Download or read book Inclusive Preaching in a Divisive World written by Linnea E Carnes and published by Independently Published. This book was released on 2020-08-30 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: INCLUSIVE PREACHING IN A DIVISIVE WORLD emerges from my experiences as a pastor in Chicago. Every Sunday I would truly see the Kingdom of God in living color. Within four years the church I was serving was transformed from twenty percent first-generation immigrants to sixty percent. As many as fifteen nationalities were present on any Sunday. Culture and language issues forced me to look at ministry and preaching in new ways. There were also people with a variety of special needs and from various educational backgrounds. The words and illustrations a preacher uses in such a diverse gathering must be easily understood and inclusive to all people. The life and ministry of Jesus demonstrated how he empowered those who were powerless in society. Jesus tells his followers how to treat the "least of these." Yet, unless we are willing to engage them and hear their stories, we cannot get to know people. Listening to people from other parts of the world gives us a far better understanding of the awesome grace and love of God. Underlying all of the areas of diversity in the church is God's command that we become one body, one people who are committed to unity. Perhaps we forget that Revelation 7:9 tells us that the Kingdom of God is comprised of every nation, tribe, people and language. Every pastor and church should see the people who walk in their doors, regardless of their color or dress, as a brother and sister in God's family and welcome them. To genuinely welcome people who look different, speak a different language or come from a different church tradition requires that a pastor learn new skills. My hope is that others will read of my experiences and be better prepared to preach in a multiethnic context. What People are Saying About INCLUSIVE PREACHING IN A DIVISIVE WORLD. "INCLUSIVE PREACHING IN A DIVISIVE WORLD offers profound wisdom and practical guidance to pastors seeking to effectively preach the word of God in multi-cultural contexts, in immigrant-rich communities, and in inter-generational churches. Rooted in years of pastoral experience, Dr. Carnes writes with deep sensitivity to the increasingly complex and diverse cultural and social milieu of our day, and with deep conviction about the Church's high calling to share the Good News of Jesus with people of every nation, tribe and language. I highly recommend this book!" Rev. Garth McGrath, Superintendent of the Great Lakes Conference, Evangelical Covenant Church "INCLUSIVE PREACHING IN A DIVISIVE WORLD by Dr. Linnea Carnes is a must-read for pastors and leaders who are navigating the challenges of becoming a multiethnic congregation. Many congregations want to follow Jesus without coming out of their racial and cultural comfort zone. The Great Commission calls for Christians to take the gospel to all people regardless of racial or cultural background. Dr. Carnes has developed a biblical framework for making the multiethnic congregation a priority and a step by step guide for successfully carrying out these spiritual priorities of diversity." Rev. Dr. D. Darrel Griffin, Pastor Oakdale Covenant Church, Chicago, IL. "Rev. Dr. Carnes is an eye-witness of a congregation, where people with vastly different backgrounds gathered in the name of one God. The community was not humanly planned, but a work of God itself. INCLUSIVE PREACHING IN A DIVISIVE WORLD is a thoughtful and insightful guide for any preacher, who is willing to be surprised by the way God works through our differences." Dr. Yumi Murayama, Researcher and Adjunct Professor of Religion and Culture at Toyo University, Japan
Download or read book The Joy of the Gospel written by Pope Francis and published by Image. This book was released on 2014-10-07 with total page 164 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The perfect gift! A specially priced, beautifully designed hardcover edition of The Joy of the Gospel with a foreword by Robert Barron and an afterword by James Martin, SJ. “The joy of the gospel fills the hearts and lives of all who encounter Jesus… In this Exhortation I wish to encourage the Christian faithful to embark upon a new chapter of evangelization marked by this joy, while pointing out new paths for the Church’s journey in years to come.” – Pope Francis This special edition of Pope Francis's popular message of hope explores themes that are important for believers in the 21st century. Examining the many obstacles to faith and what can be done to overcome those hurdles, he emphasizes the importance of service to God and all his creation. Advocating for “the homeless, the addicted, refugees, indigenous peoples, the elderly who are increasingly isolated and abandoned,” the Holy Father shows us how to respond to poverty and current economic challenges that affect us locally and globally. Ultimately, Pope Francis demonstrates how to develop a more personal relationship with Jesus Christ, “to recognize the traces of God’s Spirit in events great and small.” Profound in its insight, yet warm and accessible in its tone, The Joy of the Gospel is a call to action to live a life motivated by divine love and, in turn, to experience heaven on earth. Includes a foreword by Robert Barron, author of Catholicism: A Journey to the Heart of the Faith and James Martin, SJ, author of Jesus: A Pilgrimage
