This is a collection of texts on prayer, taken from Greek and Russian sources. The spiritual teaching of the Orthodox Church appears here in its classic and traditional form, but expressed in unusually direct and vivid language. The Art of Prayer is concerned in particular with the most frequently used and best loved of all Orthodox prayers - the Jesus Prayer. It deals also with the general question 'What is Prayer?', with the different degrees of prayer from ordinary oral prayer to unceasing prayer of the heart, with the dangers of illusion and discouragement, and the need for seclusion and inner peace.

By Water and the Spirit contains the official 1996 General Conference paper on baptism as a six-week study. Felton describes the United Methodist understanding of baptism. Practical and user-friendly.

Pilgrimage, as a global activity linked to the sacred, speaks to the special significance of persons, places and events. This book relates these sentiments to the curatorship of the Camino de Santiago that comprises a lattice of European pilgrimage itineraries converging at Santiago de Compostela in northwest Spain. The detailed analysis focuses on the management of pilgrimage settings as heritage and tourism linked to the shrine of Saint James and gives particular attention to investment guidelines, land use planning regulations, environmental stewardship, information dissemination and museology.

This essay collection, devoted to exploring the richness of Christian musical traditions in the Americas, reflects the distinctive critical perspectives of the Society for Christian Scholarship in Music, an association of scholars dedicated to exploring the intersections of Christian faith and musical scholarship. Now in our sixteenth year, we seek to celebrate our work in the world and bring it to a larger audience by offering a cross- section of the most outstanding scholarship from an international array of writers. The proposed collection follows a first collection published to celebrate the fifteenth anniversary of the Society (Exploring Christian Song, M. Jennifer Bloxam and AndrewShenton, editors, Lexington Books, 2017). That first volume focused on Christian song in a variety of different contexts. Our proposed collection surveys a broad geographical areaand demonstrates the enormous diversity of music-making and scholarship within that area. While there are some studies that focus on a single country or region and its sacred music (see the literature survey below), this will be the first collection to present a representative cross-section of the range of sacred music in the Americas and the approaches to studying them in context. The essays in this collection are ecumenical, reflecting the breadth of Christian traditions. The essays include several by distinguished senior scholars in the field (including David Music, Baylor University; and Jeff Warren, Quest University, Canada). Several essays are by noted specialists in the field (including Jesse Karlsberg, Emory University; and Cathy Ann Elias, DePaul University), and several by younger scholars (including Hannah Denecke, Florida State University; and Natasha Walsh, York University, Canada). SCSM is particularly keen to promote the work of students. The work of these rising stars thus appears alongside the work of veteran scholars working in the area of Christian sacred music, ensuring a stimulating mix of subjects, viewpoints, and methodologies.

This study proceeds historically, from the origins of the Eucharist up to our own day. Unlike most studies of this kind, it includes an introduction to and developmental summary of the diverse Eucharistic liturgies of the Christian East. It also explores the various Western rites (Ambrosian, Gallican, and Mozarabic) in addition to the Roman. With regard to theological themes, the authors give special attention to the topics of real presence (including the "consecration" of the bread and wine) and eucharistic sacrifice, the most central and most ecumenically challenging issues since the sixteenth-century Reformations. Making the book especially teacher- and student-friendly are the summary points at the end of each chapter. Each chapter also contains an abundance of liturgical texts for ease of reference.

Hymns and the music the church sings are tangible means of expressing worship. As worship is one of the central functions of the church and it occupies a prime focus, a renewed sense of awareness to our theological presuppositions and cultural cues must be maintained to ensure a proper focus in worship. Hymns and Hymnody is an introductory textbook in three volumes describing the most influential hymnists, liturgists, and musical movements of the church. This academically grounded resource evaluates both the historical and theological perspectives of the major hymnists and composers that have impacted the church over the course of twenty centuries. Volume 1 explores the early church and concludes with the Renaissance era hymnists. Each chapter contains five elements: historical background, theological perspectives communicated in their hymns/compositions, contribution to liturgy and worship, notable hymns, and bibliography. The missions of Hymns and Hymnody are to provide biographical data on influential hymn writers for students and interested laypeople, and to provide a theological analysis of what the cited composers have communicated in the theology of their hymns. It is vital for those involved in leading the worship of the church to recognize that what they communicate is in fact theology. This latter aspect is missing in accessible formats for the current literature.

