Imagine opening a jewelry box. As you carefully raise the lid, the most beautiful music you have ever heard begins to play. Peering inside, you see precious gemstones surrounding a polished strand of pearls against a black velvet lining. This isn't just any jewelry box. It's your spiritual jewelry box. Pearls are the foundational piece placed in our spiritual jewelry box. When you don't know what to pray, don't know how to pray, and don't even want to pray, you can open your jewelry box and pull out Pearls.

In the same way an oyster covers an irritant in its shell with a substance called nacre, producing a pearl, we can coat the issues in our lives with the nacre of prayer and also produce pearls. Pearls outlines five essentials for a richer prayer life, focusing on how Jesus' words, "it is better to give than to receive," relate to prayer. These words are often related to our money, our time, or our service. Pearls takes a step further and shows how giving to God through prayer in five areas enriches your prayer life and draws you into a closer relationship with Him.

Pearls is about praying. It provides a fresh look at a subject that will never grow old.

Although most historical and contemporary religions are governed by men, there are, scattered throughout the world, a handful of well-documented religions led by women. Most of these are marginal, subordinate, or secondary religions in the societies in which they are located. The one known exception to this rule is the indigenous religion of Okinawa, where women lead the official mainstream religion of the society. This book is the first in-depth look at this unique religious tradition, exploring the intersection between religion and gender. Based on fieldwork in an Okinawan village, Susan Sered argues that the absence of male dominance in the religious sphere is part of a broader absence of hiearchical ideologies and cultural patterns. In addition to providing important information on this remarkable and little-studied group, this book helps to overturn our mostly unexamined assumptions that male dominance of the religious sphere is universal, axiomatic, and necessary.

Dwight Lyman Moody defines a Prevailing Prayer as one which involves the entire being of the person praying: the entirety of the mind is focused not upon material or life circumstances, but the very being of God. Such an effort to pray so deeply is difficult: Moody, himself an experienced evangelist and preacher, had encountered many Christians who struggled to attain depth and connection with the Lord during their prayers. This book intends to help the true believer attain a material closeness to the divine through prayer which prevails. It is ideal for devotional reading before and after your daily prayers, that the insights within remain in mind. To help his fellow believers, Moody quotes numerous stories from the Biblical scriptures together with personal anecdotes from his long career as a man of God. We also hear of incidents in the life of Jesus Christ, and the many obstacles He surmounted to teach humanity of God.

This study presents a comprehensive treatment of a crucial aspect of Greek religion hitherto largely neglected in the English language. Simon Pulleyn makes a full examination of all the relevant literary and inscribed material available in order both to describe ancient Greek practices and to explain their significance.

Vitthal, also called Vithoba, is the most popular Hindu god in the western Indian state of Maharashtra, and the best-known god of that region outside India. His temple at Pandharpur is the goal of an annual pilgrimage that is one of the largest and most elaborate in the world. This book is the foremost study of the history of Vitthal, his worship, and his worshippers. First published in Marathi in 1984, the book remains the most thorough and insightful work on Vitthal and his cult in any language, and provides an exemplary model for understanding the history and morphology of lived Hinduism. The author, Ramachandra Chintaman Dhere, is the leading scholar of religious traditions in Maharashtra and throughout the Deccan, the plateau that covers most of central India. Vitthal exemplifies the synthesis of Vaisnava and Saiva elements that not only typifies Maharashtrian Hindu religious life but also marks Vitthal's resemblance to another prominent South Indian god, Venkates of Tirupati in Andhra Pradesh. Dhere's analysis highlights Vitthal's connection with pastoralist hero cults, and demonstrates the god's development from a god of shepherds to a god of the majority of the population, including Brahmans. In addition, Dhere also explores the connections of Vitthal with Buddhist and Jain traditions. In the book's final chapter, Dhere presents a culminating stage in the evolution of the worship of Vitthal: the interpretation in spiritual terms of the god, his temple, the town of Pandharpur, and the river that flows past the town. Dhere received India's highest literary award, the Sahitya Akademi prize, for this book.

This accessible study is the first critical investigation of the cult of saints among Muslims and Jews in medieval Syria and the Near East. Josef Meri's critical reading of a wide range of contemporary sources reveals a vibrant religious culture in which the veneration of saints and pilgrimage to tombs and shrines were fundamental.

