The Better Part - The Four Gospels


Book Description

Every saint and renowned spiritual director through the ages has said the same thing: if we desire to become saints, we must spend time daily in meditation. With this book, Fr. John Bartunek has created an extensive, Christ-centered resource to serve as your daily meditation companion. The Better Part offers a practical explanation of Christian meditation as well as material to draw from during your meditations, including a Bible study on the Gospels, a survey of saints' writings, and a handy guide to prayer. As you learn to read, meditate upon, absorb, and apply the Gospels to your life, you'll also find ways to personalize your times of prayer, allowing you to follow the Holy Spirit's lead along the path of holiness. Open these pages to discover the methods of meditation that best suit you, develop your friendship with Christ, and experience the true Christian joy of a deep, fruitful life of prayer.




Choosing the Better Part?


Book Description

This work is a commentary on the passages in the Gospel of Luke in which women figure as characters and in the sayings of Jesus. These include the women of vision and spirit in the Infancy Narratives, the Galilean women who encounter Jesus, and the women empowered to serve. The method makes use of historical-critical, narrative, and feminist-liberationist approaches. This commentary is intended as a resource for students of the New Testament, pastors, seminarians, preachers, retreat directors, and Bible study groups.




The Better Part of Darkness


Book Description

Atlanta: it's the promised city for the off-worlders, foreigners from the alternate dimensions of heaven-like Elysia and hell-like Charbydon—some bring good works and miracles, and some bring unimaginable evil... Charlie Madigan is a divorced mother of one, and a kick-ass cop trained to take down the toughest human and off-world criminals. She's recently returned from the dead after a brutal attack, an unexplained revival that has left her plagued by ruthless nightmares and random outbursts of strength that make doing her job for Atlanta P.D.'s Integration Task Force even harder. Since the Revelation, the criminal element in Underground Atlanta has grown, leaving Charlie and her partner Hank to keep the chaos to a dull roar. But now an insidious new danger is descending on her city with terrifying speed, threatening innocent lives: a deadly, off-world narcotic known as ash. Charlie is determined to uncover the source of ash before it targets another victim—but can she protect those she loves from a force more powerful than heaven and hell combined?




All the Better Part of Me


Book Description

It’s an inconvenient time for Sinter Blackwell to realize he’s bisexual. He’s a 25-year-old American actor working in London, living far away from his disapproving parents in the Pacific Northwest, and enjoying a flirtation with his director Fiona. But he can’t deny that his favorite parts of each day are the messages from his gay best friend Andy in Seattle—whom Sinter once kissed when they were 15. Finally he decides to return to America to visit Andy and discover what’s between them, if anything. He isn’t seeking love, and definitely doesn’t want drama. But both love and drama seem determined to find him. Family complications soon force him into the most consequential decisions of his life, threatening all his most important relationships: with Andy, Fiona, his parents, and everyone else who’s counting on him. Choosing the right role to play has never been harder. Molly Ringle's growing list of other succesful titles include: The Chrysomelia Stories 1. Persephone's Orchard 2. Underworld's Daughter 3. Immortal's Spring The Goblins of Bellwater Lava Red Feather Blue Sage and King




The Better Part


Book Description

Thomas Keating was a Cistercian monk who founded the worldwide 'Contemplative Outreach', teaching people the art of meditation. Father Keating's enlightening commentary on the contemplative meaning of the gospel, particularly the story of the siblings from Bethany, Martha, Mary, and Lazarus, fits into the great monastic tradition of Christian teaching. The talks on which this book was based were given at the John Main Seminar in 1998, the annual international event of the World Community for Christian Meditation. Previous presenters have included the Dalai Lama, Jean Vanier, Bede Griffiths, and William Johnston. A monk reflects on Scripture in the light of experience. He or she utters a word that startles his listeners into realizing that tradition is not a matter of second-hand experience but the living and human self-transmission of Christ to his disciples.




