Pentecostalism is currently the fastest-growing Christian movement, with hundreds of millions of followers. This growth overwhelmingly takes place outside of the West, and women make up 75 percent of the membership. The contributors to Spirit on the Move examine Pentecostalism's appeal to black women worldwide and the ways it provides them with a source of community and access to power. Exploring a range of topics, from Neo-Pentecostal churches in Ghana that help women challenge gender norms to evangelical gospel musicians in Brazil, the contributors show how Pentecostalism helps black women draw attention to and seek remediation from the violence and injustices brought on by civil war, capitalist exploitation, racism, and the failures of the state. In fleshing out the experiences, theologies, and innovations of black women Pentecostals, the contributors show how Pentecostal belief and its various practices reflect the movement's complexity, reach, and adaptability to specific cultural and political formations. Contributors. Paula Aymer, John Burdick, Judith Casselberry, Deidre Helen Crumbley, Elizabeth McAlister, Laura Premack, Elizabeth A. Pritchard, Jane Soothill, Linda van de Kamp

With your mouth you are either going to give God dominion over you, or you're goint to give Satan dominion over you. Quit talking the devil's language and start talking God's language.

In his fourth God's Generals volume, Roberts Liardon

chronicles God's great healing evangelists of the

twentieth century.

* Oral Roberts

* Lester Sumrall

* Charles & Frances Hunter

* George Jeffreys

* F. F. Bosworth

As you read about the lives of these ministry pioneers, your

faith for signs and miracles will grow as you anticipate

seeing God's mighty hand move in the church today.

Larry Hart s Truth Aflame brings together charismatic renewal and classic evangelical faith better than anything I have read. An important contribution to the contemporary renaissance in systematic theology Timothy George Dean of Beeson Divinity School of Samford University, Executive Editor of Christianity Today As the Pentecostal/charismatic movement continues to grow, so does the need for solid theological resources for its members. While there are many volumes of systematic theology available, very few are written from a distinctly charismatic perspective. Truth Aflame seeks to meet that need. While academically sound, Truth Aflame is written with a practical, pastoral flavor. Larry Hart defines systematic theology as the process of taking what the Bible teaches and relating it to contemporary questions and knowledge. His passion for the subject is evident: he is concerned that the reader both grasps the magnificence of the study of God and allows these great truths to be transformative. This Truth, then---liberating, enlivening, and transforming Truth---becomes central to the ongoing renewal of the church that we are seeing in our day. Dr. Hart treats each of the traditional categories---revelation, God, creation, humanity, sin, Christ, salvation, the church, and last things---from a Pentecostal/charismatic perspective. He addresses other theological viewpoints but does not get bogged down in analysis and rebuttal. Further, he seeks to build bridges of understanding to those evangelicals outside the charismatic tradition. Clear, succinct, and readable, this revised and updated edition of Truth Aflame is well-suited not only for students, but for anyone desiring a greater understanding of Pentecostal/charismatic theology."

Jon Krakauer's literary reputation rests on insightful chronicles of lives conducted at the outer limits. He now shifts his focus from extremes of physical adventure to extremes of religious belief within our own borders, taking readers inside isolated American communities where some 40,000 Mormon Fundamentalists still practice polygamy. Defying both civil authorities and the Mormon establishment in Salt Lake City, the renegade leaders of these Taliban-like theocracies are zealots who answer only to God.
At the core of Krakauer's book are brothers Ron and Dan Lafferty, who insist they received a commandment from God to kill a blameless woman and her baby girl. Beginning with a meticulously researched account of this appalling double murder, Krakauer constructs a multi-layered, bone-chilling narrative of messianic delusion, polygamy, savage violence, and unyielding faith. Along the way he uncovers a shadowy offshoot of America's fastest growing religion, and raises provocative questions about the nature of religious belief.

This book takes a look at the faith, philosophy, and way of life of the country's one remaining Shaker community. Lauber explores their spiritual and daily lives by weaving together proprietary Shaker quotations, interviews, and photographs. The result is a book that pierces many misconceptions, most notably that the Shakers and their faith are dead. Lauber places the topics of faith, community, work, and worship in the context of Shaker history and contemporary developments on the American landscape.

With over 140 million copies in print, and serving as the principal proselytizing tool of one of the world's fastest growing faiths, the Book of Mormon is undoubtedly one of the most influential religious texts produced in the western world. Written by Terryl Givens, a leading authority on Mormonism, this compact volume offers the only concise, accessible introduction to this extraordinary work.
Givens examines the Book of Mormon first and foremost in terms of the claims that its narrators make for its historical genesis, its purpose as a sacred text, and its meaning for an audience which shifts over the course of the history it unfolds. The author traces five governing themes in particular--revelation, Christ, Zion, scripture, and covenant--and analyzes the Book's central doctrines and teachings. Some of these resonate with familiar nineteenth-century religious preoccupations; others consist of radical and unexpected takes on topics from the fall of Man to Christ's mortal ministries and the meaning of atonement. Givens also provides samples of a cast of characters that number in the hundreds, and analyzes representative passages from a work that encompasses tragedy, poetry, sermons, visions, family histories and military chronicles. Finally, this introduction surveys the contested origins and production of a work held by millions to be scripture, and reviews the scholarly debates that address questions of the record's historicity.
Here then is an accessible guide to what is, by any measure, an indispensable key to understanding Mormonism. But it is also an introduction to a compelling and complex text that is too often overshadowed by the controversies that surround it.
About the Series: Combining authority with wit, accessibility, and style, Very Short Introductions offer an introduction to some of life's most interesting topics. Written by experts for the newcomer, they demonstrate the finest contemporary thinking about the central problems and issues in hundreds of key topics, from philosophy to Freud, quantum theory to Islam.

When Mike got his dream job as an FBI agent, he never thought he would also be called as an LDS bishopfour times! Follow Mike as he recalls his adventures as an FBI agent and inspiration as a bishop. As Mike "fought crime and Satan with a pistol in one hand and scriptures in the other," he learned the importance of obedience in both jobs. Filled with surprises and unexpected thrills, and told with humor and ease, Agent Bishop: True Stories from an FBI Agent Moonlighting as a Mormon Bishop is the perfect memoir for the FBI agent in all of us!

Examines Pentecostal conversion as a force of change, revealing new insights into its dominant role in global Christianity today. There has been an extraordinary growth in Pentecostalism in Africa, with Brazilian Pentecostals establishing new transnational Christian connections, initiating widespread changes not only in religious practice but in society. This book describes its rise in Maputo, capital of Mozambique, and the sometimes dramatic impact of Pentecostalism on women. Here large numbers of urban women are taking advantage of the opportunities Pentecostalism offers to overcome restrictions at home, pioneer new life spaces and change their lives through the power of the Holy Spirit. Yet, conversion can also mean a violent rupturing with tradition, with family and with social networks. As the pastors encourage women to cut their ties with the past, including ancestral spirits, they come to see their kin and husbands as imbued with evil powers, and many leave their families. Conquering spheres that used to be forbidden to them, they often live alone as unmarried women, sometimes earning more than men of a similar age. They are also expected to donate huge sums to the churches, often money that they can ill afford, bringing new hardships. Linda van de Kamp is Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands.