Pastoral Helps
Showing 401–450 of 4114 results
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Revelation
$45.00Add to cartTo craft informed sermons, pastors scour commentaries that often deal more with minutia than the main point. Or they turn to devotional commentaries, which may contain exegetical weaknesses. The Teach the Text Commentary Series bridges this gap by utilizing the best of biblical scholarship and providing the information a pastor needs to communicate the text effectively. By keeping the discussion of each carefully selected preaching unit to six pages of focused commentary, the volumes in this series allow pastors to quickly grasp the big idea and key themes of each passage of Scripture. Each unit of the commentary includes the big idea and key themes of the passage; sections dedicated to understanding, teaching, and illustrating the text; and full-color illustrations, maps, and photos.
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Following Jesus The Son
$8.99Add to cartDetermined to return humanity to the original hopes and dreams for us, God the Father sent Jesus the Son to our world to free us from our self-inflicted bondage. Jesus came to restore our relationship with God. Encounter Jesus in new ways!
The Holy Life Bible Study Series is a practical discipleship tool for both new and seasoned Christians. Author Frank Moore takes readers on a journey that unpacks theological truths of faith in a way that is both inspirational and motivating. He invites us to discover the incredible love of a God who empowers us to overcome any circumstance to live with joy, peace, and power-a God who calls us to take part in his divine nature.
Each book in the series includes thought-provoking questions to stimulate discussion in a small-group study setting.
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Pastoral Theology In The Baptist Tradition
$26.99Add to cartA veteran Baptist pastor and ministry professor offers a distinctive free church vision for pastoral ministry, attending to voices from the past four centuries as they speak about the practice of pastoral ministry. The book contains theological reflection on current ministry issues among Baptists based on biblical and historical foundations and reflects a diversity of Baptist life across time and around the world, including many different kinds of voices. Each chapter contains reflection questions to help readers consider the implications of Baptist thinking.
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God Of The Dangerous Sermon
$19.99Add to cartEvery sermon has a theology, and a god of that theology behind it. Preaching is more effective, and has more integrity when preachers understand the god behind their theology. Specifically, whether the god is a universal God, like the one expressed by Christ and the Christian faith, or a tribal god, which is sometimes dressed up to resemble Christianity but is something else entirely.
Frank A. Thomas culminates his exploration of the Dangerous Sermon with this book, which leads readers through the process of identifying and understanding the gods behind theology, and their connection to preaching. The reader is equipped to discern the metaphors, symbols, and rhetorical indicators which point to the god a preacher is serving and calling others to serve.
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Pastoral Theology In The Baptist Tradition
$49.99Add to cartA veteran Baptist pastor and ministry professor offers a distinctive free church vision for pastoral ministry, attending to voices from the past four centuries as they speak about the practice of pastoral ministry. The book contains theological reflection on current ministry issues among Baptists based on biblical and historical foundations and reflects a diversity of Baptist life across time and around the world, including many different kinds of voices. Each chapter contains reflection questions to help readers consider the implications of Baptist thinking.
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1-2 Samuel
$45.00Add to cartTo craft informed sermons, pastors scour commentaries that often deal more with minutia than the main point. Or they turn to devotional commentaries, which may contain exegetical weaknesses. The Teach the Text Commentary Series bridges this gap by utilizing the best of biblical scholarship and providing the information a pastor needs to communicate the text effectively. By keeping the discussion of each carefully selected preaching unit to six pages of focused commentary, the volumes in this series allow pastors to quickly grasp the big idea and key themes of each passage of Scripture. The text and its meaning are made clear, and sections dedicated to effectively teaching and illustrating the text help pastors prepare to preach. Full-color illustrations, maps, and photos are included throughout each volume to illustrate the world and events described in the Bible.
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Christian Meditation In Clinical Practice
$40.99Add to cartChristians are hungry for a return to their own tradition to cultivate meditation practices that are both psychologically and spiritually fruitful.
In recent decades, mindfulness meditation, which originates from the Buddhist tradition, has been embraced in many settings as a method for addressing a plethora of symptoms. What would it look like to turn instead to the Christian faith for resources to more effectively identify and respond to psychological suffering? Over the last decade, Dr. Joshua Knabb has conducted a variety of empirical studies on Christian meditation, focusing on both building theory and testing specific, replicable practices. In this overview and workbook he presents the foundations of a Christian-sensitive approach to meditation in clinical practice. Filled with practical features for immediate use by Christian clients and their therapists, Christian Meditation in Clinical Practice provides:
*an introduction to the rich resources on meditation from eight major streams of the Christian tradition
*practices from the early desert Christians, Ignatius of Loyola, Celtic Christians, the Puritans, contemporary writers, and many others
*guidance for targeting transdiagnostic processes–patterns of cognition, affect, behavior, the self, and relationships that may lead to psychological suffering
*research-based evidence for the benefits of Christian meditation
*client-friendly tools for practicing meditation, including step-by-step instructions, worksheets, journaling prompts, and links to tailored audio resources
Using the approach of Christian psychology, Knabb’s model dually builds on a biblical worldview and integrates the latest research in clinical psychology. As clients engage the variety of meditative exercises in this book, they will move toward healthier responses to difficult experiences and a deeper awareness of, and contentment in, God.
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Not Quite Fine
$16.99Add to cartA practical guide for people who care
There is no time in history and no place in the world where so many people have understood themselves to be suffering from mental health problems. There is also virtually no time and no place in the world where people who are suffering have been so readily ostracized.
In Not Quite Fine, author Carlene Hill Byron tackles the mounting dilemmas that pastors and churches face around mental health. Medicines and therapies have their roles in supporting those who live with mental health problems or mental illness. But God’s own body as the church is intended to be our greatest support in this world. How can the church step up for such a time as this? How can the body of Christ become a healing community for its members in pain–a place where the weary find strength for the journey, a place where those who mourn are raised up as rebuilders of the cities left in ruins?
Drawing on her own history of mental health problems and her experience as a teacher and lay counselor, Byron offers words of hope for those who struggle as well as practical insights to equip congregations to better support those who are suffering in their midst.
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Living By The Holy Spirit
$8.99Add to cartThe Father and Son gave believers the Holy Spirit to be with us and live in us. The transforming power of the Spirit conforms us to the image of Christ as we allow Him to work freely in our lives. Life in the Spirit accomplishes God’s hopes and dreams for your abundant living!The Holy Life Bible Study Series is a practical discipleship tool for both new and seasoned Christians. Author Frank Moore takes readers on a journey that unpacks theological truths of faith in a way that is both inspirational and motivating. He invites us to discover the incredible love of a God who empowers us to overcome any circumstance to live with joy, peace, and power-a God who calls us to take part in his divine nature. Each book in the series includes thought-provoking questions to stimulate discussion in a small-group study setting.
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Meeting God The Father
$8.99Add to cartGod created humanity in love. God placed humanity in a perfect environment with parental hopes and dreams for abundant living. Return to your roots and explore all God has in mind for you!
The Holy Life Bible Study Series is a practical discipleship tool for both new and seasoned Christians. Author Frank Moore takes readers on a journey that unpacks theological truths of faith in a way that is both inspirational and motivating. He invites us to discover the incredible love of a God who empowers us to overcome any circumstance to live with joy, peace, and power-a God who calls us to take part in his divine nature.
Each book in the series includes thought-provoking questions to stimulate discussion in a small-group study setting.
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You Were Made For This Moment Study Guide Plus Streaming Video (Student/Study Gu
$19.99Add to cartRacial divides. Political strife. Uncertain futures. This is the story of our day. But it is also the story of the exiles in Persia. The Jewish people had been taken from their homeland. They were being pressured to conform to foreign customs. They were facing discrimination. Now, an edict was being issued that would stamp out the Jewish race forever. Everything seemed to be falling apart for God’s people. But then two figures emerge on the scene . . . and everything changes.
As Max Lucado relates in this five-session study (DVD/digital downloads sold separately), Esther and Mordecai are these unlikely heroes of the tale. Both had spent their lives trying to fit in and conform. But both experience a turning point-a crucial moment where they choose to step up and stand out for the God they served. As a result of their courageous actions, winter turned to springtime for God’s people. They emerged from the crisis stronger, more unified, and more committed to serving the God of their forefathers, even in their exile.
The promise for God’s people in the book of Esther is the same promise that we have today. Our God triumphs in troubled times. When it seems as if everything is falling into pieces, he is working in our midst, causing everything to fall into place. The very one who seeks to destroy us will be destroyed. Even when it appears that evil has won, and that there is no hope for our future, we can know God’s throne is still occupied. We will triumph in the end.
The question for you today is not whether God will show up on the scene. Rather, it is whether you will choose to be a part of it when he does. Will you, like Mordacai and Esther, realize you are a position “for such a time as this” (Esther 4:14)? God is calling you to rise up in these chaotic times. You were made for this moment.
Sessions include:
1. The Problem of Conformity (Esther 1:1-2:18)
2. A Moment of Decision (Esther 2:19-4:14)
3. Heaven Set in Motion (Esther 4:15-6:14)
4. The God of Great Turnarounds (Esther 7:1-8:17)
5. Remembering God’s Faithfulness (Esther 9:1-10:3)Designed for use with You Were Made for This Moment Video Study (sold separately).
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Women Of The Bible
$11.99Add to cartLoaded with charts, graphs, images, and fascinating facts, the Women of the Bible: Old Testament Bible Study is easy enough that the new believer understands, but in-depth enough that the longtime churchgoer still comes away learning something new.
This six-session Bible study explores the impact of incredible women from the Old Testament. With fascinating historical insights and engaging discussion questions, you’ll learn about Old Testament women such as:
*The outspoken matriarch Rebecca
*Five daughters who reshaped the law for women in ancient Israel
*The outstanding judge Deborah and the feisty warrior Jael
*A life-saving wise woman of a city under siege
*The hospitable woman of Shunem
*Lady Wisdom from the book of Proverbs who is the picture of wise living -
Evangelism : How To Share The Gospel Faithfully
$29.99Add to cartPaul’s challenge to Timothy 2,000 years ago remains a clarion call for pastors today: “Do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry” (2 Tim 4:5). Because evangelism is the central work of a Christian’s life, there is a great need for pastors to understand what evangelism is and what makes it effective. Much of modern evangelical culture has become memorized conversations, pre-packaged formulas, and programmatic approaches that serve as poor substitutes for the simple proclamation of the gospel. In Evangelism: How to Share the Gospel Faithfully, John MacArthur along with pastors, missionaries, and church planters from Grace Community Church give the summons to return to the basics.
Evangelism covers four primary topics:
*Theological presuppositions and biblical foundations of evangelism
*Evangelism from a pastoral perspective
*One-on-one witnessing
*How outreach fits into and shapes the activities of the local churchYou’ll learn theological principles of sharing the gospel and practical approaches to incorporating outreach into your life, including specialized areas, like:
*Sharing the gospel with children and youth
*Witnessing to those with special needs
*Working with people suffering from addiction
*Immigrant outreach International missionsThere is an urgent need for the gospel in today’s fallen world. This insightful guide to biblical evangelism will ignite your passion and equip you to spread the gospel faithfully from your pulpit, in your church, and within your community.
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Everyday Connections For Year C
$40.00Add to cartThis beautifully bound volume provides a full fifty-two weeks of devotional prompts based on the Revised Common Lectionary for Year C. Drawing from the insightful Bible commentaries in the Connections series, each week of offerings also includes scriptural and literary readings, lectio divina, spiritual practices, questions for journaling, and a prayer. This resource has been crafted with mainline, lectionary preachers and lay leaders in mind, both to supplement their planning for the week and to feed their souls in the midst of the work of ministry.
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All The Good Leader Guide (Teacher’s Guide)
$14.99Add to cartIn All the Good: A Wesleyan Way of Christmas, a group of diverse Wesleyan scholars will take you on an Advent journey guided by the practices in John Wesley’s means of grace. In four sessions of study, prayer, and conversation, readers will look at preparing the way for God, the discipline of prayer, the substance of good works, and the recognition of God’s presence with us in communities that are called to serve the world.
This Advent learn and practice works of mercy and works of piety examining on how God’s love is embodied in communities of faith in the world.
The Leader Guide includes session outline for each group meeting with Scripture, prayer, opening activity, discussion questions, activity, and ending call to action.
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Heart That Grew Three Sizes Childrens Leader Guide (Teacher’s Guide)
$18.99Add to cartWe don’t know why the Grinch hated Christmas. We just know he did. If we’re being honest, there’s probably something within the Christmas season celebration that awakens a Grinch within all of us. Maybe the gift we unwrap was all wrong, or memories that were supposed to be joyful never were. When everything seems wrong in the world, even joyful celebrations are much too loud.
In his new Advent study, Matt Rawle explores the faith themes in the Christmas classic, How the Grinch Stole Christmas including how did the Grinch’s heart grow three sizes come Christmas morning? How did Christmas save the Grinch? Could it be that the very thing we think we hate, is the one thing that changes our life?
Rediscover and reinvigorate your Christian faith this Advent and Christmas season and look at this familiar classic through the lens of faith.
The Children’s Leader Guide contains session ideas for younger and older children including games, activities, craft ideas, and reproducible handouts.
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Heart That Grew Three Sizes (Student/Study Guide)
$16.99Add to cartWe don’t know why the Grinch hated Christmas. We just know he did. If we’re being honest, there’s probably something within the Christmas season celebration that awakens a Grinch within all of us. Maybe the gift we unwrap was all wrong, or memories that were supposed to be joyful never were. When everything seems wrong in the world, even joyful celebrations are much too loud.
In his new Advent study, Matt Rawle explores the faith themes in the Christmas classic, How the Grinch Stole Christmas including how did the Grinch’s heart grow three sizes come Christmas morning? How did Christmas save the Grinch? Could it be that the very thing we think we hate, is the one thing that changes our life?Rediscover and reinvigorate your Christian faith this Advent and Christmas season and look at this familiar classic through the lens of faith.
Additional components for a four-week Advent study include a DVD featuring Matt Rawle, a comprehensive Leader Guide, and resources for children and youth.
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Forming Resilient Children
$24.99Add to cartMany children today are growing up in the midst of adversity, whether family difficulties or larger societal crises.
All children need to be able to deal with stress, cope with challenges, and persevere through disappointments. While we cannot protect children from all hardships, we can promote healthy development that fosters resilience. In this interdisciplinary work, Holly Catterton Allen builds a bridge between resilience studies and children’s spiritual formation. Because children are spiritual beings, those who work with them can cultivate spiritual practices that are essential to their thriving in challenging times. This book equips educators, counselors, children’s ministers, and parents with ways of developing children’s spirituality to foster the resilience needed to face the ordinary hardships of childhood and to persevere when facing trauma. It offers particular insight into the spiritual experiences of children who have been hurt by life through chronic illness, disability, abuse, or disasters, with resources for healing and hope.
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Together In Ministry
$22.00Add to cartWomen and men are designed to work together in fulfilling God’s mission on earth.
Yet God’s original intent for equal partnership has been so distorted that churches and organizations continually struggle to foster healthy mixed-gender ministry collaboration. Is it even possible to return to the Genesis ideal of co-laborers in today’s contexts? Longtime ministry leader Rob Dixon knows it’s possible–though it takes intentionality, courage, and wisdom. Based on qualitative field research among ministry practitioners, Together in Ministry offers a prophetic roadmap for individuals and communities as they seek to develop flourishing ministry partnerships for women and men. Organized around the key domains of inner life, community culture, and intentional practices, this model identifies ten key attributes of partnerships that are both personally satisfying and missionally effective. For each attribute Dixon presents research findings and biblical examples, along with benefits, barriers, and practical next steps. With plenty of real-life stories from ministry leaders and reflection questions in each chapter, Together in Ministry casts a compelling–and encouraging–vision for flourishing partnerships and equips teams and individuals with next steps for making that vision a reality.
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Person Of Interest Investigators Guide (Student/Study Guide)
$14.99Add to cartImagine investigating a murder in which there was no crime scene, no physical evidence, and no victim’s body. How would you identify a person of interest in such a case?
Designed to be used alongside Person of Interest and the Person of Interest Video Study, this study guide will teach you the same investigative strategies used by detective J. Warner Wallace to examine the claims of history.
Dateline featured cold-case detective and bestselling author, J. Warner Wallace, has investigated a number of these “no body missing person” cases and has successfully identified and convicted the killers, even without the victim’s body or evidence from the crime scene.
Can the historicity of Jesus be investigated in the same way? Can the truth about Jesus be uncovered even without a body or a crime scene? In Person of Interest, Wallace describes his own personal investigative journey from atheism to Christianity, as he employs a unique investigative strategy to confirm the historicity and deity of Jesus–without relying on the New Testament manuscripts.
Imagine a scenario in which every New Testament document has been destroyed, Wallace carefully sifts through the evidence from history alone to reconstruct the identity of Jesus as the world’s most important person of interest.
Person of Interest will:
*Invite readers into the life of a cold-case detective as he uncovers the truth about Jesus, using the same approach he also employs to solve a real murder case*Teach readers how to become good detectives, using an innovative and unique “‘fuse’ and ‘fallout'” investigative strategy they can also use to examine other claims of history
*Help readers to explore common objections to Christianity
Concrete, compelling, and unique in its approach, Person of Interest will strengthen the faith of believers, while engaging those who are skeptical and distrusting of the New Testament.
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Stewardship : For The Care Of Souls
$19.99Add to cartStewardship isn’t just managing resources–it’s soul care.
Stewardship of time, talents, and treasure isn’t just about sustaining the material of the church. It’s about guiding those resources in service of the church’s primary mission: proclaiming the good news of Jesus Christ. Stewarding the lambs of Christ that make up your congregation encompasses all aspects of their lives–material and spiritual.
Nathan Meador and Heath R. Curtis present a practical theology of stewardship focused on ministry in service of the gospel. Guiding pastors away from the pitfalls of idolatry around money, they instead call stewards to embrace their identity in Christ and encourage their congregations to do the same. This fresh approach to stewardship reorients both individuals and congregations toward their true purpose as stewards who have been baptized into Christ.
Stewardship will help pastors to teach and preach stewardship as a call to repentance and new life.
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Preaching By Ear
$19.99Add to cartAccording to Kenton Anderson, professor of homiletics at ACTS Seminaries of Trinity Western University, this volume represents “a powerful tool” because it offers a new (actually old) model of preaching. For centuries, preaching has been shaped from a literary standpoint (i.e., reading, writing, outlining, and displaying sermons), but a premodern method of oral preparation and delivery has largely been forgotten. Preaching by Ear hearkens back to an earlier era when sermons were rooted inside the preacher and moved out in a natural and powerful way.
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Following : Embodied Discipleship In A Digital Age
$26.00Add to cartThis book offers theological perspectives on the challenges of discipleship in a digital age, showing how new technologies and the rise of social media affect the way we interact with each other, ourselves, and the world. Written by a Gen X digital immigrant and a millennial digital native, the book explores a faithful response to today’s technology as we celebrate our embodied roles as followers of Christ in a disembodied time.
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1 Corinthians For You
$17.99Add to cartThe scope of 1 Corinthians is breathtaking. Paul tackles a huge variety of subjects, and as he does so, he gives us a precious insight into what a local church is (or at least can be).
As Andrew Wilson walks through this compelling, challenging epistle, you’ll see how grace looks in every Christian and how it can shape every church–even a church as flawed as the Corinthian one.
This expository guide is less academic than a traditional commentary and includes lots of application. It can be read from cover to cover, used in personal devotions, used to lead small group studies, or used for sermon preparation.
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Worship Architect : A Blueprint For Designing Culturally Relevant And Bibli
$32.99Add to cartWorship professor and practitioner Constance Cherry shows how to create services that are faithful to Scripture, historically conscious, relevant to God, Christ-centered, and engaging for worshipers of all ages in the twenty-first century. More than 150 colleges and seminaries have used or currently use the first edition as a required text. In this new edition, each chapter has been substantially updated and revised, including illustrations, key terms, examples, technological references, and suggested resources for further reading. A new chapter on global worship and a new appendix on live-streamed worship are included.
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Difficult Words Of Jesus
$17.99Add to cartJesus provided his disciples teachings for how to follow Torah, God’s word; he told them parables to help them discern questions of ethics and of human nature; he offered them beatitudes for comfort and encouragement. But sometimes Jesus spoke words that followers then and now have found difficult. He instructs disciples to hate members of their own families (Luke 14:26), to act as if they were slaves (Matthew 20:27), and to sell their belongings and give to the poor (Luke 18:22). He restricts his mission (Matthew 10:6); he speaks of damnation (Matthew 8:12); he calls Jews the devil’s children (John 8:44).
In The Difficult Words of Jesus, Amy-Jill Levine shows how these difficult teachings would have sounded to the people who first heard them, how have they been understood over time, and how we might interpret them in the context of the Gospel of love and reconciliation.
Additional components for a six-week study include a DVD featuring Dr. Levine and a comprehensive Leader Guide.
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Acts Participant Workbook (Student/Study Guide)
$17.99Add to cartLearn to awaken to God’s Spirit today and every day by studying the Book of Acts with Melissa Spoelstra.
Whether it’s because of distractions, busyness, or a case of the blahs, we can experience a drift toward indifference in our spiritual lives. We have a need for an ongoing spiritual awakening if we want to become more aware of God’s presence and activity in our everyday lives.
In Acts: Awakening to God in Our Everyday Lives, a six-week study of the Book of Acts by Melissa Spoelstra, you will journey with the first followers of Jesus and witness the birth and growth of the early church through spiritual awakening to the power of God’s Spirit, message, freedom, grace, mission, and direction.