Better Decisions, Fewer Regrets


Book Description

Set yourself up for success in every season of life, for the rest of your life. Discover five game-changing questions to ask every time you make a major decision regarding your finances, relationships, career, and more. Good questions lead to better decisions. And your decisions determine the direction and quality of your life—they create the story of your life. And while nobody plans to complicate their life with bad decisions, far too many people have no plan to make good decisions. In Better Decisions, Fewer Regrets, Andy Stanley—pastor and bestselling author of Irresistible and Not In It To Win It—will help you learn from experience and stop making bad decisions by integrating five questions into every decision you make, big or small. This book will help you live differently by showing you how to: Develop a decision-making filter that reveals which choices will likely lead to positive results. Avoid selling yourself on bad ideas and making quick decisions when time is short. Find truth and clarity in any tricky decision. Improve relationships and heal division through better decisions. Discover the reasons behind your decisions so you can move forward with positive changes. Consider the long-term impact of your choices so you can write a life story worth celebrating. Easily identify any red flags that signal which decisions may result in future regrets.




The Better Part of Valor


Book Description

The second book in Tanya Huff's action-packed military sci-fi adventure Confederation series Never tell a two-star general what you really think of him.... That was the mistake Staff Sergeant Torin Kerr made with General Morris. But as a battle-hardened professional, she took pride in doing her job and getting her troops back alive. So after she'd saved the mission to bring the Silviss into the Confederation—instead of losing them and their world to the enemy known only as the Others—she let the general know exactly how she felt. And Torin’s reward—or punishment—was to be separated from her platoon and sent off on what might well prove an even more perilous assignment. She was commandeered to protect a scientific expedition to a newly discovered and seemingly derelict spaceship of truly epic proportions. And Confederation politics had saddled her with a commanding officer who might prove more of a menace to the mission’s success than anything they encountered. Only time would tell if the ship was what it appeared to be, or a trap created by the Others—or the work of an as-yet unknown alien race with an agenda that could prove all too hostile to other life forms....




Inside The Passion


Book Description

Deepen your journey into the unforgettable film, The Passion of The Christ. In this authorized, behind-the-scenes look at the movie, Fr. John Bartunek, L.C., provides biblical, historical, and theological insights gleaned from hours spent on the set and interviews with the director, actors, and filmmaking crew. Inside The Passion is the most complete and thorough commentary on the movie you will read.




Grace in Tension


Book Description

We all face stress and tension in our daily lives. We might even wonder why our God of abundant goodness doesn’t remove the everyday struggles we face. Jesus’ interactions with Martha and Mary in the Gospel provide us the key to understanding how God shows us his love by allowing tensions in our lives. As we follow the sisters’ transformative journeys through their own struggles, reflecting on what transpires between Scripture verses, we see their initial tension become the catalyst that drives both Mary and Martha to the feet of Jesus — the place where all discover peace. Grace in Tension explores the areas where stress arises in our own lives. Each chapter ends with a thought-provoking prayer to inspire us to go to God with our problems, followed by questions for reflection to help us see all the ways he’s working for our good. God doesn’t create any of it, but he does show up amid life’s difficulties, ready to lead us through. No matter how big or small our struggle, when we seek him out, he reveals what we need to do to resolve our tension, transforming it into grace. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Claire McGarry is the founder of MOSAIC of Faith, a ministry for mothers of infants to school-aged children to explore their faith through motherhood. She contributes regularly to CatholicMom.com and blogs at ShiftingMyPerspective.com. She is the author of Lenten devotional With Our Savior, and her work has appeared in Chicken Soup for the Soul, Keys for Kids, These Days, and Focus on the Family magazine. She lives in New Hampshire with her husband and three children.




Valor's Choice


Book Description

Tanya Huff—acclaimed author of the Blood Series—begins her celebrated Confederation series that will launch readers into a future where Humans are not the most evolved species... Good thing they can take orders. Brought into the multi-species Confederation, Humans earn their place along the Taykan and the Krai by acting as military guardians of the Elder Races, who have risen above societal aggression and violence. When Staff Sergeant Torin Kerr and her platoon are dragged from some well-deserved R&R to play honor guard for a diplomatic mission to the non-Confederation planet of the Silsviss, Torin suspects that something is about to go wrong. You don't make staff sergeant in the CMC without a well-developed sense of paranoia. Justified paranoia when word reaches them that the enemy has been spotted in this sector of space. The diplomatic mission becomes a race to recruit the Silsviss into the Confederation before the enemy returns, claims the reptilian warriors as their own, and turns them loose on the Confederation. One battle-weary platoon has to step up to stop the slaughter.