The Beauty of Beholding God


Book Description

How very easy and natural it is to become absorbed in the problems that bombard us daily. These difficulties may range from personal turmoils, heartbreaks with our children or marital conflicts to world dilemmas in general. Such distresses are real. They can hurt despicably and require and deserve answers and solutions.Time, energy, and general wear and tear can be saved if we learn to look straight through our immediate circumstances and behold our God as reigning King, working everything for our good as we learn to respond to Him rather than to situations or people. We can look beyond the immediate to the real reason we are on Planet Earth. We see that our Lord wants to use everything that enters our lives to get us ready to live with Him as His bride forever. Our sorrows and everyday experiences are no longer wasted, but they are used to draw us into a vital love relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ in which we receive and display His very life.As such a relationship is developed with Christ, we are blessed - every aching abyss of our inner beings is satisfied - and He is honored and glorified. We learn to enjoy life and others rather than abusing them by trying to make them meet needs and function in ways in which they were never intended.As I write this book I am painfully aware that I have only scratched the surface of the areas of which I write. However, I know if Jesus is lifted up and becomes our Lord and Lover, and if we seek Him with all our hearts, He will make Himself known to us and bring us into a level of living far beyond our greatest expectations.The purpose of this book is to start us on or aid us in that delightful journey back into the heart of God, with Jesus as our Companion, King, Lord, Lover - our all! When He is our God, all else takes its proper perspective. Each problem, whether great or small, can be successfully worked through as we behold Him. His peace and contentment or overflowing joy will then begin saturating us as a way of life.




Behold the Beauty of the Lord


Book Description

This twentieth anniversary edition (more than 111,000 copies sold) brings Henri J.M. Nouwen's writings on Eastern Orthodox icons to a new generation and adds to the Nouwen collection published by Ave Maria Press. With a foreword by Br. Robert Lentz, a well-known painter of contemporary icons, this classic Nouwen book invites readers to pray with four Russian icons with their eyes open by emphasizing seeing or gazing, which are at the heart of Eastern spirituality. Nouwen's meditations reveal his viewing of the icons not as decorations, but holy places. The book includes four full-color icons for private contemplation or meditation.




The Beauty of the Lord


Book Description

Why is God's beauty often absent from our theology? Rarely do theologians take up the theme of God's beauty—even more rarely do they consider how God's beauty should shape the task of theology itself. But the psalmist says that the heart of the believer's desire is to behold the beauty of the Lord. In The Beauty of the Lord, Jonathan King restores aesthetics as not merely a valid lens for theological reflection, but an essential one. Jesus, our incarnate Redeemer, displays the Triune God's beauty in his actions and person, from creation to final consummation. How can and should theology better reflect this unveiled beauty? The Beauty of the Lord is a renewal of a truly aesthetic theology and a properly theological aesthetics.




Beholding and Becoming


Book Description

Ruth is such a gift to us—her voice is strong and honest, yet believably grace-filled and kind. We learn and grow into who we want to be when Ruth's words and art lead us. —Annie F. Downs, bestselling author of 100 Days to Brave and host of That Sounds Fun podcast Become What You Behold You are in the process of becoming. Every day is an opportunity to be shaped and formed by what moves your heart…drives your thoughts…captures your gaze. Is it any wonder that where you direct your eyes and your heart matter in your day-to-day? We become what we behold when we set our hearts and minds on Christ and His redemption story here in the details of our daily lives. Not just on Sunday, not just on holidays, not just when extraordinarily hard or wonderful things happen…but today. Bestselling author and artist Ruth Chou Simons invites you on a new journey to Beholding and Becoming. With more than 850 pieces of intricate, original artwork, Ruth encourages you to elevate your gaze to the One who created all things. Today is an opportunity for God to demonstrate His love and His faithfulness in the midst of your mundane. No circumstance is too ordinary or too forgotten for Him to meet you there in worship. His transforming grace turns your “everyday ordinary” into a holy place of becoming.




