Alumni Authors: Biblical Studies

Churches of all kinds and sizes will value these time-tested, practical, and contemporary ideas for efficient church management. Especially useful for lay persons.

Profession-als, Men and Women Partnering with the Trinity in Everyday Life, proposes a fairly simple but revolutionary concept. The Trinitarian God of the Universe calls men and women everywhere to partnership in (Re) Creating, Redeeming and Sustaining the cosmos, starting with the establishment of the Kingdom of God here on planet earth. Profession-als takes a historical look at the concept of vocation and pushes you toward a more personal profession of that call. You'll recapture some of the thinking of past generations of reformers, and be moved into this incredible current movement of faith in the world that is in need of a vision and theological framework proposed by the author.

Engages children with multiple learning styles using a familiar medium--LEGO® bricks Building Faith Brick by Brick offers a culturally relevant, hands-on way to explore faith stories with a broad range of ages. It grew out of one congregation's realization that there was a large group of first-grade boys who needed to engage in a new way of interacting with the biblical story. Knowing how much Lego® bricks continue to be popular with children, the author dug deep into the well of creativity and an enormous bin of little plastic building bricks to meld together a new way of teaching the stories of God. This book offers the methodology as well as 30 Old Testament and 24 New Testament stories with lesson plans.

Renowned for preaching and the growth of his church, Cathedral International, from 125 members to over 7,000 today, Bishop Donald Hilliard shows church leaders how to grow spiritually healthy congregations. He begins by offering an understanding of healthy church growth, defines the mega-church phenomenon, and alerts leaders to the need to be aware of healthy vs. unhealthy church growth. In his section on having the right foundation, issues such as vision, the centrality of Christ, biblical preaching, the priority of holy living, sound doctrine, being people-oriented rather than program-oriented, the importance of tithing, and good Christian education are lifted up and discussed as tools. Hilliard pinpoints the signs leaders should look for in knowing their churches are growing in a healthy manner, and includes a discussion of satellite, extension churches and new church plants as signs of healthy growth. Prophetic preaching of the

The book begins with a visit to the long-neglected site of ancient Magdala on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee. Unexcavated and slipping into the sea, Migdal stands as a reminder of the lost history of Mary Magdalene, and of ancient women. From Migdal, the reader moves back in history, looking through Mary's legends to her fame and notoriety. Mary's medieval and modern legends are contrasted sharply with her depiction in the Gnostic and apocryphal materials of Tomas and Philip. The scrolls of Nag Hammadi are discussed, and Mary's role as visionary and leader are looked at, all giving a portrait of Mary's prominence in the early centuries of Christianity. Mary's story is part of an overall egalitarian and mystical movement that interpreted the absence of Jesus' body as a powerful and prophetic sign of God's vindication of the world's suffering. The conclusion takes us back to the contemporary world. A reconstruction of Mary Magdalene and a Magdalene Christianity might be a source for social transformation. An epilogue, completely new to this book, looks at the phenomenon of The Da Vinci Code.

Was Jesus a wisdom sage or an apocalyptic prophet? Did later followers view him as the Danielic "Son of Man" or did he use this expression for himself? These are familiar questions among historical Jesus scholars, and there has been much debate over Jesus' eschatological outlook since the controversial work of the Jesus Seminar. This book asks what is at stake in these debates and explores how scholarly constructions of Christian origins participate in contemporary efforts to confirm or challenge particular understandings of the essence of Christianity. Proposing that a Jesus-centered perspective has overly shaped our interpretation of the sayings source Q, Johnson-DeBaufre offers alternative readings to key Q texts, readings that place an interest in the community that shaped Jesus at the center of inquiry.

Among the many pressing social concerns that have galvanized evangelical Christians' response--abortion, human trafficking, environmental degradation, and many others--the care of animals has received relatively little attention. Yet as author Sarah Withrow King deftly uncovers in Vegangelical, animal stewardship is a necessary aspect of a holistic ethic of Christian peace and justice. Indeed, care for animal welfare correspondingly strengthens our care for environmental and human flourishing. Practical, restrained in its conclusions, and grounded on a broader theology of Christian compassion, Vegangelical calls readers to a greater attentiveness to one of the primary relationships in God's created order, that between humans and animals.

Why should Christians care about animals? Is there a biblical basis for abstaining from eating animals? Is avoiding companies that use (and misuse) animals a viable way for Christians to better live out the message of God?In Animals Are Not Ours, Sarah Withrow King makes the argument that care for all of creation is no "far-fetched" idea that only radical people would consider, but rather a faithful witness of the peaceful kingdom God desires and Jesus modeled. This includes all living and breathing creatures that share this earth with us. King uses her decade-plus experience as a vegan, her seminary education, her evangelical Christian faith, and her years working with PETA to call Christians to examine how we treat and view the nonhuman animals with whom we share a finite planet.

Dozens of resources help churches seeking new pastoral leadership, but what about the ministers who are seeking a specific ministry call? How can a pastor discern when to stay or where to go? Denominational leaders Riley Walker and Marcia Patton begin this practical and spiritual guide with the conviction that it is Gods Spirit that guides ministry transition. Therefore, the transition process is essentially and uniquely spiritual, as ministers evaluate their current ministry settings and consider new contexts. The book does not offer to pastors and other ministry leaders a specific course but a plan for the journey. The authors identify common areas of concern, frequent pitfalls and missteps, and oft-traveled routes to a successful transition. Includes practical resources such as personal skill assessments, an overview of the typical search and call process, sample interview questions, and best practices for ending ones service with integrity and grace.

In The Work of the Associate Pastor, author Alan R. Rudnick presents the associate pastorate as equally important but distinctively different from the role of senior or solo pastor. Within these pages, readers will Explore the diverse roles and responsibilities that fall under the associate umbrella Embrace associate ministry as more than training ground for a senior pastorate Discover the challenges and opportunities for associate pastors The book's appendix offers these practical resources for churches: How to plan for an associate Sample job descriptions Compensation guidelines Associate ministers also will find a personal assessment, helpful in discerning when to stay and when to leave their associate position. Whether you are an associate pastor, a senior pastor, a seminarian, or a member of the church staff or pastoral relations committee, this guide will provide valuable insight into one of the most undervalued and misunderstood ministries in the life of the church. Book jacket.

What Are You Missing? Peter Scazzero learned the hard way: you can't be spiritually mature while remaining emotionally immature. Even though he was pastor of a growing church, he did what most people do: Avoid conflict in the name of Christianity Ignore his anger, sadness, and fear Use God to run from God Live without boundaries Eventually God awakened him to a biblical integration of emotional health, a relationship with Jesus, and the classic practices of contemplative spirituality. It created nothing short of a spiritual revolution, utterly transforming him and his church. In this book Scazzero outlines his journey and the signs of emotionally unhealthy spirituality. Then he provides seven biblical, reality-tested ways to break through to the revolutionary life Christ meant for you. "The combination of emotional health and contemplative spirituality," he says, "unleashes the Holy Spirit inside us so that we might experientially know the power of an authentic life in Christ."

The Emotionally Healthy Church, Updated and Expanded Edition, the newly updated and expanded edition of the groundbreaking bestseller The Emotionally Healthy Church, features a fuller, deeper look at the six principles contained in the original and includes a crucial, additional chapter: Slow Down to Lead with Integrity. New Life Fellowship in Queens, New York, had it all: powerful teaching, dynamic ministries, an impressive growth rate, and a vision to do great works for God. Things looked good--but beneath the surface, circumstances were more than just brewing. They were about to boil over, forcing Peter Scazzero to confront needs in his church and himself that went deeper than he'd ever imagined. What he learned about the vital link between emotional health, relational depth, and spiritual maturity can shed new light on painful problems in your own church. In this revised and expanded edition of his Gold Medallion Award-winning book, Scazzero shares refreshing new insights and a different and challenging slant on what it takes to lead your congregation to wholeness and maturity in Christ. Our churches are in trouble, says Scazzero. They are filled with people who are * unsure how to biblically integrate anger, sadness, and other emotions * defensive, incapable of revealing their weaknesses * threatened by or intolerant of different viewpoints * zealous about ministering at church but blind to their spouses' loneliness at home * so involved in "serving" that they fail to take care of themselves * prone to withdraw from conflict rather than resolve it Sharing from New Life Fellowship's painful but liberating journey, Scazzero reveals exactly how the truth can and does make you free--not just superficially, but deep down. This expanded edition of The Emotionally Healthy Church not only takes the original six principles further and deeper, but also adds a seventh crucial principle. You'll acquire knowledge and tools that can help you and others: * look beneath the surface of problems * break the power of past wounds, failures, sins, and circumstances * live a life of brokenness and vulnerability * recognize and honor personal limitations and boundaries * embrace grief and loss * make incarnation your model to love others * slow down to lead with integrity This new edition shares powerful insights on how contemplative spirituality can help you and your church slow down--an integral key to spiritual and emotional health. The Emotionally Healthy Church, Updated and Expanded Edition includes story after story of people at New Life whose lives have been changed by the concepts in this book. Open these pages and find out how your church can turn a new corner on the road to spiritual maturity.

