This book is a collection of 52 inspirational stories that illustrate the strength of Christianity in China that will both encourage and inspire you.Drawn from his experiences as a missionary in China, Luke Wesley shares stories of ordinary people doing extraordinary things, motivated by their love of God. It also enables us to learn about the church in China - its struggles and its remarkable victories. We catch a glimpse of what life is like for the millions of Chinese Christians!Stories from China will move you to make the most of every opportunity as you share in the lives of those you'd never have the opportunity to meet.

The spiritual vision of Trobisch's classic answers to love's questions is reproduced here in a new edition.

Redeem your story, redefine your creativity, and make a life that truly matters Sometimes the greatest gift you can receive is for your life to fall apart. After years stuck in a painful cycle fueled by past abuse and ongoing addiction, actor, artist, and director Blaine Hogan finally hit rock bottom. No longer able to hide behind the veneer of success or find comfort in the shadows of compulsion, Blaine was forced to look at the story his life was telling and realize he'd lost the plot. Desperate to find hope, he gave up a budding career and took a major life detour where he discovered that facing his past was the key to unlocking a new kind of creativity. In Exit the Cave, Blaine shares the stories that shaped him while exploring how our relationship to our past defines how we imagine the future and live in the present. Through powerful personal revelations, he invites you to take up the practices of radical imagination and real creativity so you can tell a better story with your life. If you've ever been stuck, addicted, ashamed, discontented, or lost, take courage--a richer, more imaginative, and meaningful life is waiting for you just outside the cave. "A tender but fierce story of survival, reckoning, and redemption. Blaine manages to somehow weave themes of acting, allegory, addiction, family, and faith into one beautifully written account of his own healing. This is the kind of story that will redeem you."--Laura McKowen, bestselling author of We Are the Luckiest "Blaine Hogan has inspired me for many years with his unique way of seeing the world. In this book you'll find a blast of inspiration and a trusty guide to help you exit the cave and enter a world that is real and beautiful and vital."--Brad Montague, New York Times bestselling author and illustrator of The Circles All Around Us, Becoming Better Grownups, and Kid President's Guide to Being Awesome

This book is an investment not only for your immediate future but for your eternal future. The scriptures in this devotional helped me get through a difficult time in my life. Through my pain, I experience peace. You too can find peace, if you seek peace. As you go through your daily devotional you will find weekly "walk" scriptures strategically placed for your encouragement. Not Shown are 365 photos to brighten your day or night and to help bring to remembrance the Word of God. We had such an amazing time studying God's Word and having Him illuminate his encouraging, thought-provoking, peaceful and comforting words to our hearts as we pined the words to paper. Isaiah 55:11 says, "So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; It shall not return to Me void, But it shall accomplish what I please, And it shall prosper in the thing which I sent it." NKJV As you go from day to day or night to night, you too can start experiencing life in a 'new' light. It does not matter if you are not currently "walking" with God, if you are just starting to "walk" with God or if you have been "walking" with Him for years. You will receive and experience your blessing(s) as you turn the page to a new day each day of your life from year to year. This will be the one book you will need to get you through to the next year.

From beloved spiritual writer and Catholic leader Gregory Floyd comes a moving meditation on the power of memory and how God is often more clearly seen when we look back. This is a book about memory, about what stays in the mind, and why. It is a book about the presence of God in our lives and the sights, sounds, words, and experiences that become unforgettable. Beginning with a single word he heard in the middle of the night-one that changed his life-this powerful memoir by Gregory Floyd asks the question: without memory, who are we? It is a meditation on beauty, marriage, family, and prayer, asking of the memories that each implants: what do they reveal? Where do they lead? -and witnessing to their potential to draw us to God.

A coming-of-age travel memoir that probes thorny spiritual questions while taking the reader on a wild ride from the deep American South to the Middle East, Europe, and the Far East. Once the golden girl of her Arkansas town, Natalie finds herself squeezed under small town shame and rejection after being kicked out of church for getting a divorce. It's a hard fall off of a sanctimonious high horse, and religious fundamentalism has left her feeling broken and stuck. But she can't shake the 'wanderlust woes' that have plagued her since childhood, so she runs away to the Middle East. As a mostly-sheltered Southerner, she struggles to adapt but is determined to be 'at home' in the world. Her journey is more than a pilgrimage, it's a peregrination: a one-way ticket to elsewhere in search of the place of her own resurrection. Within these pages is a suspenseful adventure filled with love, loss, laughter, tears, and a little bit of scandalous behavior, but at the heart of it, Natalie walks squarely into the unknown to confront the secret matters of the soul that we wrestle with at night.