From their experiences you will learn postures that will help you attune your own spiritual heart to experience God’s presence, hear God’s voice, and see God at work all around.
This study offers a fresh encounter with God to prepare you to:
– Face daily battles
– Be able to discern the messages of our culture
– Be ready to share God’s love with others alwaysComponents for this six-week Bible study, each available separately, include a Participant Workbook, a Leader Guide, and video sessions with six 20 to 25-minute segments (with closed captioning).
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Integration Of Psychology And Christianity
$30.99Add to cartOver the course of recent decades, scholars and practitioners have been working to integrate contemporary psychology-related fields and Christianity.
This project continues to move forward, evidenced in associations, publications, degree programs, and conferences around the world. While much progress has been made, there are still foundational issues to be worked out and aspects of integration the community is just now venturing into. In this expert overview, psychologists William L. Hathaway and Mark A. Yarhouse take stock of the integration project to date, provide an introduction for those who wish to come on board, highlight work yet to be done, and offer a framework to strategically organize next steps. The authors’ attention encompasses five domains:
*worldview integration
*theoretical integration
*applied integration
*role integration
*personal integrationTheir comprehensive approach yields insights relevant for non-clinical areas of psychological science as well as for counseling, social work, and other related mental health fields. Done properly, integration enriches our understanding of both Christianity and psychology. Through biblical and theological grounding and numerous examples, Hathaway and Yarhouse demonstrate how synthesis can continue to serve the field and make a difference in caring for individual lives.
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Pastoral Leadership : For The Care Of Souls
$17.99Add to cartChrist’s sheep need shepherding. That’s where you come in.
With more than 60 years of ministry between them, Harold Senkbeil and Lucas Woodford have come to understand that everything in ministry–even administration, leadership, and planning–revolves around the ancient tradition of the care of souls. Pastors are entrusted with the care of a flock by the Good Shepherd and are called to be faithful to this task. But pastoring seems to be getting more and more difficult.
Based on a sound theological framework, Senkbeil and Woodford present a set of practical tools for church leadership and strategy. Calling on their vast experience, they encourage pastors to protect, guide, and feed their flock as Jesus would, bridging the eternal wisdom of the word of God with the everyday practicality of hands-on leadership. Originally published as Church Leadership & Strategy, this revision includes a new chapter and litany.
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Funerals : For The Care Of Souls
$17.99Add to cartDeath will strike your congregation. Are you ready? Are they?
Death has become a four-letter word. Whereas in previous generations, the practice of memento mori (“remember death”) was embedded in family life, people today have found ways to distance themselves from death. As Western culture becomes increasingly more secular, the Christian understanding of death and the funeral appear more and more strange.
Fear of death affects us all, and so pastors have significant hurdles to overcome. What Christians need today is a renewed vision of the traditional Christian funeral liturgy. In Funerals, Tim Perry recovers the rich theology inherent to the Christian funeral: communion with the saints in death, peace in forgiveness, hope in the resurrection, and joy in life eternal. Perry guides pastors through the practice of funerals, from planning the service to preaching the eulogy, and offers wisdom for the hard cases.
Perry’s Funerals will help pastors disciple their people to see through the valley of the shadow of death and into the hope beyond.
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Ephesians Study Guide Plus Streaming Video (Student/Study Guide)
$22.99Add to cartThe book of Ephesians is about identity. It’s about learning who we are, living who are, and then leveraging who we are. When we do that, we stop walking in defeat, and instead, walk with our heads held high.
Too often, our shoulders slump under the weight of family struggles, financial stress, and feelings of insecurity. We are pushed down by insignificance, insecurity, and an overwhelming sense of powerlessness, disappointment and discouragement.
You are not meant to be under that burden any longer. You are a chosen child of God, saved by His grace, forgiven and free. It’s time to walk with your head held high.
In this six-session video Bible study (DVD/digital downloads sold separately), Lori Wilhite draws on her experience as the pastor’s wife of the fifth largest congregation in the country located in the town otherwise named ‘Sin City’ to share the truth of what Paul tells the Ephesians about unity and its direct reflection of our hearts, our focus, and our love for God.
The Beautiful WordTM Bible Study Series helps you connect God’s Word to your daily life through vibrant video teaching, group discussion, and deep personal study that includes verse-by-verse reading, Scripture memory, coloring pages, and encouragement to receive your own beautiful Word from God. In each study, a central theme-a beautiful word-threads throughout the book, helping you connect and apply each book of the Bible to your daily life today, and forever.
Designed for use with Ephesians Video Study (sold separately).
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Worlds Greatest Sermons And Preachers
$16.99Add to cartRay Comfort and Kirk Cameron have compiled some of the signature sermons of the greatest Christian preachers in history. Join these “fathers of the faith” as they discuss a wide range of subjects, including the key to evangelism and how to reach souls.
Thanks to this treasured collection of classic Christian wisdom, you can experience…
*The eloquence of Charles Spurgeon
*The zeal of John Wesley
*The effectiveness of Jonathan Edwards
*The passion of Martin Luther
*The power of George Whitfield
*The brilliance of R. A. Torrey
*The influence of Gawin KirkhamThese men laid the foundation of evangelical Christianity that we carry on today. Discover the secret of their success and the truth that you, too, can win the lost!
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For The Common Good
$14.00Add to cartFor the Common Good reminds us that the Holy Spirit gives each Christian one or more spiritual gifts to be used for the common good. It guides readers to discover their own particular gifts and learn to use their gifts to serve others.