The second of four volumes containing the edited texts, commentaries and source notes for each of the nearly nine hundred occasions of special worship and for each of the annual commemorations in England and Wales, Scotland, and Ireland. Since the sixteenth century, the governments and established churches of the British Isles have summoned the nation to special acts of public worship during periods of anxiety and crisis, at times of celebration, or for annual commemoration and remembrance. These special prayers, special days of worship and anniversary commemorations were national events, reaching into every parish in England and Wales, in Scotland, and in Ireland. They had considerable religious, ecclesiastical, political, ideological, moral and social significance, and they produced important texts: proclamations, council orders, addresses and - in England and Wales, and in Ireland - prayers or complete liturgieswhich for specified periods supplemented or replaced the services in the Book of Common Prayer. Many of these acts of special worship and most of the texts have escaped historical notice. National Prayers. Special Worship since the Reformation, in four volumes, provides the edited texts, commentaries and source notes for each of the nearly nine hundred occasions of special worship, and for each of the annual commemorations. The second volume,General Fasts, Thanksgivings and Special Prayers in the British Isles 1689-1870, contains the texts and commentaries for the numerous and frequent special prayers, fast days and thanksgivings during the wars which consolidated the 1688 revolution, through the long imperial wars of the eighteenth century, and the wars against revolutionary and Napoleonic France, as well as prayers and thanksgivings associated with Jacobite risings, epidemics, socialunrest, and episodes in the lives of the kings and queens.

In some respects, the contrasts of Christmas are what make it the most delightful time of the year. It is a time of generosity, kindness and peace on earth, with broad permission to indulge in food, drink and gifts. On the other hand, Christmas has become a battleground for raging culture wars, marred by debates about how it should be celebrated and acknowledged as a uniquely Christian holiday. This text argues that much of the animosity is based on a fundamental misunderstanding of the holiday's core character. By tracing Christmas' origins as a pagan celebration of the winter solstice and its development in Europe's Christianization, this history explains that the true "reason for the season" has as much to do with the earth's movement around the sun as with the birth of Christ. Chapters chronicle how Christmas's magic and misrule link to the nativity, and why the carnival side of the holiday appears so separated from traditional Christian beliefs.

Stephen Cherry's latest book is a sequence of beautifully crafted prayer-meditations, providing simple yet profound spiritual nourishment for the Lenten season. The book gives an engaging introduction to the different ways that prayer can work in the lives of the busiest of Christians. Barefoot Prayers is ideal for people who may have little time for sitting and reading but more time for thinking and reflecting.

At its best, all Christian worship is led by the Holy Spirit. But is there a distinctive theology of Pentecostal worship? The Pentecostal church or the renewal movement is among the fastest-growing parts of the body of Christ around the world, which makes understanding its theology and practice critical for the future of the church. In this volume in IVP Academic's Dynamics of Christian Worship (DCW) series, theologian Steven Felix-Jager offers a theology of renewal worship, including its biblical foundations, how its global nature is expressed in particular localities, and how charismatic worship distinctively shapes the community of faith. With his guidance, the whole church might understand better what it means to pray, "Come, Holy Spirit!" The Dynamics of Christian Worship series draws from a wide range of worshiping contexts and denominational backgrounds to unpack the many dynamics of Christian worship-including prayer, reading the Bible, preaching, baptism, the Lord's Supper, music, visual art, architecture, and more-to deepen both the theology and practice of Christian worship for the life of the church.

Based on the Revised Common Lectionary (RCL), "Feasting on the Word Worship Companion: Liturgies for Year A, Volume 1" is an invaluable aid that provides liturgical pieces needed in preparing for worship each week. Written and compiled by a team of eleven ecumenical and seasoned liturgy writers under the creative leadership of Kimberly Bracken Long, this resource offers a multitude of poetic prayers and responsive readings for all parts of worship and is meant to complement existing denominational resources. In addition, the weekly entries include questions for reflection and household prayers for morning and evening that are drawn from the lectionary, allowing churches to include them in their bulletin for parishioners to use throughout the week.

During times of the year when two different tracks of Old Testament texts are offered by the RCL, this resource offers an entire set of materials for each track. Also, a CD-ROM is included with each volume that enables planners to easily cut and paste relevant readings, prayers, and questions into worship bulletins.

