God's Order is written for Christians who want to rediscover the basics of Christian life. It provides foundational teachings to help readers understand God and build a deeper relationship with Him. The instructions within theses pages reinforce the order of the world and the people in it, as designed by God. It is not a condemnation for those who choose not to live according to God's order, but rather a guide for those who want to know and follow the truth.
An incisive look at how evangelical Christians shaped—and were shaped by—the American criminal justice system. America incarcerates on a massive scale. Despite recent reforms, the United States locks up large numbers of people—disproportionately poor and nonwhite—for long periods and offers little opportunity for restoration. Aaron Griffith reveals a key component in the origins of American mass incarceration: evangelical Christianity. Evangelicals in the postwar era made crime concern a major religious issue and found new platforms for shaping public life through punitive politics. Religious leaders like Billy Graham and David Wilkerson mobilized fears of lawbreaking and concern for offenders to sharpen appeals for Christian conversion, setting the stage for evangelicals who began advocating tough-on-crime politics in the 1960s. Building on religious campaigns for public safety earlier in the twentieth century, some preachers and politicians pushed for “law and order,” urging support for harsh sentences and expanded policing. Other evangelicals saw crime as a missionary opportunity, launching innovative ministries that reshaped the practice of religion in prisons. From the 1980s on, evangelicals were instrumental in popularizing criminal justice reform, making it a central cause in the compassionate conservative movement. At every stage in their work, evangelicals framed their efforts as colorblind, which only masked racial inequality in incarceration and delayed real change. Today evangelicals play an ambiguous role in reform, pressing for reduced imprisonment while backing law-and-order politicians. God’s Law and Order shows that we cannot understand the criminal justice system without accounting for evangelicalism’s impact on its historical development.
In this most up-to-date study, Aaron Yom provides a comprehensive analysis of the doctrine of God, particularly from a pneumatological perspective. He focuses on retrieving the order of God that has been consistently misunderstood and mistreated by modern scholars. The author carefully examines scholarly works of modern thinkers such as Karl Barth, Thomas Torrance, Karl Rahner, David Coffey, Jurgen Moltmann, Clark Pinnock, and Stanley Grenz, as well as ancient masters such as Augustine and Aquinas. With a critical analysis, he highlights the strengths and weaknesses of their work to lay a foundational platform for understanding God's order in the twenty-first-century theological context. Yom proposes a holistic approach that does not marginalize the logic of the Trinity that begins with God's order of ontology rather than God's order of economy, though the former is read from the latter. He maintains the intricate balance of the immanent Trinity and the economic Trinity with his newfound principle of identity and duality. Yom offers several new theological paradigms for those who are interested in the topic of systematic theology.
The ideas of Rene Girard are having a profound effect on Christian theology. This book offers a critical introduction to his thought and then uses it to interpret the Book of Revelation. The result is a reading of extraordinary relevance for the contemporary world. Readers of the Apocalypse are often disturbed by the images of destruction in the book and are unsure why these are unleashed after the exaltation of Jesus. This study examines past approaches to these texts and uses Girard's theories to revive some old ideas and propose some new ones. Seen in this light the Apocalypse becomes the story of the ultimate vindication of the victim, a source of hope, and a resource that can be used both to encourage resistance to the destructive forces within culture, and to help the church and the poor to engage constructively with the issues of our day.
Teens' Guide to Identity from FamilyLife All teens wrestle with the question "Who am I?" and wonder, What makes me special? Though these questions linger for life, they are most intense in the teen years, where confusion, awkwardness, and a desperate grab for identity reign. So how does a young person answer these critical questions? Where do young men and women find their significance, worth, and value? True Identity is perfect for parents and youth workers to give to the teenagers (14-16) in their lives to help them in their journey. Drawing on experiences and wisdom from a wide array of experts, the book provides compassionate answers to help teens discover who they really are, emphasizing their identity in Christ above all other ways our culture defines them. As the book walks teens through the steps to make their faith their own, it highlights healthy independence and God-honoring relationships. The Passport2Identity curriculum launched in April 2016, and True Identity is its trade book companion.
Rick Renner unearths a rich treasure trove of truths in his remarkable devotional. Drawing from an extensive study of both the English Bible and New Testament Greek, Rick illuminates 365 passages with more than 1,285 in-depth Greek word studies. Far from intellectualizing, he blends his solid instruction with practical applications and refreshing insights. Find challenge, reassurance, comfort, and reminders of God's abiding love and healing every day of the year.
This is a thorough, full- scale English commentary on the Greek text of 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus. While author George W. Knight gives careful attention to the comments of previous interpreters of the text, both ancient and modern, his emphasis is on exegesis of the Greek text itself and on the flow of the argument in each of these three epistles. Besides providing a detailed look at the meanings and interrelationships of the Greek words as they appear in each context, Knight's commentary includes an introduction that treats at length the question of authorship (he argues for Pauline authorship and proposes, on the basis of stylistic features, that Luke might have been the amanuensis for the Pastoral Epistles), the historical background of these letters, and the personalities and circumstances of the recipients. Knight also provides two special excursuses: the first gathers together the information in the Pastorals and elsewhere in the New Testament on early church offices and leaders; the other excursus examines the motivations for conduct in Titus 2:1-10 with a view to their applicability to present-day situations.
(The latest in the PROPHETS, PRIESTS AND KINGS SERIES is here for serious Bible students. Misunderstandings and misinformation on the true priesthood of Christ are addressed by several hundred relevant Scripture passages. With God’s Word as the authority, the role of priests is defined before the search for the mysterious Christ-like figure, Melchizedek, can begin. The entire Bible is examined for clues to the man that Genesis 14:18 calls ‘Priest of God Most High.’ Following each lead, Scripture takes the investigation in a unique direction. Concluding Melchizedek had flesh-and-blood pays dividends when the pursuit leads to a “person-of-interest.” From there, a case is solidly built for one of the most dramatic Bible discoveries of any era. Until now, God has cloaked Melchizedek in mystery. Solving this mystery is the Lord’s gift to his last day’s saints, The Priests of God. Knowing who was hidden behind the veil will have tremendous implications for the priestly order of Melchizedek. Get ready to be challenged. Get set to objectively re-think and re-examine all you have learned about prophecy. Be prepared for a life-changing and mind-blowing experience. You must be open to the Spirit. Your destiny as God’s servant awaits.)