Looking Unto Jesus


Book Description




Seeing and Savoring Jesus Christ (Revised Edition)


Book Description

Who is Jesus Christ? You've never met him in person, and you don't know anyone who has. But there is a way to know who he is. How? Jesus Christ-the divine Person revealed in the Bible-has a unique excellence and a spiritual beauty that speaks directly to our souls and says, "Yes, this is truth." It's like seeing the sun and knowing that it is light, or tasting honey and knowing that it is sweet. The depth and complexity of Jesus shatter our simple mental frameworks. He baffled proud scribes with his wisdom but was understood and loved by children. He calmed a raging storm with a word but would not get himself down from the cross. Look at the Jesus of the Bible. Keep your eyes open, and fill them with the portrait of Jesus in God's Word. Jesus said, "If anyone's will is to do God's will, he will know whether the teaching is from God or whether I am speaking on my own authority." Ask God for the grace to do his will, and you will see the truth of his Son. John Piper has written this book in the hope that all will see Jesus for who he really is and will come to enjoy him above all else.




The Pleasures of God


Book Description

The author of Desiring God reveals the biblical evidence to help us see and savor what the pleasures of God show us about Him. Includes a study guide for individual and small-group use. Isn’t it true—we really don’t know someone until we understand what makes that person happy? And so it is with God! What does bring delight to the happiest Being in the universe? John Piper writes, that it’s only when we know what makes God glad that we’ll know the greatness of His glory. Therefore, we must comprehend “the pleasures of God.” Unlike so much of what is written today, this is not a book about us. It is about the One we were made for—God Himself. In this theological masterpiece—chosen by World Magazine as one of the 20th Century’s top 100 books, John Piper reveals the biblical evidence to help us see and savor what the pleasures of God show us about Him. Then we will be able to drink deeply—and satisfyingly—from the only well that offers living water. What followers of Jesus need now, more than anything else, is to know and love—behold and embrace—the great, glorious, sovereign, happy God of the Bible. “This is a unique and precious book that everybody should read more than once.” —J.I. PACKER, Regent College, Vancouver, British Columbia




The Beauty of Beholding God


Book Description




Behold Your God: The Weight of Majesty Workbook


Book Description

Nothing provides the true follower of Christ with more profound and enduring satisfaction than turning from the limitations of self and this world to the unfathomable fullness of the living God. Nothing so directly affects the study of Scripture as one's understanding of what lies behind the little word "God." Nothing calls for such an entire consecration of the mind, heart, and will of the student as the study of this eternal Being, who is the cause and reason for all things. Nothing holds more practical value for the Christian than the realities of God¿s perfection. For twelve weeks, Behold Your God: The Weight of Majesty guides the reader through passages that reveal God¿s perfections: His incomprehensibility, self-existence, independence, transcendence, immutability, infinity and eternity, omnipresence, omnipotence, omniscience, wisdom, sovereignty, righteousness, holiness, wrath, goodness, love, patience, and zeal. The aim of this study is to provide the student with a tool for vastly enlarging his or her understanding of God in a manner that enlightens the mind, captivates the heart, and re-directs the will. Behold Your God: The Weight of Majesty is designed for individual or group study. This workbook may be studied alone, but is intended for use with a companion set of thirteen DVDs which reinforce the lessons of each week.God truly is a "sea without a shore, a sun without a sphere." Each of us stands before the boundless immensity of God's majesty. He commands us to know Him. He has provided all that we need to know Him through the redemptive labors of His Son, the illuminating work of the Spirit, and the Bible. A.W. Tozer wrote only the truth when he stated that God "can show a new aspect of His glory to us each day for all the days of eternity, and we have but begun to explore the depths of riches of His infinite being."




Insurgence


Book Description

Why does the allegiance that radical terrorists give to their false cause exceed the allegiance that most Christians today give to Jesus Christ? In Insurgence, bestselling author Frank Viola presents a radical proposal for Christians. Namely, that we have lost the explosive, earthshaking gospel of the kingdom that Jesus, Paul, and the other apostles preached. Viola argues that we've lost this dynamic, titanic, living gospel and exchanged it for a gospel of religious duty or permissiveness and "easy believism." In today's politically charged era, Christians on the progressive left as well as the conservative right both equate their particular viewpoints with the kingdom of God. Viola challenges and dismantles these perspectives, offering a fresh and revolutionary look at the gospel of the kingdom. Viola writes with gripping power, challenging Christians to embrace an unparalleled allegiance to Jesus Christ and his kingdom. This high-octane message is being reclaimed today, launching a spiritual insurgence.