Download or read book The Gospel of Inclusion written by Carlton Pearson and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2009-03-10 with total page 323 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Fourth-generation fundamentalist Carlton Pearson, a Christian megastar and host, takes a courageous and controversial stand on religion that proposes a hell-less Christianity and a gospel of inclusion that calls for an end to local and worldwide conflicts and divisions along religious lines. In The Gospel of Inclusion, Bishop Carlton Pearson explores the exclusionary doctrines in mainstream religion and concludes that, according to the evidence of the Bible and irrefutable logic, they cannot be true. Bishop Pearson argues that the controlling dogmas of religion are the source of much of the world's ills and that we should turn our backs on proselytizing and holy wars and focus on the real good news: that we are all bound for glory, everybody is saved, and if we believe God loves all mankind, then we have no choice but to have the same attitude ourselves. Bishop Pearson tells the story of how he had gone from a powerful religious figure, once preaching to an audience of over 6,000 people, to watching everything he had built crumble around him due to a scandal. Why? He didn't steal money nor did he have inappropriate sexual relationships. Following a revelation from God, he began to preach that a loving God would not condemn most of the human race to hell because they are not Christian. He preaches that God belongs to no religion. The Gospel of Inclusion is the inspiring journey of one man's quest to preach a new truth.
Download or read book Sermon Seeds Year C Inclusive Reflections for Preaching from the United Church of Christ written by Kathryn Matthews Huey and published by Pilgrim Press. This book was released on 2012-11-01 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written in expansive, inclusive language, characteristic of the United Church of Christ and drawing on the finest biblical scholarship, Sermon Seeds provides reflections on selected texts for every Sunday all in one volume. New and seasoned preachers will gain inspiration and valuable insight through this collection of thoughtful biblical interpretations.
Download or read book Preaching on Race written by Robert Frederick West and published by . This book was released on 1962 with total page 168 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This courageous minister-author faces one of the most crucial moral and spiritual issues of the contemporary world with decisive pastoral insight, presenting a comprehensive appraisal of the subtle, complex problems involved in the church and race issue. The first part of this book proceeds well in its important endeavor: it gives a true Christian-eye view of the matter and provides a fine Christian statement for our day, charts the minister's tasks, and outlines the techniques to use in approaching the subject of race in sermons. A collection of ten sermons, dealing with race, makes up the second half of the volume. Written from practical experience within the framework of the South, they provide proof that the issue can be handled wisely and effectively. Ministers will find great satisfaction in this thoroughgoing aid to pastoral and preaching duties. Laymen will be equally interested in his highly readable analysis -- Book jacket.
Download or read book The New Interpreter s Handbook of Preaching written by and published by Abingdon Press. This book was released on 2010-11-01 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The New Interpreter’s Handbook of Preaching is a major reference tool for preaching, with articles on every facet of Christian sermon preparation and delivery. This resource is both scholarly and practical. It focuses on the most distinctive feature and greatest strength of homiletics as a discipline: It is rooted in interdisciplinary scholarship and it develops theory geared to practice. Its theory arises out of the study of both excellent preaching past and present and actual sermon preparation and composition. When theory and practice critique each other, it is possible to produce guidelines that assist greater excellence and economy in preaching the gospel. Excellence in standards is an area in which homiletics needs to grow, and this project will be both a means to encourage and develop it. A guiding question throughout will be, Will it preach? The answers will be offered in the sense that “here is something that works well,” rather than “here is something to try.” Preachers will turn to this resource with the expectation that they will find scholarly treatment of topics, brief bibliographies of relevant key books and articles, along with practical methodological suggestions for preachers to employ. The contributors are homileticians, preachers, and writers in various disciplines who are committed to the pulpit through practice.
