Meditations for Advent


Book Description

Carefully selected to lift your soul to God in those hectic days that stretch from Thanksgiving to Christmas, these forty daily meditations will keep you mindful of the real meaning of Christmas while affording you an admirable distillation of the doctrines and piety of our Holy Catholic Church.




Light Amid Darkness


Book Description

More than mere autobiography, Light Amid Darkness presents an account of an English childhood set in the context of several generations of the Pope, Birkett, and Kelly families--each of which must strive to overcome the challenges, setbacks, and tragedies of their age. It is a tale of human loss and gain, of countless hardships faced and overcome, and of the enduring personal victory of love, hope, faith, and determination. The story commences during the reign of Queen Victoria--at the height of the British Empire--and it concludes during that of her great-granddaughter, the Second Elizabeth--at a time when Britain was coming to terms with the loss of that same empire. The themes of emigration, early life on the Canadian frontier, the promises of young love and the poignancy of love amidst the carnage of the Somme, the joy of marriage and the despair of abandonment, and growing up in wartime England--all are explored in this unique and cogent portrayal of an English childhood.




The Spirit-Led Leader


Book Description

In our postmodern, experience-oriented culture, people are longing for greater authenticity, integrity, and depth in their pastors and leaders. Board directors, church members, and staff alike are all eagerly seeking leaders who effectively integrate their spirituality and leadership. Pastors and executives, however, often struggle with knowing how to integrate their spiritual values and practices into their leadership and management roles. Designed for pastors, executives, administrators, managers, coordinators, and all who see themselves as leaders and who want to fulfill their God-given purpose, The Spirit-Led Leader addresses the critical fusion of spiritual life and leadership for those who not only want to see results, but who also desire to care just as deeply about who they are and how they lead as they do about what they produce and accomplish. Geoffrion creates a new vision for spiritual leadership as partly an art, partly a result of careful planning, and always a working of the grace of God




God's Team


Book Description

IT'S TIME TO IMPACT PEOPLE FOR CHRIST EACH AND EVERY DAY! I often say, "It's going to take everyone to reach everyone!" Over the centuries, many in the church transitioned from being the church to simply going to church. But God is mobilizing the church once again to impact all people. Reading God's Team-Unleashing the Full Power of the Church will encourage every Christ follower to: See themselves as part of God's powerful team Embrace the responsibility of impacting lives and society Mobilize people to impact others outside the church walls seven days a week Reading God's Team-Unleashing the Full Power of the Church will encourage Pastors to: Evaluate their current church culture Build a greater soul winning and serving church Build a church that increasingly impacts their local community It is going to take everyone to reach everyone! Imagine the impact when every Christ follower purposely engages in spreading the gospel through both word and action seven days a week. Jack Redmond is a thought leader helping to shape the nuances today's church requires to engage culture. If you want to move beyond engaging information to executing transformation, God's Team is a must read. -David D. Ireland, Ph.D., Lead Pastor, Author of One in Christ and Raising a Child Who Prays, www.DavidIreland.org




When God Made Light


Book Description

From the author and illustrator of the best-selling When God Made You comes a new illuminating message about God's design affirming young readers. 'Let there be light!' that's what God said. And light began shining and then started to spread." Wild and creative illustrations from top children's illustrator David Catrow pair with Matthew Paul Turner's lyrical verse in this message of a God-made light that cuts through darkness to bring vision and hope to all young readers. This light radiates, chasing away the shadows, providing the wonder and fun of stargazing or firefly chasing. Most important, this light appears in each child--an inner God-given spark that grows and will be used to change the world.




A Light in Dark Times


Book Description

The New School for Social Research opened in 1919 as an act of protest. Founded in the name of academic freedom, it quickly emerged as a pioneer in adult education—providing what its first president, Alvin Johnson, liked to call “the continuing education of the educated.” By the mid-1920s, the New School had become the place to go to hear leading figures lecture on politics and the arts and recent developments in new fields of inquiry, such as anthropology and psychoanalysis. Then in 1933, after Hitler rose to power, Johnson created the University in Exile within the New School. Welcoming nearly two hundred refugees, Johnson, together with these exiled scholars, defiantly maintained the great traditions of Europe’s imperiled universities. Judith Friedlander reconstructs the history of the New School in the context of ongoing debates over academic freedom and the role of education in liberal democracies. Against the backdrop of World War I and the first red scare, the rise of fascism and McCarthyism, the student uprisings during the Vietnam War and the downfall of communism in Eastern Europe, Friedlander tells a dramatic story of intellectual, political, and financial struggle through illuminating sketches of internationally renowned scholars and artists. These include, among others, Charles A. Beard, John Dewey, José Clemente Orozco, Robert Heilbroner, Hannah Arendt, and Ágnes Heller. Featured prominently as well are New School students, trustees, and academic leaders. As the New School prepares to celebrate its one-hundredth anniversary, A Light in Dark Times offers a timely reflection on the legacy of this unique institution, which has boldly defended dissident intellectuals and artists in the United States and overseas.




