologians. This study, the first of its kind, brings Torrance's eschatology to light through an exploration of the whole range of his corpus, including sermons, lectures, and correspondence. It also demonstrates that his eschatology is molded by momentous historical events such as World War II, the spread of communism, and the ecumenical movement. Out of all this, we realize that eschatology is a central component of Torrance's theology–so much so that it conditions his thinking on other Christian doctrines.

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Cutting-edge missional witness just got bloodier and yet more hopeful than ever! Many Christians in America have lost loved ones who gave their lives in military service to save the country and the «free world.» John Shorack is one of them. His father, Theodore James Shorack Jr., was shot down in Vietnam in 1966. Unlike many, John didn't conform to his father's legacy of military sacrifice for the nation. He found a completely different way to give his life–for Christ and his kingdom among the poor of the nations.
Nail Scarred Hands Made New speaks from the trenches of a violent, Latin American slum. With deeply personal and theologically probing reflections, John speaks to the next generation of mission workers who feel compelled to lay down their lives–in the surprising hopefulness of God's ability to use the good, bad, and ugly of our kingdom-seeking efforts to accomplish his restoration of all creation.

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The Ten Commandments in Poems will inspire its readers through the felt presence of God perceived from his spoken words revealed to Moses and his children at Mount Sinai around 1440 BC. These poems in rhyme reflect God's laws for man as recorded in the book of Exodus in the Bible, and how God expects each person to live his or her life.

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Not a reference tool, this unique work is a teaching-learning guide to studying the earliest Gospel. The focus is on showing how rather than on telling what. «Maps» followed by leading questions and statements help both faculty and students to see how the Evangelist adopted and adapted his sacred texts (as well as Jewish and Greco-Roman resources) in light of his convictions about and experience of Jesus. Noticing the dominance of words and themes leads one to discover the primary concerns of the Author and his readers. Observing how St. Mark internally arranged his materials provides a clue as to the kind of work it is and how it was meant to function.

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The sacred Scriptures, stylized in poetry
After thorough readings through the Bible and study of biblical languages, The Haiku Bible started as an effort to make better sense of the complex and nuanced anthology. While rich in content and layered with meaning, the overarching themes of Scripture can be easily lost in the chasm of time and context that separate us from the original authors.
Reflecting the styles and genres of the different books, The Haiku Bible weaves fresh insight into the ancient writings, while finding the threads that tie together the tapestry of Scripture.

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At once a lament-psalm and a love song, Grief's Liturgy records Gerald Postema's work and worship of grief upon the loss of his wife, a year's work aided by the companions–poetry and prayers, icons and images, music and silence–that sat patiently with him. Structured around the liturgy of the Divine Office, reflections in each «hour» take on a distinctive expressive and emotional tone and fall into a jagged, broken rhythm over the course of each «day» yielding ultimately an understanding of the life-affirming necessity of grief.

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Throughout the entire world, Auschwitz has become known as the Concentration Camp (KZ) in which the bureaucratic, alarmingly and perfectly organized mass exterminations of human beings found its abysmal culmination. Less well known is the first period of Auschwitz in which this Concentration Camp (KZ) was different from many others because Polish people had to live and die there.
This book makes unambiguously clear that Auschwitz remains, in the memory of many Poles, a martyrology of its people.
Caps Off . . . is the first ever English translation of Mutzen ab . . ., a report about the experiences in the Punishment Company (SK) of the KZ Auschwitz by the Polish journalist and prisoner Zenon Rozanski. This report, based on the immediacy of experience, offers an important contribution to current knowledge about concentration and death camps in National Socialist Germany. This narrative report by an individual Polish prisoner is a voice for the countless, anonymous victims of all nationalities who were exterminated in the gas chambers of Auschwitz. It also brings into focus the reality of an undaunted human spirit who endured and withstood the bestiality of the SS men. Rozanski not only casts into narrative this experience of utter darkness but also captures the rays and glimmers of light, hope, and precious moments of human dignity which penetrated this unbelievably hellish environment.

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