Download or read book Surviving a Dangerous Sermon written by Frank A. Thomas and published by Abingdon Press. This book was released on 2020-04-07 with total page 187 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Preachers increasingly see the need for to deliver sermons that are "dangerous" in a variety of ways, the way they challenge hearers' comfort levels and challenge established powers and hierachies. Thomas helps readers understand those dangers—especially the forces of power and hierarchy that are so intrinsic in our everyday lives and in society as a whole. He teaches how to anticipate and navigate those forces, to open opportunities for dangerous preaching, and to mitigate negative impact on congregants, the preacher, and the preacher-congregation relationships. Surviving a Dangerous Sermon is a logical follow-up to Thomas's previous book, How to Preach a Dangerous Sermon.It equips preachers to say what must be said, in a way that it is heard, so that the sermon has a chance to do its work on human hearts, without negative consequences.
Download or read book Evangelism and Mission written by Benjamin Argak Kwashi and published by . This book was released on 2018-03-09 with total page 164 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Archbishop Kwashi's towering experience as a frontline practitioner in the Mission of the Church over several years is condensed in this book. This is a compelling companion to all obedient disciples to the Supreme mandate of Jesus Christ to the Church as far as the eternal destiny of the lost is concerned.
Download or read book The Compelling Community written by Mark Dever and published by Crossway. This book was released on 2015-04-16 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The local church is meant to embody the vibrant diversity of the global church, transcending racial, cultural, and economic boundaries. Yet local churches too often simply reflect the same societal divisions prevalent in our world today—making them more akin to social clubs filled with like-minded people than the supernatural community the New Testament prescribes. Pastors Mark Dever and Jamie Dunlop argue that authentic fellowship is made up of two crucial ingredients: commitment (depth) and diversity (breadth). Theologically rooted yet extremely practical, this book sets forth basic principles that will help pastors guide their churches toward the compelling community that we all long for.
Download or read book Burying White Privilege written by Miguel A. De La Torre and published by Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. This book was released on 2018-12-11 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Short. Timely. Poignant. Pointed. Burying White Privilege is all of these and more. This is the book that everybody who cares about contemporary American Christianity will want to read. Many people wonder how white Christians could not only support Donald Trump for president but also rush to defend an accused child molester running for the US Senate. In a 2017 essay that went viral, Miguel A. De La Torre boldly proclaimed the death of Christianity at the hands of white evangelical nationalists. He continues sounding the death knell in this book. De La Torre argues that centuries of oppression and greed have effectively ruined evangelical Christianity in the United States. Believers and clerical leaders have killed it, choosing profits over prophets. The silence concerning—if not the doctrinal justification of—racism, classism, sexism, and homophobia has made white Christianity satanic. Prophetically calling Christian nationalists to repentance, De La Torre rescues the biblical Christ from the distorted Christ of white Christian imagination.
Download or read book A Call to Resurgence written by Mark A. Driscoll and published by Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.. This book was released on 2013 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It’s tempting to believe that the Christian faith is alive and well in our country today. Our politicians talk about God. Our mega-churches are filled. Christian schools dot our landscape. Brace yourself. It’s an illusion. Believe it or not, only 8 percent of Americans profess and practice true evangelical Christian faith. There are more left-handed people than evangelical Christians in America. In this book, Mark Driscoll delivers a wake-up call for every believer: We are living in a post-Christian culture—a culture fundamentally at odds with faith in Jesus. This is good and bad news. The good news is that God is still working, redeeming people from this spiritual wasteland and inspiring a resurgence of faithful believers. The bad news is that many believers just don’t get it. They continue to gather exclusively into insular tribes, lobbing e-bombs at each other in cyberspace. Mark’s book is a clarion call for Christians. It’s time to get to work. We can only do this if we unite around Jesus and the essentials found in his Word, while at the same time, appreciating the distinctives within each Christian tribe. Mark shows us how to do just that. This isn’t the time to wait or debate. Join the resurgence.