The Western Wall-Judaism's holiest site-occupies a prominent position in contemporary Jewish and Israeli discourse, current events, and local politics. In The Western Wall: The Dispute over Israel's Holiest Jewish Site, 1967-2000, Kobi Cohen-Hattab and Doron Bar offer a detailed exploration of the Western Wall plaza's evolution in the late twentieth century. The examination covers the role of archaeology in defining the space, the Western Wall's transformation as an Israeli and Jewish symbol, and the movement to open it to a variety of Jewish denominations. The book studies the central processes and shifts that took place at the Western Wall during the three decades that followed the Six-Day War-a relatively short yet crucial chapter in Jerusalem's extensive history.

This excellent book represents one of the first and best presentations of Eastern wisdom in the English language. It concerns ancient Hindu traditions and the Yogic practice of observing and regulating the breath. We begin with an admission that Western students are often confused by what exactly Yoga is, and what it is meant to accomplish. Stereotypes of the yogi as spindly, dirty and disheveled men commonly seen sitting in fixed posture at a roadside or marketplace abound. Yet these dismissive images serve only to neglect the spiritual substance and ancient wisdom of yogi science. Seeking to dispel the negative stereotypes and present the vivid truth, Atkinson discusses the multiple schools of yoga and their general purpose. Some emphasize control over the body's motions, while others favor inner development of the spirit. Several however emphasize the control of the breath; and it a practical explanation of this that Atkinson relays in the remaining fifteen chapters of this book.

For author Brenda Stanford Southerland, honoring the Father through prayer is more valuable than gold or silver, and it truly yields precious rewards. In "Honoring the Father through Prayer," she presents a guided study of the book of Isaiah to show how prayers can greatly impact the lives of Christians.

The book of Isaiah, often referred to as the mini-Bible with its sixty-six chapters, demonstrates the importance of prayer and studying Isaiah yields rich fruit. With emphasis on biblical examples, Brenda helps Christians by delivering a model for prayer. Her model: teaches about Isaiah the man, a prophet of God provides a perspective on Israel's historical background-national and international discusses the prophecy of Babylonian exile explores God's grace through divine deliverance and restoration delivers a true perspective on prayer as it relates to honoring God, focusing on God as the Father, and describes the prayer guidelines that are divine instructions to create a practical method of daily prayer.

In "Honoring the Father through Prayer," Brenda helps Christians focus on God and facilitates a more meaningful prayer life to change lives and deepen relationships with God.

Christopher Melchert proposes to historicize Islamic renunciant piety (zuhd). As the conquest period wound down in the early eighth century c.e., renunciants set out to maintain the contempt of worldly comfort and loyalty to a greater cause that had characterized the community of Muslims in the seventh century. Instead of reckless endangerment on the battlefield, they cultivated intense fear of the Last Judgement to come. They spent nights weeping, reciting the Qur'an, and performing supererogatory ritual prayers. They stressed other-worldliness to the extent of minimizing good works in this world. Then the decline of tribute from the conquered peoples and conversion to Islam made it increasingly unfeasible for most Muslims to keep up any such regime. Professional differentiation also provoked increasing criticism of austerity. Finally, in the later ninth century, a form of Sufism emerged that would accommodate those willing and able to spend most of their time on religious devotions, those willing and able to spend their time on other religious pursuits such as law and hadith, and those unwilling or unable to do either.

Are you tired of your prayers lacking power? Would you like them to be authoritative and prevailing instead? If you're ready for a revitalized prayer life that illustrates the marvelous capability of your Christian walk, then "God Delights in the Prayers of His Children" can help you get there.

This collection of faith-building prayers is a powerful resource, designed to encourage believers to communicate intimately with God. Author Terri Flynn shows you how to enrich your prayer life by providing prayers that incorporate Scripture to help you pray with purpose and confidence. She targets specific prayer needs for children, family, finances, healing, deliverance, strength, encouragement, and much more.

Flynn shares her spiritual experiences by using devotional prayers and commentary to illustrate how to have a personal relationship with God. She explores some of the doubts, fears, and perplexities we experience and offers prayers that address these issues. In addition, she reveals the four basic elements of prayer, as well as methods for establishing a prayer life and interceding with power.

If you desire an intimate relationship with God, "God Delights in the Prayers of His Children" provides a foundation to help you develop a life-changing commitment to prayer. Connect your spirit to the knowledge of God's Word through prayer and see Him work in your life

This shorter edition of Christian Prayer presents a selection of material for Morning Prayer and Evening Prayer in a format that is easier for the lay person to use that the complete Christian Prayer or the four-volume Liturgy of the Hours.