Wired Church 2.0 is the go-to guide for church staff and volunteers coordinating multimedia digital technology for worship, the classroom, and marketing. Covering everything from website design and trends in digital media to selecting and training your media team. Wilson and Moore were on the leading edge of media ministry with their 1999 volume The Wired Church: Making Media Ministry. Wired Church 2.0 is the guidebook for a new generation of technology, addressing new multimedia trends, including blogs, podcasts, streaming video, and more. Wired Church 2.0 is a comprehensive how-to book written in an easy-to-understand "dummies' guide" style. Church media coordinators will learn about the technology, costs, methods, and tricks-of-the-trade for producing high-quality web and video elements for worship, education, and marketing. Len Wilson and Jason Moore run Midnight Oil Productions, a cutting-edge media ministry agency based in Grand Prairie, Texas. They have authored several books together, including Design Matters: Creating Powerful Imagery for Worship (2006), Digital Storytellers: The Art of Communicating the Gospel in Worship (2002) and The Wired Church: Making Media Ministry (1999), all from Abingdon Press.
Pornography is powerful. Our contemporary culture as been pornified, and it shapes our assumptions about identity, sexuality, the value of women and the nature of relationships. Countless Christian men struggle with the addictive power of porn. But common spiritual approaches of more prayer and accountability groups are often of limited help. In this book neuroscientist and researcher William Struthers explains how pornography affects the male brain and what we can do about it. Because we are embodied beings, viewing pornography changes how the brain works, how we form memories and make attachments. By better understanding the biological realities of our sexual development, we can cultivate healthier sexual perspectives and interpersonal relationships. Struthers exposes false assumptions and casts a vision for a redeemed masculinity, showing how our sexual longings can actually propel us toward sanctification and holiness in our bodies. With insights for both married and single men alike, this book offers hope for freedom from pornography.
Edward M. Bounds takes us on a journey deep into the heart of active, powerful, life-giving prayer. He invites us to pray in such a way that involves and touches our entire being: mind, soul and body. We have all heard stories of great men and women whom God used to change the world as they wrestled with Him on their knees. This book uncovers the secrets to their devotion and gives practical ideas and advice for entering into a more intimate and powerful life with God through prayer.
Bob Hasson and Shawn Bolz have come together to help infuse you with hope, truth, and perspective about your God-given role in the marketplace. Whether you own or manage a business, have spent decades in your career, or are simply trying to find value in the work that you do, this book is for you. As you walk this journey with us, you'll have an opportunity to build spiritually driven goals for both your own career as well as the industry you are called to. Throughout the book, we explore real-life examples of what it looks like to hear God and follow His leading within marketplace roles. We also discuss where our understanding of God, Church, and the marketplace has been immature or broken. The goal is that you are empowered to do it differently, getting a greater result in your relationship to God's voice impacting the way you partner to your career.
Discover the tools to create a new kind of church and move from merely surviving to thriving. Drawing on an extensive two-year field study of 200 churches from a variety of denominations and geographic regions, Milfred Minatrea--a missiologist, urban strategist and practioner in minister--presents the best practices for re-energizing Christian spirituality in a congregational setting. He provides readers with the tools for assessing their congregation’s position on the continuum between maintenance and mission and for determining the actions that will move them toward becoming a missional community. He also outlines key strategies that successful churches have used to become relevant in a postmodern society without losing what is distinctly Christian in their spiritual practices. Milfred Minatrea (Irving, TX) is Director of the Missional Church Center for the Baptist General Convention of Texas.
“I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you.”Too often, these words of Jesus from John 17:20-21 seem like an unreachable ideal. But in Your Church Is Too Small, John Armstrong shows that Jesus’ vision of Christian unity is for all God’s people across social, cultural, racial, and denominational lines.“With attention to his own pilgrimage and growth in ecclesial awareness, John Armstrong explores here the evangelical heart and ecumenical breadth of churchly Christianity. I am encouraged by his explorations and commend this study to all believers who pray and labor for the unity for which our Savior prayed.” – Timothy George, senior editor, Christianity Today.“Dr. Armstrong’s irenic approach should make it easy for Christians—whether Catholic, Orthodox, or Protestant—to engage the challenging thesis of the book, while recognizing that there remain points of doctrine between them which will require further clarification. Anyone concerned about either evangelism or Christian unity should read this book, and take seriously its call for both mission and ecumenism.” – Fr. Thomas A. Baima, Provost, University of Saint Mary of the LakeJohn Armstrong is one of those Evangelical theologians—may their tribe increase and the valley abound with their tents—who know that full obedience to Christ embraces the historical transmission through which we know him. This book refuses to scale down the bearer of that tradition—the historical church, that is—or reduce the authority of its voice. – Fr. Patrick Henry Reardon, senior editor, Touchstone “It's a must for anyone who has grown weary with Christian divisiveness and schism and longs to discover ways of strengthening the bonds that unite us in the Spirit of Christ.”– Chuck Colson
Stand on the shoulders of giants!Have you ever wished you could have a mentor like the Apostle Paul—someone trustworthy to guide your spiritual development and ministry? Tony Cooke, author, teacher, and student of church history, has assembled a panel of the greatest Christian spiritual leaders of all time, curating a profound, yet...