Examining key passages in Paul’s writings, author Christine Harman leads readers through a personal spiritual gift assessment. She names 25 distinct spiritual gifts-such as discernment, hospitality, compassion, evangelism, or music-and helps people explore scripture references on each one. After identifying their particular gifts, clergy and laypeople will learn how to apply them for the good of their church, community, and the world. This book is ideal for both group study and self-discovery. The book also includes suggestions for how to build a ministry team based on the gifts of each individual.
This book is the text for a Lay Servant Ministries advanced course on spiritual gifts. It also can be used for a small-group study.
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Transforming Worship : Planning And Leading Sunday Services As If Spiritual
$20.99Add to cartSpiritual formation is the key to the survival of our faith.
Stigmatized by scandal, the church in North America and throughout Europe has been branded as useless and irrelevant. To stem the tide of nominal Christianity, we need to get serious about making disciples who can make other disciples. There is an urgent need today for church services that are substantive and purposeful. Rory Noland is a worship leader who has led in contexts ranging from megachurches to small retreat settings such as the Transforming Center. Combining discipleship and worship–what Noland calls “Transforming Worship”–he offers a vision for worship as spiritual formation. We need to reclaim our worship services as a formative space, and through that we will become the light of Christ in a dark world.
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Stepping Out Of Denial Into Gods Grace Participants Guide 1 (Student/Study Guide
$7.99Add to cartThe Celebrate Recovery Participant’s Guides are essential tools for the personal recovery journey. In the six lessons in Guide 1: Stepping Out of Denial Into God’s Grace, you will experience the first 3 of the 8 recovery principles:
1 Realize I’m not God. I admit that I am powerless to control my tendency to do the wrong thing and that my life is unmanageable. “Happy are those who know they are spiritually poor” (Matthew 5:3).
2 Earnestly believe that God exists, that I matter to him, and that he has the power to help me recover. “Happy are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted” (Matthew 5:4).
3 Consciously choose to commit all my life and will to Christ’s care and control. “Happy are the meek” (Matthew 5:5).
By working through the lessons and exercises found in each of the four Participant’s Guides you will begin to experience the true peace and serenity you have been seeking, restore and develop stronger relationships with others and with God, and find freedom from life’s hurts, hang-ups, and habits. All the scriptures have been updated to the new NIV 2011 version.
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Celebrate Recovery Updated Participants Guide Set Volumes 1-4 (Student/Study Gui
$30.99Add to cartAlcoholism–Divorce–Sexual Abuse–Codependency–Domestic Violence–Drug Addiction–Sexual Addiction–Food Addiction–Gambling Addiction.
Move beyond your hurts, habits, and hang-ups to experience the forgiveness of Christ. The Journey Begins Participant Guides are essential tools in the Celebrate Recovery program for your personal recovery journey. These four guides by Pastor John Baker walk you through the eight recovery principles, drawn from the Beatitudes, upon which the 12-step Celebrate Recovery program is built.
This shrinkwrapped pack includes one each of all four participant’s guides for the Celebrate Recovery Program:
Guide 1: Stepping Out of Denial
Guide 2: Taking an Honest and Spiritual Inventory
Guide 3: Getting Right with God
Guide 4: Growing in ChristBy working through the lessons and exercises found in each of the four Participant’s Guides, you will begin to experience the true peace and serenity you have been seeking, restore and develop stronger relationships with others and with God, and find freedom from life’s hurts, habits, and hang-ups.
Note: This shrinkwrapped pack is identical to the participant’s guides included in the Celebrate Recovery Updated Curriculum Kit (9780310131601). Designed for use with the Celebrate Recovery Journal (9780310090342), sold separately.
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Taking An Honest And Spiritual Inventory Participants Guide 2 (Student/Study Gui
$7.99Add to cartThe Celebrate Recovery Participant’s Guides are essential tools for the personal recovery journey. In the five lessons in Guide 2: Taking an Honest and Spiritual Inventory, you will experience an in-depth look at the 4th principle in the recovery process:
4 Openly examine and confess my faults to God, to myself, and to someone I trust. “Happy are the pure in heart” (Matthew 5:8).
By working through the lessons and exercises found in each of the four Participant’s Guides you will begin to experience the true peace and serenity you have been seeking, restore and develop stronger relationships with others and with God, and find freedom from life’s hurts, hang-ups, and habits. All the scriptures have been updated to the new NIV 2011 version.
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Listening Hearts 30th Anniversary Edition (Anniversary)
$23.95Add to cartThis 30th anniversary edition presents the unique approach of Listening Hearts to the spiritual practice of discernment for a new generation.
Written to make the often elusive and usually clergy-centered spiritual practice of discernment accessible to all people, Listening Hearts features simple reflections and exercises drawn from scripture and from Quaker and Ignatian traditions. The seminal work in the Listening Hearts Series, this book has been a beloved resource for tens of thousands of individual readers, retreat participants, small groups, and church leaders listening for and responding to God’s call in their lives.
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Celebrate Recovery Updated Leaders Guide (Teacher’s Guide)
$21.99Add to cartThere is a way the church can help the wounded move beyond their hurts, habits, and hang-ups to experience the forgiveness of Christ. Celebrate Recovery helps the church fulfill its role as Christ’s healing agent. You don’t have to lead alone. To lead people forward in spiritual, physical, and emotional restoration is to walk in the footsteps of Christ. And that’s why the Celebrate Recovery Leader’s Guide is so important.
With everything you need to encourage lasting life-change, the leader’s guide is the best way to facilitate Celebrate Recovery in your church and help people look forward to a whole new future.
