Churches are increasingly exploring the potential of diaconal ministry to help them serve wider society in the contemporary context. Those involved in this ministry seek to forge improved connections between churches and the wider communities in which they are located. However, the role of those ordained to be deacons is diverse, challenging and often controversial, both within and outside the Church.

This book explores how deacons within the Methodist Church in Britain have understood their own ministry and sought to address these challenges. It draws on innovative research undertaken with the Methodist Diaconal Order over two years. Key questions and implications for practice are provided to help those wishing to reflect further on this ministry.

This book makes a significant contribution to the ecumenical debate on diaconal ministry. It offers much that will be of interest to all those seeking to reflect on, understand, engage in or work with those involved in this ministry in their own contexts."

Wife No. 19 is the compelling, informative and emotionally fraught biography of Ann Eliza Young, a member and wife within the Mormon church during the 19th century. Young sets out to chronicle a lengthy expos of the various misdeeds she witnessed or was personally part of. She describes the character of the founder and prophet of the Mormon Church, Joseph Smith, in the context of his interpersonal relationships. The gradual emergence of polygamy, and its uptake among the higher ranking members of the church, is detailed. Although the title highlights the polygamous relationships for which Mormonism gained notoriety, this book does not shy away from the other scandals or controversies. For example; the means via which Brigham Young dishonestly relieved his followers of their money, possessions and cattle via a number of schemes, and the frequent use of the local Native American populations as scapegoats.

Described by Pope Pius XII as the most important theologian since Thomas Aquinas, the Swiss pastor and theologian, Karl Barth, continues to be a major influence on students, scholars and preachers today.
Barth's theology found its expression mainly through his closely reasoned fourteen-part magnum opus, Die Kirchliche Dogmatik. Having taken over 30 years to write, the Church Dogmatics is regarded as one of the most important theological works of all time, and represents the pinnacle of Barth's achievement as a theologian.

There is much talk and teaching about generational curses and how they can be spiritually transmitted through the family bloodline. But what about generational blessings? The same Scriptures that speak of curses that need to be revoked also point to multi-generational blessings that can transform our lives today and impact our children and grandchildren. What you do today in the Courts of Heaven can release generational blessings for you and your family!

Robert Henderson is a recognized apostolic leader in the church and the bestselling author of the Courts of Heaven series. He has given his life to helping individuals, churches, and nations break legal agreements with the enemy by operating in the Courts of Heaven to step into the breakthroughs that Scripture promises. But now, writing alongside his son, Adam, a powerful new revelation is being released. It was his experience praying for breakthrough over Adam that taught Robert Henderson about both breaking curses and releasing generational blessings from the Courts of Heaven.

You will learn how to:

• Experience family freedom by bringing your loved ones before Heaven's Courts and interceding for verdicts of blessing, freedom, and salvation
• Pray according to what's written in the books of Heaven for you and your family
• Approach the Courts of Heaven for generational blessing using a 5-Step Prayer Model observed in the life of David
• Retrieve lost and stolen wealth from past generations
• See prodigals reclaimed and restored to God as you pray Courtroom prayers on their behalf

It's one thing to cancel the enemy’s assignment for our life by dealing with bloodline issues and curses; it’s another dimension to proactively and powerfully enter the Courts of Heaven, partner with the purposes of God, and secure blessing today and in generations to come.

Open the ancient door of an old church, says Ronald Blythe, and framed in the silence is a house of words where everything has been said: centuries of birth, marriage and death words, gossip, poetry, philosophy, rant, eloquence, learning, nonsense, the language of hymn writers and Bible translators - all of it spoken in one place. This work contains words spoken by Ronald Blythe in the churches he serves as a Reader in the Church of England, and as the local writer expected to add his own distinctive voice. Originating as addresses given at Matins or Evensong, they follow various paths into old and new liturgies, literature and the local countryside. They bring together the author's delight in language, his recollections of farming, his recognition of friends and neighbours, and the hopes he has found in faith.

This book is unique in recording the history of all the Protestant churches in Ireland in the twentieth century, though with particular focus on the two largest - the Presbyterian and the Church of Ireland. It examines the changes and chances in those churches during a turbulent period in Irish history, relating their development to the wider social and political context. Their structures and beliefs are examined, and their influence both in Ireland and overseas is assessed.

Not every Christian needs to go to seminary, but there are certain teachings of the Bible that every Christian should know. Whether you're a relatively new believer in Jesus or a mature Christian looking for a better understanding of basics of the faith, Christian Beliefs is for you.

This readable guide to twenty basic Christian beliefs condenses Wayne Grudem's award-winning book Systematic Theology, prized by pastors and teachers everywhere. He and his son, pastor Elliot Grudem, have boiled down the essentials of theology for everyday Christians and made them both clear and applicable to life. Each brief chapter concludes with questions for personal review or group discussion.

In this revised and updated edition of Christian Beliefs, you will learn about:

• The Bible and its authority for our lives
• The characteristics of God
• The importance of prayer
• Angels and the reality of spiritual warfare
• What it means that we are created in the image of God
• What God has done for us in Christ
• The purpose of the church
• What will happen when Christ returns
• The biblical understanding of heaven
• And much more

Christian Beliefs is the ideal book for every Christian who wants a solid foundation for understanding the most basic and essential teachings of the Bible.

This study describes the creation of the Primitive Baptist movement and discusses the main outlines of their thought. It also weaves the story of the Primitive Baptists with other developments in American Christianity in the Early Republic.

A contribution to the field of theological aesthetics, this book explores the arts in and around the Pentecostal and charismatic renewal movements. It proposes a pneumatological model for creativity and the arts, and discusses different art forms from the perspective of that model. Pentecostals and other charismatic Christians have not sufficiently worked out matters of aesthetics, or teased out the great religious possibilities of engaging with the arts. With the flourishing of Pentecostal culture comes the potential for an equally flourishing artistic life. As this book demonstrates, renewal movements have participated in the arts but have not systematized their findings in ways that express their theological commitments-until now. The book examines how to approach art in ways that are communal, dialogical, and theologically cultivating.

The growth of Christianity in the global South is one of the most important religious stories of the last decade. In no branch of Christianity has that growth been more rapid than Pentecostalism. There are over 100 million Pentecostals in Africa, and Pentecostal practices infuse Catholic, Anglican, and Independent churches. In the traditional Catholic stronghold of Latin America, Pentecostalism now vies with Catholicism for the soul of the continent. And the largest Pentecostsal church in the world, with over 800,000 members, is in Seoul. In To the Ends of the Earth, Allan Anderson offers a historical and theological examination of the growth of global Pentecostalism. Examining such issues as revivalism, healing, gender, worship, and globalization, Anderson seeks to show how the growth of global Pentecostalism is changing the face of Christianity as a whole.

This monograph tracks the development of the socio-economic stance of early Mormonism, an American Millenarian Restorationist movement, through the first fourteen years of the church's existence, from its incorporation in the spring of 1830 in New York, through Ohio and Missouri and Illinois, up to the lynching of its prophet Joseph Smith Jr in the summer of 1844. Mormonism used a new revelation, the Book of Mormon, and a new apostolically inspired church organization to connect American antiquities to covenant-theological salvation history. The innovative religious strategy was coupled with a conservative socio-economic stance that was supportive of technological innovation. This analysis of the early Mormon church uses case studies focused on socio-economic problems, such as wealth distribution, the financing of publication projects, land trade and banking, and caring for the poor. In order to correct for the agentive overtones of standard Mormon historiography, both in its supportive and in its detractive stance, the explanatory models of social time from Fernand Braudel's classic work on the Mediterranean are transferred to and applied in the nineteenth-century American context.