Join pastor and New York Times bestselling author Jentezen Franklin in this inspiring journey to uncover the hidden potential in your life and circumstances--and discover God's perfect plan for you. "This book reminds us that God wants good things for us and He provides good things--we just need to open our eyes and see!"--ROBERT MORRIS "If you're determined to fulfill your destiny, then this book is a must-read!"--JOHN BEVERE "A powerful message of hope that God is near and preparing you for spiritual greatness."--CRAIG GROESCHEL

What happens when authority is abused?Imagine our nation without police officersImagine our lives without the protection of the badge.Imagine traveling without stop signs, traffic signals, and roadside warnings.Imagine no violations, no punishments--a grade school playground without rules, a government without leaders...You might as well imagine the earth without gravity, because without authority, there would be chaos.But what happens when authority is misused? Or worse, what happens when spiritual abuse is written off as "authority"?As surely as the absence of authority produces chaos, the abuse of authority produces destruction. Countless people have fallen victim to the manipulation of power and authority. Lives have been warped forever, marriages have been destroyed, women and children have been abused, and husbands and fathers undermined within the boundaries of their home. Also, tragically, it's inside the church--where salvation, healing, freedom, and love should abound--that some of the worst authority abuse takes place. God's design for authority has been misunderstood, twisted, and manipulated, leaving innocent people as victims and prisoners of controlling, abusive situations. The wounded and weak have been preyed upon, and the guilty have been frightened into submission by leaders who use people to improve their own self-esteem or advance their careers.Wake up!!! This is not God's design for the church--or authority.In this book, Bishop George Bloomer discusses: Gods true design for authorityWhy people abuse authorityThe effects of authority abuse in the homeHow to recognize an authority abuserGod's restoration plan for the abused and the abuserAndThe key to breaking freefrom the bondage of spiritual abuse.

Winner of the 2020 Paraclete Poetry Prize, Litany of Flights is a luminous examination of the journey of the soul, from moments of loss to moments of incandescent transformation. These poems remind us to behold the extraordinary in the ordinary, and that the secret workings of the divine occur even through the difficult: "the painful paring of your hollow bones has made you light." Drawing on the beauty of the natural world, the devastating effects of drought and wildfires, tender moments of daily experience, and lessons of the saints, the poet creates a landscape of light and darkness, with unexpected turns into divine presence and absence. Through a spiral of red-tailed hawks, the nest of a mourning dove, the parting of waters, and the ripeness of a persimmon, this shimmering collection invites the reader to singular and transfiguring flight. Litany of Flights (from the forthcoming collection) First, the winged movement, steady, forward. Scrub jays in flitting progress, hawks in predator glide, a ringing up, a knife-sharp slope down. Second, the effortless type, wind-splayed, motionless pinions in thermal recline, as the Psalmist says, blessings breeze his love even in sleep. Third, the hungry, against the gale, the destination singular and the sun dipping crimson. Fourth, the metallic, business or pleasure. Fifth, the whirring kind, all hummingbird. A picnic, apples and chocolate in the garden with roses, both flower and child. You miss it when it's gone. Sixth, a baffling flight of stairs, winding upward, passage and yet vehicle, spiraling to unseen landings-hope courses in the kaleidoscopic lights. Seventh, soar to the sun. Eighth, melt in bitter hubris. You know the story. Ninth, escape. A flight out of Egypt, a path through the sea cleared by divine hand. The times you ran, the times you were left behind in lament. Tenth, only rotting in the belly of a whale tames your stubborn turn from Nineveh. Eleventh, flights of despair and of yearning, two sides of one letting go, hard-earned release back into the wild, unbound by expectation, featherlike. Twelfth, in a moment, caught up high by the Beloved, the one making all things work together, wings, body, arch, air-caught up, like the Shulamite bride, to regions beyond aeronautical wisdom, transported in joy. See, he says, the painful paring of your hollow bones has made you light.

Have you ever felt hopeless? Perhaps you're facing circumstances you never prepared for or even imagined. Maybe you're looking for any hint of encouragement, any inkling that this--whatever your this might be--won't last forever or destroy you. Maybe you're afraid to hope or perhaps you're not even sure what hope is. Whether you're new to faith or a lifelong Christ follower, holding onto hope can be hard. Create in Me a Heart of Hope is a six-week Bible study packed with relevant observations and applications, as well as daily prayers and Scripture memorization. Perfect for individuals or small groups, this study will help you - learn where hope comes from and the difference it can make in your life - cling to God's truth and assurance when you're waiting or overwhelmed, when you've been hurt, or when you feel trapped - begin living with confidence as you firmly grasp the hope God is offering Whatever you're facing, God's unshakable hope can meet you there.

In this collection, poet Sarah Law presents lucid, lyrical reflections on the much-loved saint, Therese of Lisieux (1873-97), whose life and writing has been an inspiration to so many people. For Sarah Law, there is something about Therese that catches at the heart, and her poems flow from that sense of friendship and tenderness with her subject. Many of the poems meditate on events, large and small, in Therese's brief but spiritually significant life. The first section explores her childhood, and the second, her nine precious years as a Carmelite nun; years of both sweetness and suffering. Several poems are inspired by well-known photographs of Therese, some of which are included in this volume. A final section considers Therese's legacy, as her 'little way' of confidence and love became known throughout the world. Each poem may be read as an individual reflection, and as part of the larger biographical sequence.