One of the greatest social tragedies of our day is the underperformance of marriage—not only marriages that end in divorce, but also those which, while remaining “intact,” become painfully strained and emotionally scarred. Surely there must be hope for something better, for something more. With profound insight and vivid illustrations, marriage counselor Tim Savage helps us to realize the unlimited potential of marriage—to discover how the glory of God can infuse our unions, increase our joy, and make us bright lights in a troubled world.
How safe is your marriage? The answer may surprise you. The biggest threat to any marriage isn’t infidelity or miscommunication. The greatest enemy is ordinary. Ordinary marriages lose hope. Ordinary marriages lack vision. Ordinary marriages give in to compromise. Ordinary is the belief that this is as good as it will ever get. And when we begin to settle for ordinary, it’s easy to move from “I do” to “I’m done.” Justin and Trisha Davis know just how dangerous ordinary can be. In this beautifully written book, Justin and Trisha take us inside the slow fade that occurred in their own marriage—each telling the story from their own perspective. Together, they reveal the mistakes they made, the work they avoided, the thoughts and feelings that led to an affair and near divorce, and finally, the heart-change that had to occur in both of them before they could experience the hope, healing, and restoration of a truly extraordinary marriage.
Read this classic, passionate romance from USA Today bestselling author Michelle Reid, now available for the first time in e-book! Jilted at the altar! Shaan Saketa has heard the words before but never thought they would apply to her. Humiliated and alone, she stands facing a thousand guests when her boss, ruthless tycoon Rafe Danvers, makes a shocking proposal. Suddenly she finds herself married to the wrong man and whisked away on a honeymoon! Rafe has always suspected that there was more to his mousy secretary than meets the eye, and he’s right. But as he indulges in exquisite nights little does he know that Shaan is wondering just how ruthless he really is and just how far he went to have her in his bed! Originally published in 1997
This is an in-depth study into the Holy Spirit, who is not a mere force. He is not energy. The Holy Spirit is a person and part of the Trinity along with the Father and the Son. God is Sovereign, and just so God wills and moves according to His will. Just so, the Spirit of the Lord moves and acts never out of His own accord, but always follows the leading of the Father. So the Spirit is interdependent, as there is a mutual dependency within the Trinity. The work of the Spirit is far greater in scope than merely the spiritual gifts, for the Spirit of the Lord leads us in our calling on the narrow path to the glory of the Lord. It is of utmost necessity for the Church to be one that is utterly and completely Spirit-filled, and not led by the flesh. For only in the Spirit can we fulfil the Great Commission, be true disciples and walk in His truth, His way and His life.
Many pastors feel ill-equipped to handle the challenges that arise when a couple is going through marital difficulties. If you are or have been in this situation before, this book shows church leaders how to counsel married couples from both a logical and biblical perspective. Author and pastor Jonathan Holmes offers you a practical guide to get started with the first sessions and then offers specific guidance on nine of the most common topics that come up in marriage counseling. In Counsel for Couples, Holmes provides you with: a biblical methodology that navigates you through the world of marriage counseling based on God’s word a theological counseling approach addressing the deepest of marital issues advice from several respected voices in the biblical counseling community In each chapter, you'll meet a new couple dealing with a different issue, much like the people in your church, office, and neighborhood. Whether you're a novice or already knowledgeable, Counsel for Couples provides theologically sound and biblically practical tools to help you as you help couples in need.
Tales of archaic Greek city foundations continued to be told and retold long after the colonies themselves were settled. This book explores how the ancient Greeks constructed their memory of founding new cities overseas. Greek stories about colonizing Sicily or the Black Sea in the seventh century B.C.E. are no more transparent, no less culturally constructed than nineteenth-century British tales of empire in India or Africa; they are every bit as much about power, language, and cultural appropriation. This book brings anthropological and literary theory to bear on the narratives that later Greeks tell about founding colonies and the processes through which the colonized are assimilated into the familiar story lines, metaphors, and rituals of the colonizers. The distinctiveness and the universality of Greek colonial representations are explored through explicit comparison with later European narratives of new world settlement. Unique in its focus on issues of representation and colonial ideology, rather than the traditional historical approach, this book adds much to the study of the archaic colonization movement. Through new historicist readings, Carol Dougherty shows how, long after the Greek colonization movement itself was over, the colonial tale, embedded in important poetic genres and performed as part of significant civic occasions, enabled the Greeks to continue to colonize the past and to establish themselves as the imperial power in that cultural memory.