In his book Faithonomics, K. Brad Stamm brings together the Scriptures, basic economic principles, and popular culture in an entertaining way, appealing to the informed and the uninformed about economics and Christian worldview. If you want to learn about a topic more talked about than the weather, or if you want to reflect on your spiritual life from a new perspective, Faithonomics is a book that will encourage, enrich, and bring new insight.

New Monasticism is a growing movement of committed Christians who are recovering the radical discipleship of monasticism and unearthing a fresh expression of Christianity in America. It's not centered in a traditional monastery--many New Monastics are married with children--but instead its members live radically, settling in abandoned sections of society, committing to community, sharing incomes, serving the poor, and practicing spiritual disciplines. New Monasticism by Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove offers an insider's perspective into the life of the New Monastics and shows how this movement is dependent on the church for stability, diversity, and structure. A must-read for New Monastics or those considering joining the movement, it will also appeal to pastors, leaders, those interested in the emerging church, and 20- and 30-somethings searching for new ways to be Christian.

We learn who we are as we walk together in the way of Jesus. So I want to invite you on a pilgrimage. Rwanda is often held up as a model of evangelization in Africa. Yet in 1994, beginning on the Thursday of Easter week, Christians killed other Christians, often in the same churches where they had worshiped together. The most Christianized country in Africa became the site of its worst genocide. With a mother who was a Hutu and a father who was a Tutsi, author Emmanuel Katongole is uniquely qualified to point out that the tragedy in Rwanda is also a mirror reflecting the deep brokenness of the church in the West. Rwanda brings us to a cry of lament on our knees where together we learn that we must interrupt these patterns of brokenness But Rwanda also brings us to a place of hope. Indeed, the only hope for our world after Rwanda's genocide is a new kind of Christian identity for the global body of Christ--a people on pilgrimage together, a mixed group, bearing witness to a new identity made possible by the Gospel.

2018 Foreword INDIES Book of the Year Award Finalists - Multicultural "I am a man torn in two. And the gospel I inherited is divided." Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove grew up in the Bible Belt in the American South as a faithful church-going Christian. But he gradually came to realize that the gospel his Christianity proclaimed was not good news for everybody. The same Christianity that sang, "Amazing grace, how sweet the sound" also perpetuated racial injustice and white supremacy in the name of Jesus. His Christianity, he discovered, was the religion of the slaveholder. Just as Reconstruction after the Civil War worked to repair a desperately broken society, our compromised Christianity requires a spiritual reconstruction that undoes the injustices of the past. Wilson-Hartgrove traces his journey from the religion of the slaveholder to the Christianity of Christ. Reconstructing the gospel requires facing the pain of the past and present, from racial blindness to systemic abuses of power. Grappling seriously with troubling history and theology, Wilson-Hartgrove recovers the subversiveness of the gospel that sustained the church through centuries of slavery and oppression, from the civil rights era to the Black Lives Matter movement and beyond. When the gospel is reconstructed, freedom rings for both individuals and society as a whole. Discover how Jesus continues to save us from ourselves and each other, to repair the breach and heal our land.

If the church is more than just a building, what could it mean to live in it--to inhabit it as a way of life? From their location in new monastic communities, Otto, Stock, and Wilson-Hartgrove ask what the church can learn from St. Benedict's vows of conversion, obedience, and stability about how to live as the people of God in the world. In storytelling and serious engagement with Scripture, old wisdom breathes life into a new monasticism. But, like all monastic wisdom, these reflections are not just for monks. They speak directly to the challenge of being the church in America today and the good news Christ offers for the whole world.