Download or read book Connections A Lectionary Commentary for Preaching and Worship written by Joel B. Green and published by Westminster John Knox Press. This book was released on 2020-04-14 with total page 584 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Designed to empower preachers as they lead congregations to connect their lives to Scripture, Connections features a broad set of interpretive tools that provide commentary and worship aids on the Revised Common Lectionary. This nine-volume series offers creative commentary on each reading in the three-year lectionary cycle by viewing that reading through the lens of its connections to the rest of Scripture and then seeing the reading through the lenses of culture, film, fiction, ethics, and other aspects of contemporary life. Commentaries on the Psalms make connections to the other readings and to the congregations experience of worship. Connections is published in partnership with Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary.
Download or read book The Breadth of Salvation written by Tom Greggs and published by Baker Academic. This book was released on 2020-07-21 with total page 141 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: All too often, the Christian understanding of salvation has been one-dimensional, reducing all that God has done for us to a single conception or idea. Tom Greggs, one of today's leading theologians, offers a brief, accessibly written, but theologically substantive treatment of the doctrine of salvation. Drawing on the broad tradition of the church and the Christian faith in explaining the Christian understandings of salvation, Greggs challenges the contemporary church to be captured afresh by the immeasurable height, depth, and breadth of God's saving actions.
Download or read book The Gadfly Papers written by Todd Eklof and published by . This book was released on 2019-05-28 with total page 151 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Gadfly Papers is a collection of three essays written by Rev. Dr. Todd F. Eklof about the negative impacts the emerging culture of Political Correctness, Safetyism, and Identitarianism is having on America's most liberal religion. It's written specifically for Unitarian Universalists who care about the future of their faith, but will prove of interest to anyone seeking to understand how today's identity politics can fundamentally alter any institution, and presents a seminal case-study for researchers of this timely subject. The Gadfly Papers is a substantive, well argued work that's based on plenty of credible scholarship, yet is written in a conversational tone that makes its complex subject matter easy to understand. Whether you're a Unitarian Universalist, a student of history, social science, politics, or simply value the rare but refreshing application of logic, The Gadfly Papers is a book you won't put down until it's finished.
Download or read book Preaching to Convert written by John Fletcher and published by University of Michigan Press. This book was released on 2013-11-13 with total page 413 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Preaching to Convert offers an intriguing new perspective on the outreach strategies of U.S. evangelicals, framing them as examples of activist performance, broadly defined as acts performed before an audience in the hopes of changing hearts and minds. Most writing about activist performance has focused on left-progressive causes, events, and actors. Preaching to Convert argues against such a constricted view of activism and for a more nuanced understanding of U.S. evangelicalism as a movement defined by its desire to win converts and spread the gospel. The book positions evangelicals as a diverse, complicated group confronting the loss of conservative Christianity’s default status in 21st-century U.S. culture. In the face of an increasingly secular age, evangelicals have been reassessing models of outreach. In acts like handing out Bible tracts to strangers on the street or going door-to-door with a Bible in hand, in elaborately staged horror-themed morality plays or multimillion-dollar creationist discovery centers, in megachurch services beamed to dozens of satellite campuses, and in controversial “ex-gay” ministries striving to return gays and lesbians to the straight and narrow, evangelicals are redefining what it means to be deeply committed in a pluralist world. The book’s engaging style and careful argumentation make it accessible and appealing to scholars and students across a range of fields.
Download or read book Finding St Paul in Film written by Richard Walsh and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2005-11-07 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Paul goes to the movies and finds himself, Zelig-like, in many contemporary films.
Download or read book Disunity in Christ written by Christena Cleveland and published by InterVarsity Press. This book was released on 2013-10-04 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Despite Jesus' prayer that all Christians "be one," divisions have been epidemic in the body of Christ. Though we may think we know why this happens, Christena Cleveland says we probably don't. Learn the hidden reasons behind conflict and divisions, the unseen dynamics at work that tend to separate us from others. Here are the tools we need to build bridges.
