The Alpha Guide is a companion to either the Alpha Film Series or Alpha with Nicky Gumbel. This guide is divided up by session with an easy-to-read outline so that guests can follow along during each talk. With simple bullet-point organization and plenty of room for notes, the guide functions as an invaluable resource to the guest during Alpha, and as a reference tool for individual reflection long after Alpha. It is considered an essential resource for Alpha guests as well as the host and helpers on Alpha. Alpha creates an environment of hospitality where people can bring their friends, family, and work colleagues to explore the Christian faith, ask questions, and share their point of view. Alpha makes it easy to invite friends to have spiritual conversations which explore life's biggest questions in a safe and respectful way. Alpha's approach to hospitality, faith, and discussion is designed to welcome everyone, especially those who might not describe themselves as Christians or church-goers. Each session includes time for a large group meal, short teaching, and small group discussion.

Over the past few decades, short-term mission trips have exploded in popularity. With easy access to affordable air travel, millions of American Christians have journeyed internationally for ministry, service and evangelism. Short-term trips are praised for involving many in global mission but also critiqued for their limitations. Despite the diversity of destinations, certain universal commonalities emerge in how mission trip participants describe their experiences: "My eyes were opened to the world's needs." "They ministered to us more than we ministered to them." "It changed my life." Anthropologist Brian Howell explores the narrative shape of short-term mission (STM). Drawing on the anthropology of tourism and pilgrimage, he shows how STM combines these elements with Christian purposes of mission to create its own distinct narrative. He provides a careful historical survey of the development of STM and then offers an in-depth ethnographic study of a particular mission trip to the Dominican Republic. He explores how participants remember and interpret their experiences, and he unpacks the implications for how North American churches understand mission, grapple with poverty and relate to the larger global church. A groundbreaking book for all who want to understand how and why American Christians undertake short-term mission.

The story of the murder of a missionary in Turkey - killed because of his faith. Rumours of a terrible, triple murder were circulating around the world. Something horrific had happened but reports were sketchy at best, frequently embellished and exaggerated. As hearsay was replaced with hard evidence it was revealed that Susanne Geske had become a martyr's widow, a long way from home, in Malatya, eastern Turkey. With so many aggrandised stories being told as fact, this book seeks the truth from the one person who could provide it with complete authority - Susanne Geske - a truly remarkable woman. Married to a Martyr is a story of tragedy and hope.

This is a call for a new understanding of apologetics, moving away from appeals to tran-cultural rationality, arguing for a new form of cross-cultural dialogue. Christian apologetics is in crisis. Old concepts do no longer hold and post-modern development pose new questions. Benno van den Toren argues for an apologetic witness that is an exercise in cross-cultural dialogue aimed at persuading our conversation partners of the relevance of a life centred on the reality revealed in Jesus Christ. Some significant steps have been made toward the development of such a new apologetic practice. The aim of this book is to provide theological and philosophical basis for a new paradigm for Christian apologetic dialogue with our post-modern and multi-cultural world and to work out its practical relevance.

As the world around us is changing, our methods also need to adapt in order to fulfill the unchanging vision of reaching the lost. Innovations in Missions provides outstanding opportunities to solve the great challenges of ministry in this new Century. This book is not an all-or-nothing approach to being innovative in ministry. It offers what has worked in other areas and lets the reader choose what might be a possibility for their church or ministry. It will provide insight, encouragement and hope to those who are critically looking at the world and considering the problems that must be addressed. Missionaries, mission executives, mission pastors and mission committees wanting to adapt effective strategies in order to stay current with global changes will benefit greatly from this book.

God is at work in the city. And he invites his people to join him. But the city is not merely a mission field for Christians to target. The city is also the environment where Christians are discipled and lives are forged into the image of Jesus. Urban ministry veteran Randy White shows how God transforms you when you answer God's call to the city. Urban life peels away your sin and self-deception and challenges your unexamined assumptions about privilege, race, class and power. Experiential discipleship moves you from abstract theory to hands-on learning and on-the-ground action, revolutionizing your perspective and making a difference in local neighborhoods and beyond. Passionate and practical, White's vivid narratives of experiencing God in the city show you how your spiritual health is intertwined with the health of the metropolis. Seek the welfare of the city, and both you and the city will be transformed.