In Jewish Integration in the German Army in the First World War David J. Fine offers a surprising portrayal of Jewish officers in the German army as integrated and comfortably identified as both Jews and Germans. Fine explores how both Judaism and Christianity were experienced by Jewish soldiers at the front, making an important contribution to the study of the experience of religion in war. Fine shows how the encounter of German Jewish soldiers with the old world of the shtetl on the eastern front tested both their German and Jewish identities. Finally, utilizing published and unpublished sources including letters, diaries, memoirs, military service records, press accounts, photographs, drawings and tomb stone inscriptions, the author argues that antisemitism was not a primary factor in the war experience of Jewish soldiers.

Christianity Today's Book of the Year Award of Merit What happens when a diverse church glorifies the global God? We live in a time of unprecedented intercultural exchange, where our communities welcome people from around the world. Music and media from every culture are easily accessible, and our worship is infused with a rich variety of musical and liturgical influences. But leading worship in multicultural contexts can be a crosscultural experience for everybody. How do we help our congregations navigate the journey? Innovative worship leader Sandra Maria Van Opstal is known for crafting worship that embodies the global, multiethnic body of Christ. Likening diverse worship to a sumptuous banquet, she shows how worship leaders can set the table and welcome worshipers from every tribe and tongue. Van Opstal provides biblical foundations for multiethnic worship, with practical tools and resources for planning services that reflect God's invitation for all peoples to praise him. When multiethnic worship is done well, the church models reconciliation and prophetic justice, heralding God's good news for the world. Enter into the praise of our king, and let the nations rejoice!

Struggle well. Fight for progress. Know the One who has fought for you. The writer of Hebrews says that we are to "throw off everything that hinders" and run "the race marked out for us" (Hebrews 12:1). We are called to action and empowered to struggle well. And yet, as we navigate life, we realize there are difficulties without and discouragements within. Not only do we feel ill equipped to thrive . . . we don't even know how to survive. In this six-session study, Ben Stuart will give you practical strategies to help you war against the enemy of your soul and find the rest that God has promised for you. You will discover how to overcome deceptive strategies the enemy aims at you. How to move away from aimless affections and toward things that develop intimacy with God. How to make a place, a time, and a plan for communicating with God each day. And how to keep in step with the Spirit. Life is hard, but there are promises to grip. Strategies and tactics to employ. Progress to be made. Are you ready? This study guide has everything you need for a full Bible study experience, including: The study guide itself-with video notes, personal study and group discussion sections, and a guide to best practices for leading a group. An individual access code to stream all five video sessions online (you don't need to buy a DVD!). Sessions and video run times include: FREED TO FIGHT (20:30) AWAY AND TOWARD (17:30) DOWNSTREAM AND UPSTREAM (21:00) CONSISTENCY AND CREATIVITY (19:30) FOCUS AND UNITY (20:30) KEEP IN STEP (20:30) Watch on any device! Streaming video access code included. Access code subject to expiration after 12/31/2027. Code may be redeemed only by the recipient of this package. Code may not be transferred or sold separately from this package. Internet connection required. Void where prohibited, taxed, or restricted by law. Additional offer details inside.

The Gospel Coaltion Award of Distinction-Arts and Culture ECPA Top Shelf Award Winner For practitioners and fans, jazz expresses the deepest meanings of life. Its rich history and its distinctive elements like improvisation and syncopation unite to create an unrepeatable and inexpressible aesthetic experience. But for others, jazz is an enigma. Might jazz be better appreciated and understood in relation to the Christian faith? In this volume, theologian and jazz pianist William Edgar argues that the music of jazz cannot be properly understood apart from the Christian gospel, which like jazz moves from deep lament to inextinguishable joy. By tracing the development of jazz, placing it within the context of the African American experience, and exploring the work of jazz musicians like Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, John Coltrane, Ella Fitzgerald, and Louis Armstrong, Edgar argues that jazz deeply resonates with the hope that is ultimately found in the good news of Jesus Christ. Grab a table. The show is about to begin.