The Celebrate Recovery Leader’s Guide includes:
*Fresh testimonies
*A 90-day start-up strategy
*A clear, easy-to-follow format
*Step-by-step instructions for each meeting
*Guide for conducting leader training
*Teaching notes for the 25 lessons of The Journey Begins (Participant Guides 1-4)
*Overview of the 25 lessons of The Journey Continues (Participant Guides 5-8)Along with a willing heart, this leader’s guide is invaluable for leading men and women forward in complete restoration and transformation through Christ.
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Standard Lesson Commentary NIV Large Print Edition 2021-2022 (Large Type)
$22.99Add to cartAs the world’s most popular annual Bible commentary for more than two decades, Standard LessonCommentary (SLC) provides 52 weeks of study in a single volume and combines thorough Bible study with relevant examples and questions.
Key features include:
*Verse-by-verse explanation of the Bible text
*Detailed lesson context
*Pronunciation guide for difficult words
*Printed Scripture
*Discussion starters
*A review quiz for each quarterAvailable in the King James Version (KJV) and New International Version(R) (NIV) Bible translations, the SLC is based on the popular Uniform Series. This series, developed by scholars from numerous church fellowships, outlines an in-depth study of the Bible over a six-year period.
The four main themes of the 2021-2022 study are:
*Celebrating God–Exodus, 2 Samuel, Psalms, Mark, Acts, Revelation
*Justice, Law, History–Pentateuch, 2 Samuel, Ezra, Job, Isaiah, Nahum
*God Frees and Redeems–Deuteronomy, Ezra, Matthew, John, Romans, Galatians
*Partners in a New Creation–Isaiah, John, RevelationThe SLC is perfect as the primary resource for an adult Sunday School class, for personal study, or as a supplemental resource for any curriculum that follows the ISSL/Uniform Series. Nearly two dozen ministers, teachers, and Christian education specialists contribute their expertise to SLC.
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Love Your Church
$15.99Add to cartGod calls us to be devoted to one another in love (Romans 12:10). What does this look like for us today? How can we be the kind of church member who makes a real difference?
This engaging book by Tony Merida explores what church is, why being part of it is exciting, and why it’s worthy of our love and commitment. He sets out eight privileges and responsibilities of a church member: to belong, to welcome, to gather, to care, to serve, to honor, to witness and to send.
As we see how wonderful it is to belong to God’s family and be a part of his amazing witness to both the earthly and the heavenly realms, we’ll grow in our love for and commitment to our local church.
This is a great book for every churchgoer to read, whether they’re new or have been attending for some time but need re-energizing with God’s vision for the local church.
With a discussion guide at the end of the book, Love Your Church is also a great resource for small groups.
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Whats So Amazing About Grace Participants Guide Updated Edition (Student/Study G
$13.99Add to cartIn this six-session revised and updated video Bible study, bestselling author Philip Yancey explores the concept of grace-the one thing the world cannot duplicate and the one thing it craves above all else-and explores what it looks like in action. He also examines how Christians, as the sole dispensers, are doing at lavishing the grace on a world that knows far more of cruelty and unforgiveness than it does of mercy.
As Yancey explains, true grace is shocking and scandalous, for God does not excuse sin but always treasures the sinner. God always extends his grace to individuals regardless of what they have done-for no one is unforgiveable in his eyes. Grace thus shakes our conventions with its insistence on getting close to sinners and touching them with mercy and hope. It forgives the unfaithful spouse, the racist, the child abuser. It loves today’s AIDS-ridden addict as much as the tax collector of Jesus’ day.
Yancey offers compelling and true portraits of grace’s life-changing power. He searches for its presence in his own life and in the church. He asks how Christians today can contend graciously with moral issues that threaten all they hold dear. And he challenges each of us to become living answers to a world that desperately wants to know, “what’s so amazing about grace.”
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Caring Congregation Ministry
$19.99Add to cartPastors and congregations everywhere yearn to care for others, especially those who are suffering from loss or pain of any kind. But pastors cannot care for an entire church, and laity typically don’t have the training to do it. The Caring Congregation Ministry is a model for ministry that’s been proven to work in small and large churches across the U.S. It is a laity-centered ministry, where laypersons receive rigorous training and then are commissioned to serve as Congregational Care Ministers, caring for one another, for their own congregation.
This remarkable approach to congregational care was first developed by author Karen Lampe and her team at The United Methodist Church of the Resurrection, in Kansas City. It has been tested, refined, and strengthened, and is now being adapted in all sorts of congregational settings. One early adapter was co-author Melissa Gepford, who launched a Caring Congregation Ministry in her own rural church. Karen and Melissa have partnered to share this immensely practical guide for any pastor or leader seeking to create a version of this ministry in their own church.
This Implementation Guide is the main book for getting started. It introduces the ministry model and explains the Five Essentials which form the ministry’s foundation. It is extremely practical, full of checklists and other tools to help pastors and other leaders understand (and explain) this way of providing congregational care.
The Implementation Guide also includes a section focused on the crucial component of this ministry–the Congregational Care Minister, or CCM. This section fully describes the characteristics of CCM’s, how to recruit people to this ministry, how to discern if candidates are a good fit, and how to conduct the CCM training over a multi-week period. It details the critical information CCM’s must know, and the behaviors and habits they must practice in order to be effective.
Note that the companion book, The Caring Congregation Ministry: Care Minister’s Manual, is required for the CCM training. It serves as a training workbook, which then becomes the CCM’s personal reference manual.