John Piper pleads with fellow pastors to abandon the professionalization of the pastorate and pursue the prophetic call of the Bible for radical ministry.
Religion Online provides new insights about religiosity in a contemporary context, offering a comprehensive look at the intersection of digital media, faith communities, and practices of all sorts. Recent research on Apple users, video games, virtual worlds, artificial intelligence, digital music, and sports as religion supports the idea that media and religion, once considered separate entities, are in many cases the same thing. New media and religious practice can no longer be detached; this two-volume set discusses how religionists are embracing the Internet amidst cultural shifts of secularization, autonomous religious worship, millennials' affinity for new media, and the rise of fundamentalism in the global south. While other works describe case studies, this book explains how new media are interwoven into the very fabric of religious belief, behavior, and community. Chapters break down the past, present, and projected future of the use of digital media in relation to faith traditions of many varieties, extending from mainline Christianity to new religious movements. The book also examines the impacts of digital media on beliefs and practices around the world. In exploring these subjects, it calls on the study of culture, namely anthropology, to conceptualize a technological period as significant as the industrial revolution.
We are designed to make connections to God through prayer in more ways than we can imagine. Prayer can be so much more than a simple conversation. It can be a wordless connection with God, a step beyond the boundary of the separated self. It can be a way to listen to the silence. And it can be learned. We can learn how to pray in ways we never thought possible. It doesn't take more effort; it takes more understanding. Wilson's book shows how the brain is designed by God: To calm itself To relax into love To become increasingly aware of how connected everything is in God To experience a deeper intimacy with our Creator Prayer is something that our brains want to do with a little help. Ken Wilson tells us how. Praise for Mystically Wired: “Smart, savvy, candid, credible, unafraid, self-effacing, and shot through with passionate love of Jesus . . . yes, hands down, this is the best book on prayer that I have ever read. — Phyllis Tickle, Compiler, The Words of Jesus: A Gospel of the Sayings of Our Lord “I confess, I don’t normally like books on prayer, but Mystically Wired is a big exception. While this book is incredibly practical, I was routinely blown away by the intuitive genius of Ken’s view and application of prayer. Page after page, thinking I knew what was next, I was surprised with fresh insight and unique perspectives on connecting with God. Being an evangelist, I was excited to realize I could also send this to spiritual friends who don’t follow Jesus as a way to introduce him.” — R. York Moore, National Evangelist InterVarsity Christian Fellowship USA “It began the day Jesus’ disciples came to him and asked, ‘Lord, teach us to pray.’ Ever since, Christ-followers have been wanting to learn the ways of prayer. Ken Wilson’s Mystically Wired is an extraordinary contribution to that learning tradition. It’s a wonderful read that leaves you feeling, ‘Yes, this is for me. Yes, I can do this. Yes, it’s within reach.’” — Brian McLaren, Author/Speaker/Activist “I wandered away from religion because religion thought it had all the answers. Pastor Ken Wilson, though, understands that life and faith are really about having the right questions. If you want to pray for favors, put this book down now. If you want the answers, the help here is only partial. But if you’re looking for a wide-ranging inquiry, and a path that can bring you closer to the mystery—without the mumbo-jumbo—delve within.” — Carl Safina, Author, Song for the Blue Ocean and The View From Lazy Point “Mystically Wired was a breath of fresh apologetic air for me. I pray and I experience God, and I find fixed hour prayer deeply meaningful, but this book shows that God made us to do such things and our brain is wired to communicate with God.” — Scot McKnight, Karl A. Olsson Professor in Religious Studies, North Park University “In my library there are scores of books on prayer—by legends and modern guides as well. It is not easy to make a genuine contribution to this body of literature. But Ken Wilson has done so. Mystically Wired manages to bring together the best of the sciences and philosophies of mind, brain, and consciousness with deep spirituality and candid personal reflection. While it will happily fit my on my shelf, it fits best in a heart yearning to pray.” — Todd Hunter, Anglican Bishop