This book offers a systematic, chronological analysis of the role played by the human senses in experiencing pilgrimage and sacred places, past and present. It thus addresses two major gaps in the existing literature, by providing a broad historical narrative against which patterns of continuity and change can be more meaningfully discussed, and focusing on the central, but curiously neglected, area of the core dynamics of pilgrim experience. Bringing together the still-developing fields of Pilgrimage Studies and Sensory Studies in a historically framed conversation, this interdisciplinary study traces the dynamics of pilgrimage and engagement with holy places from the beginnings of the Judaeo-Christian tradition to the resurgence of interest evident in twenty-first century England. Perspectives from a wide range of disciplines, from history to neuroscience, are used to examine themes including sacred sites in the Bible and Early Church; pilgrimage and holy places in early and later medieval England; the impact of the English Reformation; revival of pilgrimage and sacred places during the nineteenth and twentieth Centuries; and the emergence of modern place-centred, popular 'spirituality'. Addressing the resurgence of pilgrimage and its persistent link to the attachment of meaning to place, this book will be a key reference for scholars of Pilgrimage Studies, History of Religion, Religious Studies, Sensory Studies, Medieval Studies, and Early Modern Studies.

In the past 20 years, a new paradigm has emerged around the study of festive dining as a seminal social practice that functioned as the matrix for the social formation of a variety of groups in the Greco-Roman world, including earliest Christianity and pre-Rabbinic Judaism. Most recently, an international team of scholars, organized as the Society of Biblical Literature Seminar on Meals in the Greco-Roman World, has developed this paradigm in a series of groundbreaking studies. This volume provides a collection of those studies in four areas of focus: The Typology of the Greco-Roman Banquet; The Archeology of the Banquet; Who Was at the Greco-Roman Banquets?; and The Culture of Reclining. Together they establish festive meals as an essential lens into social formation in the Greco-Roman world.

The Black Church is an institution that emerged in rebellion against injustice perpetrated upon black bodies. How is it, then, that black women's oppression persists in black churches that espouse theological and ethical commitments to justice? The book engages the Chalcedonian Definition as the starting point for exploring the body as a moral dilemma. It reveals how the body of Christ has historically posed a problem for the church, and has produced a Christian trajectory of violence that has resulted in the breaking of the body of Christ. A survey of the black body as an American problem provides the lens for understanding how the theological problem of body has functioned as a social dilemma for black people. An exploration of the black Social Gospel as the primary theological trajectory that has approached the problem of embodied difference reveals how body injustice, namely sexism, functions behind the veil of race in black churches.

This is a book for pacesetters -- church leaders who desire to help their churches break free of the things that turn them in on themselves and keep them from being outward-looking and outward-moving communities of Jesus Christ. The ingrown church is a common phenomenon. It is the 'norm' for contemporary evangelical and Protestant churches. But ingrownness is a pathology. It can destroy the vital spiritual health of a church. It must, therefore, be combated with the norms of Scripture. And that is why this book was written. Outgrowing the Ingrown Church is a masterful mix of biblical principle, objective analysis, and personal experience. It traces the author's own growing awareness of the problem of ingrownness in his calling as a pastor, seminary professor, and evangelist/missionary. In his own discovery of the power and presence of God he discovered the tendency of the church to live by its own power and resources. This is a book written to help change churches by changing the individuals who read it. It offers one an unparalleled challenge to be evaluated, revitalized, and then used by God for the work of ministry. Thus it is a book not merely for pastors, but for the whole body of Christ. 'I have never been as excited about any book concerning church growth as when I read this book . . . . (His biblical) principles, if followed, transform individual lives and then lead to a movement within a church to change the whole congregation, ' writes John Guest in the foreword

Glory in our Midst explores the key themes of Advent, Christmas, Epiphany and Candlemas, setting them within a liturgical context. It can be read either cover to cover or used meditatively throughout the Advent and Christmas seasons, taking us daily more deeply into the mystery of the incarnation and inspiring us to make it a real and vivid part of our lives. Using bible stories and prayer, Michael Perham explores how the meaning of Christ's coming is revealed and, behind that unfolding, how key elements emerge in the Christian understanding of God himself. Michael Perham is well known for his many reflective and liturgical publications, which have inspired, challenged and strengthened many on their spiritual journeys. Michael Perham is the Bishop of Gloucester and was an architect of Common Worship. He has written extensively on liturgy, worship and spirituality and his books include New Testament Handbook of Pastoral Liturgy and Signs of Your Kingdom.