Southwestern Journal of Theology 2021 Book of the Year Award (Honorable Mention, Preaching/Ministry/Leadership) A veteran pastor with thirty years of experience guides readers through a ten-step process to preaching Old Testament narratives from text selection to delivery. The first edition received a Christianity Today award of merit and a Preaching magazine Book of the Year award. This edition, now updated and revised throughout for a new generation, includes a new chapter on how to preach Christ from the Old Testament and an exemplary sample sermon from Mathewson. Foreword by Haddon W. Robinson.

"One problem with evangelistic sermons is that they look and sound like evangelistic sermons." So says Craig Loscalzo, respected preacher and teacher of preachers. He believes in the gospel and its unique power, but knows that today's pastors no longer proclaim the gospel in a more or less "Christian" culture. Our pluralistic setting means that the evangelistic sermons of yesterday--which assumed a common premise and deep respect for Christian authorities--can no longer work so smoothly. So here you will find invaluable guidance in shaping evangelistic sermons that are fresh and appealing to today's unbeliever. Evangelistic Preaching that Connects includes a rationale for evangelistic preaching, sample sermons and practical direction, making it ideal for working pastors and seminary students alike.

Leading ethicist and pastoral theologian Brian Brock reflects on the challenge of disability, refuting widely held misconceptions and helping readers respond well to the pastoral implications of disability. Brock, the father of a child with special needs, weaves together theological commentary with narrative reflection, offering rich theological wisdom for shepherding people with disabilities. He shows pastors and ministers-in-training that thinking more closely and theologically about disability is a doorway into a more vibrant and welcoming church life for all Christians.

Have you ever wondered about the correctness of the messages and teachings of preachers behind the pulpits and on TV today? Who holds them accountable for explanations and outlines of the truth? Who questions them or anything they say? With sound biblical exegesis, this book challenges you to keep an open mind and determine for yourself what is true or false. As an ordained Word of Faith preacher, Joe Bachota has firsthand knowledge of the doctrines being preached.

"Word of Faith Preachers" isn't meant to be an exhaustive discussion of every doctrinal position taken by the movement. Instead, it explores a few of the major heresies the Word of Faith churches are teaching, with the goal of preventing you from being led astray if you are exposed to them. Even though Bachota once believed, preached, and taught most of these doctrines, the Lord has led him in another direction, opening his eyes to the heresies contained in some of the Word of Faith doctrine. Hopefully, this book will lead you in the same way and enable you to come to the same conclusion he did: the teachings of many churches today, particularly Word of Faith churches, are completely out of touch with sound biblical doctrine.

2012 Christianity Today Book Award winner 2011 Leadership Journal Top Book of the Year Copastors Kent Carlson and Mike Lueken tell the story of how God took their thriving, consumer-oriented church and transformed it into a modest congregation of unformed believers committed to the growth of the spirit--even when it meant a decline in numbers. As Kent and Mike found out, a decade of major change is not easy on a church. Oak Hills Church, from the pastoral staff to the congregation, had to confront addiction to personal ambition, resist consumerism and reorient their lives around the teachings of Jesus. Their renewed focus on spiritual formation over numerical growth triggered major changes in the content of their sermons, the tenor of their worship services, and the reason for their outreach. They lost members. But the health and spiritual depth of their church today is a testimony of God's transforming work and enduring faithfulness to the people he loves. Honest and humble, this is Kent and Mike's story of a church they love, written to inspire and challenge other churches to let God rewrite their stories as well. Read it for the church you love.

Winner of the 2013 Frank S. and Elizabeth D. Brewer Prize presented by the American Society of Church History Mississippi Praying examines the faith communities at ground-zero of the racial revolution that rocked America. This religious history of white Mississippians in the civil rights era shows how Mississippians' intense religious commitments played critical, rather than incidental, roles in their response to the movement for black equality. During the civil rights movement and since, it has perplexed many Americans that unabashedly Christian Mississippi could also unapologetically oppress its black population. Yet, as Carolyn Renee Dupont richly details, white southerners' evangelical religion gave them no conceptual tools for understanding segregation as a moral evil, and many believed that God had ordained the racial hierarchy. Challenging previous scholarship that depicts southern religious support for segregation as weak, Dupont shows how people of faith in Mississippi rejected the religious argument for black equality and actively supported the effort to thwart the civil rights movement. At the same time, faith motivated a small number of white Mississippians to challenge the methods and tactics of do-or-die segregationists. Racial turmoil profoundly destabilized Mississippi's religious communities and turned them into battlegrounds over the issue of black equality. Though Mississippi's evangelicals lost the battle to preserve segregation, they won important struggles to preserve the theology that had sustained the racial hierarchy. Ultimately, this history sheds light on the eventual rise of the religious right by elaborating the connections between the pre- and post-civil rights South.

This complete guide to giving and stewardship sheds new light on solid financial resources, one of the 12 keys to building an effective church. Here is a practical plan for the growth and development of giving and stewardship in your congregation, complete with action worksheets that advance the progress of the plan over four years.

God is up to something And his plans are far greater than you might imagine. Christianity is not merely about isolated individuals going to heaven. It's about God transforming the entire world and making things right. Sicknesses will be healed, sins will be forgiven, injustice will be eradicated, and all creation will be redeemed. But this is not merely a distant future. It's happening now through what Jesus came to establish--the kingdom of God. Allen Wakabayashi reawakens you to the world-changing reality of the kingdom of God. With clear, biblical insight, he unpacks what Jesus proclaimed about the good news of the kingdom and spells out the implications for you today. Focusing on the kingdom of God will revolutionize how you live out your faith, how you think about your world and how you explain the good news about Jesus. Ultimately, understanding yourself as a citizen of the kingdom will empower you to be one of God's change agents in the world. God is at work to restore everything to be the way he intended it to be, and you can be a part of what he is doing Get a glimpse of the kingdom coming, and experience his will being done--on earth as it is in heaven.