The Implementation Guide closes with thoughtful and immediately helpful chapters full of information on situations involving special care, including personal crisis and trauma, community trauma, mental illness, recovery/addiction, and important considerations for doing this ministry in times of social distancing.
This book provides ev
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I Love Jesus But I Want To Die
$17.00Add to cartWhat happens when loving Jesus doesn’t cure you of depression, anxiety, or suicidal thoughts? You might be crushed by shame over your mental illness, only to be told by well-meaning Christians to “choose joy” and “pray more.” So you beg God to take away the pain, but nothing eases the ache inside. As darkness lingers and color drains from your world, you’re left wondering if God has abandoned you.
You just want a way out.
But there’s hope.
In I Love Jesus, But I Want to Die, Sarah J. Robinson offers a healthy, practical, and shame-free guide for Christians struggling with mental illness. With unflinching honesty, Sarah shares her story of battling depression and fighting to stay alive despite toxic theology that made her afraid to seek help outside the church. Pairing her own story with scriptural insights, mental health research, and simple practices, Sarah helps you reconnect with the God who is present in our deepest anguish and discover that you are worth everything it takes to get better.
Beautifully written and full of hard-won wisdom, I Love Jesus, But I Want to Die offers a path toward a rich, hope-filled life in Christ, even when healing doesn’t look like what you expect.
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Reawakened : How Your Congregation Can Spark Lasting Change
$16.99Add to cartDoes your church have gummed-up gears? Or are you activated for ministry?
Are you relevant in the community in which you serve? More and more people are moving away from the church–not because they lack faith in God, but because the church is no longer relevant to their lives. The church, not God, is the problem. There are eight keys to unlocking the power of relevance in your ministry. In the pages of [title], Glen Guyton, executive director of a Mennonite denomination, explores those keys and gives practical suggestions to churches for reaching out. Offering a biblical scaffold for the idea of the activated church and sharing stories from successful ministries that are actively engaging their communities, Reawakened helps Christians ask the big questions about God’s work in the world.
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Reawakened : Activate Your Congregation To Spark Lasting Change
$29.99Add to cartEvery church wants to make a lasting difference. Unlock the keys to how.
More and more people are moving away from the church-not because they lack faith in God but because the church is no longer relevant to their lives. The church, not God, is the problem. In Reawakened, Glen Guyton explores eight keys to developing the abilities of congregations to bring healing and hope to their communities. These eight keys give voice to the most urgent needs of a community and offer practical suggestions for how churches can spark holistic and lasting differences in their communities.
Built on a solid biblical framework, Rewakened positions churches as catalysts for transformative mission and change. Filled with stories from successful ministries that are actively engaging their communities, Reawakened helps Christians ask the big questions about God’s ongoing work in the world.
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Ministers Of Reconciliation
$21.99Add to cartRace is one of the most pressing issues of our time; How should pastors tackle it from the pulpit?
In this collection of essays, issues of race and ethnicity are explored from a variety of perspectives, offering guidance to pastors on how to address those topics in their own contexts. Each builds on a foundational passage of Scripture. With contributions from Bryan Loritts, Ray Ortlund, J. D. Greear, and more, Ministers of Reconciliation offers practical and biblically faithful approaches to the subject of race.
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How To Fight Racism Study Guide (Student/Study Guide)
$14.99Add to cartThe How to Fight Racism Study Guide, used together with the How to Fight Racism Video Study, provides groups and individuals with practical tools and suggestions, along with real-world examples of change, to enable them to become proactive initiators of racial justice.
Tisby offers an array of actionable items to confront racism in our relationships and in everyday life through a simple framework–the A.R.C. Of Racial Justice–that helps readers consistently interrogate their own actions and maintain a consistent posture of anti-racist action. This book is for anyone who believes it is time to stop compromising with racism and courageously confront it.
The study guide, along with the video study, offers readers the opportunity to be part of the solution to racial problems and suggests that the application of these principles can offer us hope that will transform our nation and the world. Tisby encourages us to reject passivity and become active participants in the struggle for human dignity across racial and ethnic lines. Readers of the book will come away with a clear model for how to think about race in productive ways and a compelling call to dismantle a social hierarchy long stratified by skin color.
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Pursued Womens Bible Study Leader Guide (Teacher’s Guide)
$15.99Add to cartDiscover how God is pursuing you as you explore His relentless love from Genesis to Revelation in Pursued by Jennifer Cowart.
We all want to be loved. We long to be desired, pursued-whether by a special someone, our friends, or others in our lives. This longing for love and acceptance is the underlying story of many of our lives, and it’s the overarching story we see throughout the Scriptures. Although the Bible tells many stories, the main theme is God’s relentless love for us.
In Pursued, a six-week Bible study by Jennifer Cowart, we will explore God’s great love for us from Genesis to Revelation. We will see that God passionately pursues people who do not deserve His love, and we are those people!
Like Cain, Abraham, Sarah, Rebekah, David, the woman caught in adultery, Peter, and so many others, we are the ones who have broken relationship with God. But He runs after us anyway to bring us home.
In this study, we will explore God’s love as evidenced in the stories of creation, the patriarchs, the judges and prophets, Jesus, and the early church. Together we will dive into a great love story and discover that it is our story!
Through this study women will:
*See the big picture of God’s love for them throughout the Scriptures
*Discover that God wants a personal relationship with them
*Experience God’s relentless love for them individually
*Realize that God never stops pursuing themComponents for this six-week Bible study, each available separately, include a Participant Workbook, a Leader Guide, and video sessions with six 20 to 25-minute segments (with closed captioning).
