Why do Americans find it appealing to create and live in artificial worlds--whether in space, at Disneyland, in computer networks, or in our own minds?
Is ministering to youth like being a cross-cultural missionary? You'd better believe it. The parallels between ministry within youth culture and global missions have long been touted by youth ministry experts, yet few resources exist to help youth workers benefit practically from the insights of missiologists. In Youth Ministry as Mission, Brian Hull and Patrick Mays fill this gap with an introduction to missiology, missions practice, and missionary witness tailored especially for a youth ministry context. Youth ministers will discover missiological language that describes realities they face regularly and activities of cross-cultural missionaries that translate well into leaders within youth ministries. Hull and Mays address issues such as: • Understanding the relationship of the incarnation to ministering in youth culture • Translating stories and practicing storytelling as preparation for witnessing • Teaching for witness in a multi-religious context Youth Ministry as Mission will be a valuable guide for college and seminary students as well as a breath of fresh air to those already working in youth ministry. "Hull and Mays show us how missiology can help us see a way forward in youth ministry, humbly discovering the mission of God right where we are--where we, too, have been sent to become living translations of the gospel for young people." --Brad M. Griffin, senior director, Fuller Youth Institute; author of 3 Big Questions That Change Every Teenager "With deferential scholarly humility, Hull and Mays have written a book that insists on integration over invention." --Dr. Dave Rahn, coauthor of Disrupting Teens with Joy
"Within reasonable limits, Man has been aware of both his present and his past. Knowledge of his future, however, has remained an insoluble mystery, a great, darkly impenetrable unknown. In past ages, Man has been plagued with all sorts of prophets, seers, soothsayers, oracles, and witch-doctors trying to foretell the future. None of them, however, really had such powers. But today there is a new kind of prophet--the science fiction writer. On the basis of existing scientific knowledge he projects his imaginative vision into the future. And his prophecies have been astonishingly accurate: television, automation, nuclear energy, space flight. A great deal of what is today accepted as the natural product of science was first presented to the world in the guise of fiction. In this collection of twelve exciting stories, some of the greatest of modern science fiction writers have given free rein to their powers of imagination. Their minds have leaped into the future to explore the infinite heights intelligence can reach--will reach! The result: stories of adventure calculated to hold the reader in unmatched suspense and to startle him into new ways of thinking."--Pg. [i].
In this study of early Christian traditions, C. Clifton Black explores the figure and function of Mark, the apostolic associate to whom Christians traditionally have attributed authorship of the New Testament's anonymous Second Gospel and whose very existence has been a controversial issue among scholars. Black contends that in their justifiable doubt about Mark's writing of the Second Gospel, biblical scholars have neglected the development of that ascription as well as its religious motivations. Using a variety of critical lenses—historical, literary, and theological—Black examines the images of Mark that emerge from the New Testament and from the writings of the early church fathers. Black's comprehensive investigation culminates in a fresh appraisal of the relationship between the Gospel of Mark and the legends surrounding its composition. Black concludes that the figure of Mark was carefully crafted as a part of the interpretive framework within which early Christians read the Second Gospel and heard its witness as faithful to their understanding of Jesus. Like the Markan Gospel itself, the image of Mark the Evangelist helped the early church in the formation of its religious memory and theological identity.
In light of our increasingly post-Christian Western contexts, David Gustafson offers a mission-oriented ecclesiology that moves from missional theory to practices of missional engagement. Introducing “God’s human drama” as a way to explain the gospel within God’s redemptive story, he outlines specific ways for pastors and church leaders to shape a “gospeling” culture within their congregations. Gustafson expertly lays the foundations of and approaches to evangelism that are seminal and apt for the church today.
Arguably the greatest science fiction writer who ever lived, Isaac Asimov also possessed one of the most brilliant and original minds of our time. His accessible style and far-reaching interests in subjects ranging from science to humor to history earned him the nickname “the Great Explainer.” I. Asimov is his personal story—vivid, open, and honest—as only Asimov himself could tell it. Here is the story of the paradoxical genius who wrote of travel to the stars yet refused to fly in airplanes; who imagined alien universes and vast galactic civilizations while staying home to write; who compulsively authored more than 470 books yet still found the time to share his ideas with some of the great minds of our century. Here are his wide-ranging thoughts and sharp-eyed observations on everything from religion to politics, love and divorce, friendship and Hollywood, fame and mortality. Here, too, is a riveting behind-the-scenes look at the varied personalities—Campbell, Ellison, Heinlein, Clarke, del Rey, Silverberg, and others—who along with Asimov helped shape science fiction. As unique and irrepressible as the man himself, I. Asimov is the candid memoir of an incomparable talent who entertained readers for nearly half a century and whose work will surely endure into the future he so vividly envisioned.