When, with her family at the age of eight, Bathsheba tops a hill and witnesses the bloody and violent stoning of an adulterous woman, she does not know that the memory will stay with her and will vividly return to be a threat to her in her early twenties. As the granddaughter of an influential man named Ahithophel, Bathsheba grows up in a loving home, only to lose her mother and her grandmother at a young age. Her father, Eliam, disguises her as a boy and takes her with him as he travels on a camel caravan for several years. At the age of fourteen, she becomes mistress of Grandfather Ahithophel’s household when he is called to be a counselor to King David in Jerusalem. When she turns fifteen, without her father’s knowledge, Grandfather Ahithophel marries her off to a widowed man named Uriah. Hers is an abusive marriage. After years of abuse, when Bathsheba goes to Jerusalem for the procession of the Ark, which King David has brought to the city, she meets a handsome dancer from the procession. Later when Uriah buys a place near Ahithophel’s in Jerusalem, she moves there with Gebur, Uriah’s son from his first marriage. One day on a visit to the ruins behind Jerusalem, where she goes for peace, she encounters again the dancer from the procession of the Ark. They spend the day talking yet fighting a growing attraction. In the heat of the evening, she goes to the aliyah, the semiprivate rooftop porch, to bathe. In the dancing moonbeams of a sultry, hot night, a man stands on his aliyah, which overlooks much of the city. His eyes fasten upon the movements of a beautifully shaped woman who is innocently bathing in the ivy-curtained aliyah below him. The next day, though she knows she should not, Bathsheba plans to return to the ruins, where she had met the dancer. But it is not to be. Her stepson, Gebur, awakens ill, and she does not want to leave him. That night, as twilight deepens to dark, a messenger and soldiers arrive on her doorstep. The king has summoned her. It is not a request. Questions hurtle through her as she is escorted into the palace, up the stairs, and allowed entrance through walnut double doors. Upon entering she is alone, except for the shadowed figure who emerges from the folds of golden drapes at the far edge of the aliyah. “What are you doing here? I am waiting for the king,” bursts forth from her. The dancer from the ruins, now arrayed in a robe of opulent red and gold, silences her as he quietly speaks her name. “Bathsheba.” She stops, for she knew she had not told it to him. Leading her to a divan, he explains that he was the dancer in the procession of the Ark but he is also King David. Her lord and sovereign, she realizes with astonishment, aware again of the powerful attraction between them. I will be all right as long as he doesn’t touch me, she thinks. Then King David reaches to slowly turn her to him, bending to claim her lips in a tender but oh so breathtaking kiss. In his eyes is a question she cannot refuse. As David lowers himself toward her, he realizes that he has gained more than possession of her body. He has gained entrance to her soul. Four days later, Bathsheba comes out of her world of wonder to realize she has broken Yahweh’s law of adultery. It is Yahweh’s law she has broken; to Yahweh she must go. She sees no one as she enters the women’s courtyard. The high priest, Zadok, is the only priest there at that time of day. He and the prophet Nathan both enter the women’s court silently to witness a depth of sorrow they have seldom seen. After Zadok makes his presence known, he intercedes and offers absolution for Bathsheba, not knowing what the cause of her deep grief is. In three months’ time, Bathsheba, during the time between sleep and gentle wakefulness as she feels again the morning sickness in her stomach, accepts the fact that she is carrying King David’s baby. Uriah, her husband, has been soldiering at Ammon for many months. She is terrifi
Doris Kearns Goodwin’s Pulitzer Prize–winning classic about the relationship between Franklin D. Roosevelt and Eleanor Roosevelt, and how it shaped the nation while steering it through the Great Depression and the outset of World War II. With an extraordinary collection of details, Goodwin masterfully weaves together a striking number of story lines—Eleanor and Franklin’s marriage and remarkable partnership, Eleanor’s life as First Lady, and FDR’s White House and its impact on America as well as on a world at war. Goodwin effectively melds these details and stories into an unforgettable and intimate portrait of Eleanor and Franklin Roosevelt and of the time during which a new, modern America was born.
Hellenistic philosophy concerns the thought of the Epicureans, Stoics, and Skeptics, the most influential philosophical groups in the era between the death of Alexander the Great (323 BCE) and the defeat of the last Greek stronghold in the ancient world (31 BCE). The Routledge Handbook of Hellenistic Philosophy provides accessible yet rigorous introductions to the theories of knowledge, ethics, and physics belonging to each of the three schools, explores the fascinating ways in which interschool rivalries shaped the philosophies of the era, and offers unique insight into the relevance of Hellenistic views to issues today, such as environmental ethics, consumerism, and bioethics. Eleven countries are represented among the Handbook’s 35 authors, whose chapters were written specifically for this volume and are organized thematically into six sections: The people, history, and methods of Epicureanism, Stoicism, and Skepticism. Earlier philosophical influences on Hellenistic thought, such as Aristotle, Socrates, and Presocratics. The soul, perception, and knowledge. God, fate, and the primary principles of nature and the universe. Ethics, political theory, society, and community. Hellenistic philosophy’s relevance to contemporary life. Spanning from the ancient past to the present, this Handbook aims to show that Hellenistic philosophy has much to offer all thinking people of the twenty-first century.