ABOUT THE BOOK: The Tommie Scott Story is a true story-a true love story-but not of the usual variety. This is a story of a gangbanger, drug dealer, and "hit man" who worked his way through the juvenile reform system and into a California state prison by age twenty. It's the story of an angry young criminal with no remorse and no hope. And it's here-in the depths of hopeless darkness-that this story begins again. It begins again with a humble, gray-haired man who was not ashamed to be a servant and to share the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes. It begins again with a new birth-a spiritual rebirth into God's family through Jesus Christ. And it continues today with a repentant and joyful servant-a dedicated soldier for Christ-whose true story affirms God's Word that says, ..". neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 8:38 NIV). "For we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do" (Ephesians 2:10 NIV). **** ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Tommie Scott is former gang member and now born-again believer in Jesus Christ. He is an author, advocate for at-risk youth, a chaplain for the Las Vegas Community Gang Task Force, and a dedicated witness and soldier for Christ. Tommie is a native of Southern California. He grew up in poverty and was introduced to drugs, alcohol, and gangs as a pre-teen. The juvenile justice system, and later the California Department of Corrections, became his home. By God's grace, Tommie was introduced to Jesus Christ through a faithful Christian prison ministry. Just like Paul's dramatic conversion on the road to Damascus, God changed Tommie's heart and life forever during a prison Bible study. Tommie is now living and doing good works in Christ in Las Vegas, Nevada, with his wife, Rache't, and their five children.

Who gets to narrate the world? The late Robert Webber believed this question to be the most pressing issue of our time. Christianity in America, he preached, will not survive if Christians are not rooted in and informed by the uniquely Christian story that is the gospel of Jesus Christ. This is the burden of Webber's final book, Who Gets to Narrate the World?: Contending for the Christian Story in an Age of Rivals. Convinced that American evangelicals are facing the demise of their entire way of life and faith, Webber challenges his readers to rise up and engage both the external and internal challenges confronting them today. This means that Christians must repent of their cultural accommodation and reclaim the unique story--the Christian story--that God has given them both to proclaim and to live.

In her inspiring true story of her walk of faith, Eileen shares a candid glimpse into a God guided journey as she and Alan, her husband, transformed by a powerful conversion, left everything behind and travelled to India with their young family as missionaries. Here you enter the miraculous faith venture of two passionate people, prepared to do whatever the Lord says. Led to witness modern day miracles of healing, and incredible answers to prayer, Eileen and Alan embarked upon an unforgettable path of supernatural provision, as they only made their needs known to God. This book teaches life-changing lessons that will make you useful to God. The story is told with purpose; weaving together lessons of faith learnt as they took small steps everyday to grow in faith and in the joy of the Holy Spirit. You will be challenged to get up and live your faith.

"Faith Works" offers the compelling testimony of a couples' salvation and missionary years in India that seeks to challenge others to learn what it takes to be useful to God.

Mechanistic dehumanization occurs when human beings are objectified and exploited as a means to an end, comparable to expendable components of a machine. This misconstruction of human value is a source and sustainer of overproduction, an excess of consumption, and the pursuit of unrestrained economic growth, damaging both people and the planet.The notion of mission as accompaniment promotes solidarity among church companions that embodies interdependence and mutuality. Grounded in the New Testament expression of koinonia, Mission as Accompaniment is affirmed in this study as a suitable foundation to counteract mechanistic dehumanization.Through this research with the University of KwaZulu-Natal (South Africa) Theology and Development program, Brian E. Konkol incorporates economics, ecology, anthropology, and postcolonial missiology. He maintains that two particular elements-the African concept of Ubuntu, and an Olive Agenda-when integrated into mission as accompaniment, will equip the ELCA Global Mission with an advocacy-driven trajectory in response to mechanistic dehumanization.

EVANGELISM MANUAL

This manual exemplifies the most effective methods of evangelism. It also provides many strategic plans and guidelines for effective evangelism. All believers, particularly those who aspire to be in leadership or are currently in ministry should own this evangelism manual. This manual is a much-needed resource in the field of evangelistic outreach. It seeks to give practical training and equipping to those who wish to fulfill the call of the Great Commission. The manual is useful for teaching, training, witnessing, follow-up discipleship, launching your own ministry, and even for acquiring personal knowledge of evangelism.