This Beautiful Truth


Book Description

We live in a broken world. Amid the daily realities of sickness and isolation, disappointment and pain, it can be profoundly difficult to grasp the real goodness of God. But this is where God breaks into our darkness with beauty. In the wonder of creation, in art or film, story or song, in the kindness of his people and the good they create, God breaks into our pain in a tangible way, teaching us to trust his kindness and hope for his healing. Beauty is a voice singing into our suffering, beckoning us toward restoration. In This Beautiful Truth, Sarah Clarkson shares her own encounters with beauty in the midst of her decade-long struggle with mental illness, depression, and doubt. In a voice both vulnerable and reflective, she paints a compelling picture of the God who reaches out to us in a real and powerful way through the "taste and see" goodness of what he has made and what he continues to create amid our darkness. "To recognize and trust God's gift in pain," she writes, "empowers us to create and love as powerful witnesses to God's healing love in a hopeless world." If you want to renew your capacity to recognize and encounter God's beauty in your life, this hope-filled book will show you the way.




Darkness of the Light


Book Description

Peter David, a creative force in television, and a best-selling author of comics and novels, has created a fantasy world sure to delight his legions of readers. The Damned World is home to twelve races, each of which has fought the others for survival for generations. What none of them knows is that they are all creatures of Earth, a world of legend. On Earth eleven of the twelve races were creatures of human myth or folklore. All live in awe of the all-powerful Overseer, whose authority none dare challenge. A new spirit has arisen among those sick of war and tired of living in fear. Some believe that it is possible for the races to become allies instead of adversaries. With this new spirit has come a time of possibility, of change. Jepp, a human woman and Karsen, a Bottom Feeder, have broken with tradition and cast their lots together. They seek the Orb of Light, with which they believe they can gain the power and release the Damned World from its chains of violence and ignorance. But they’re not alone, for everyone who knows about the Orb would kill to get it. If someone gets the Orb, things will change. These are, as the proverb warns, interesting times.




Light in Dark Times


Book Description

What will become of us in these trying times? How will we pass the time that we have on earth? In gorgeously rendered graphic form, Light in Dark Times invites readers to consider these questions by exploring the political catastrophes and moral disasters of the past and present, revealing issues that beg to be studied, understood, confronted, and resisted. A profound work of anthropology and art, this book is for anyone yearning to understand the darkness and hoping to hold onto the light. It is a powerful story of encounters with writers, philosophers, activists, and anthropologists whose words are as meaningful today as they were during the times in which they were written. This book is at once a lament over the darkness of our times, an affirmation of the value of knowledge and introspection, and a consideration of truth, lies, and the dangers of the trivial. In a time when many of us struggle with the feeling that we cannot do enough to change the course of the future, this book is a call to action, asking us to envision and create an alternative world from the one in which we now live. Light in Dark Times is beautiful to look at and to hold – an exquisite work of art that is lively, informative, enlightening, deeply moving, and inspiring.




Called Out of Darkness


Book Description

The first memoir from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Interview with a Vampire—a "very affecting story of a well-known prodigal’s return ... [a] vivid, engaging tale of the journey of a soul into light” (Chicago Sun-Times). Anne Rice was raised in New Orleans as the devout child in a deeply religious Irish Catholic family. Here, she describes how, as she grew up, she lost her belief in God, but not her desire for a meaningful life. She used her novels—beginning with Interview with a Vampire—to wrestle with otherworldly themes while in her own life, she experienced both loss (the death of her daughter and, later, her beloved husband, Stan Rice) and joys (the birth of her son, Christopher). And she writes about how, finally, after years of questioning, she experienced the intense conversion and re-embracing of her faith that lie behind her most recent novels about the life of Christ.