Living Religions

The day your mother dies is the day you acquire a powerful and persistent new companion-grief. It is also the day you become the keeper of a legacy that has the potential to affect generations to come. Between a past you can't let go of and a future you can hardly find the energy to think about, you stand. The ground may feel shaky, but it is sacred. And it must be tread.

Take the voyage of a lifetime...for a lifetime! As the young, hard-nosed, newly-appointed captain of a commercial fishing boat, Jack Frost returned the first week as "Top Hook" - he had out-fished all the others. But he also harpooned his mentor's heart on the way to the top.

Crashing the chatterbox = Overpowering lies of insecurity, fear, condemnation, and discouragement with the promises of God. “I used to think that someone who struggled with the kinds of weaknesses I deal with daily was useless to God. I felt so often like I was drowning in internal dialogue I couldn’t control. It had been the soundtrack of my life for as long as I could remember.

Ff we spend our lives trying to be “the strong one,” we become exhausted, burned-out, and disconnected from our truest selves. What if it were different? Could there be a different way to be strong? Could strength mean more than pushing on and pushing through pain, bearing every heavy burden on our own? What if, instead, true strength were more like the tide: soft and bold, fierce and gentle, moving together as one powerful force? In Strong like Water, author and trauma therapist Aundi Kolber offers a framework for true flourishing.

From the authors of the bestselling Parenting with Love and Logic, this teen-specific resource empowers parents to raise responsible tweens, teens, and young adults without anger, nagging, or power struggles. Learn to set healthy boundaries, encourage important skills, and foster effective decision-making with empathy and grace. Designed to help you and your child grow during the challenges of the teenage years, this book addresses a wide range of real-life issues.

At a time when we are all more rudderless than ever, we look for the very best teachers and mentors to guide us. In Fully Alive, an unusual and gripping memoir, Timothy Shriver shows how his teachers have been the world's most forgotten minority: people with intellectual disabilities. In these pages we meet the individuals who helped him come of age and find a deeper and more meaningful way to see the world.

"Be holy, for I am holy," commands God to His people. But holiness is something that is often missed in the Christian's daily life. According to Jerry Bridges, that's because we're not exactly sure what our part in holiness is. In The Pursuit of Holiness, he helps us see clearly just what we should rely on God to do-and what we should accept responsibility for ourselves.

A lot of time and money is spent by Christians who have a passion to spread the gospel. Across the globe, this effort is paying off as seekers find Christ, the source of truth and peace. In many cultures, though, appeals made on behalf of the Christian faith are met with blank stares, indifference, even mocking hostility. Ken Ham, one of Christendom's most astute observers of evangelism, is convinced that compromise with evolutionary world views has virtually crippled preaching and teaching efforts, especially in Western societies.

The world is a broken place marred by evil, and evil’s influence impacts us all. It is often difficult for people to grasp what God is like in a world such as ours. Jesus shows us the heart of God in a world of heartache. He is the most beautiful, compelling, tender person who has lived.

For months, thousands around the globe prayed for a miraculous healing for Beni, beloved wife of pastor Bill Johnson, that never came. At Bethel Church, a global outpost of revival known for its signs and wonders, her passing thundered through the community like an avalanche in the valley.

Loving Our Kids on Purpose combines the principles of the Kingdom of God and revival to form a powerful strategy for parents. Rather than the traditional approaches that train children to learn to accept being controlled by well-meaning parents and adults, this book teaches parents how to train children to manage their freedoms and protect their important heart-to-heart relationships. Children were designed with the core need of freedom. To deny this or live ignorant of it eventually destroys the trust connection between parent and child.

The word of God is like a seed and your heart is the soil. Most Christians want change in some area of their lives. They try and try to make those changes but soon find themselves falling back into the same habits and behaviors. Self-discipline and self-control have once again failed them. So how does lasting change take place? A worm doesn't struggle to become a butterfly in the cocoon. A seed doesn't strive to become a tree and produce fruit. They simply do what they were designed to do by god and the change takes place, effortlessly.

The 40 days of fasting before Christmas are meant to prepare us for the Feast of the Nativity, but the busyness of the secular celebration can interfere with our best efforts to center our hearts on Christ. Behold a Great Light is a daily devotional, designed to help listeners contemplate the mysteries of the Incarnation, from the beginning of the Nativity fast on November 15, through Christmas and Theophany, ending with the Synaxis of St. John the Baptist on January 7.

Our thought lives have incredible power over our mental, emotional, and even physical well-being. In fact, our thoughts can either limit us to what we believe we can do or release us to experience abilities well beyond our expectations. When we choose a mindset that extends our abilities rather than placing limits on ourselves, we will experience greater intellectual satisfaction, emotional control, and physical health. The only question is... how?

One of the problems with being a Christ follower is that we can substitute religious expressions and religious behaviors for authentic experiences and encounters without even know we are doing it. The longer we go to church the more we know the right words to say and the right things to do, but we can easily say those words and do those things without transformational intimacy with Jesus? We can start with significant, transformational encounters with God, and end up with dusty old religion.

Two quotients analyze our minds and emotions: IQ and EQ. But Kris Vallotton believes we are ignoring a deeper dimension - spiritual intelligence. Because believers have the mind of Christ through the Holy Spirit, we have the capacity for brilliance. God invites us to embark on a journey of discovery as he reveals mysteries and helps us bring our perspective in line with his - transforming our understanding and endowing us with spiritual intelligence.

The Orthodox Christian tradition is filled with wisdom and guidance about the biblical path of salvation. Yet this guidance remains largely inaccessible to parents and often disconnected from the parenting challenges we face in our homes. Parenting Toward the Kingdom will help you make the connections between the spiritual life as we understand it in the Orthodox Church and the ongoing challenges of raising children.

In Holy Hygge, author Jamie Erickson unites the popular Danish practice with the deep theological truths of the gospel. She unpacks the seven tenets of hygge: hospitality, relationships, well-being, atmosphere, comfort, contentment, and rest. In addition, Erickson shows how the external veneer of a lifestyle can create a life-giving home only when placed under the hope of the gospel. Holy Hygge provides practical ideas for using hygge to gather people and introduce them to faith in Christ.

When you fast, your spirit becomes uncluttered by the things of this world and amazingly sensitive to the things of God. Once you've experienced even a glimpse of this and the countless rewards and blessings that follow, it changes your entire perspective. Jentezen Franklin gives you the keys to experiencing this kind of transformation in Fasting, one of the best and most comprehensive books available on the topic.

Considered by many to be the greatest single book of Marian spirituality ever written, True Devotion to Mary is St. Louis de Montfort's classic statement on the spiritual way to Jesus Christ though the blessed Virgin Mary. Beloved by countless souls, this book sums up the entire Christian life, revealing a way of holiness that is short, easy, secure, and perfect. In this beautiful and sublimely inspiring book, de Montfort explains the wonderful spiritual effects which true devotion to Mary brings about in a person's life.