Howard Zinn is one of the most celebrated historians and social activists of our time. Raised in a working class family in Brooklyn, he was a shipyard worker and union organizer when World War II began. He served as a bombardier in the European Theatre and this experience shaped his opposition to war as an instrument of foreign policy. He became active in the civil rights movement as well as the anti-war movement from the 1950s to the 1970s. He is perhaps best known as the author of A People's History of the United States, published in 1980. This study of Zinn's life and work opens the door to many aspects of historical study generally untouched in traditional secondary and collegiate survey courses in United States history. To Zinn, history is not an objective account of the past to be indelibly carved into the brains of American citizens; rather, history is an ever-changing palette of events as people react to the contexts and cultures they find themselves immersed in. By considering the lives and thoughts of less politically and socially prominent individuals, students have the opportunity to re-examine their own beliefs and assumptions about contemporary American life. Students will gain insight into how history is constructed and recorded through a consideration of the life and writings of Howard Zinn.

The Book of Acts never ended

A generation today is asking, "Where are all God's miracles which our fathers told us about? "(Judges 6:13).

From 1960-1966, author Tommy Welchel answered this question, living among the youth of one of the greatest spiritual outpourings ever experienced--the Azusa Street Revival. During this time, Tommy recorded first-hand accounts of the miracles that they had witnessed... and even performed themselves

These testimonies have been shared around the world, and the results have been amazing: Miraculous healings, supernatural phenomena, and impossible situations being turned around by a wonder-working God.

As you read about the miracles that God performed during this great move of His Spirit, your faith will be stirred to:

Encourage others that God's healing power has not passed away

Believe for the miraculous in your life

Release supernatural breakthrough to people who need a touch from God

Prepare to experience a fresh outpouring of God's Spirit... "today"

Hell Without Fire has been nominated in the Creative Nonfiction Historical Division category of the 39th Annual Georgia Author of the Year Awards. Abingdon Press would like to congratulate Henry Whelchel on this honor.

Conversion is one of the most significant motifs in American church history. From the First and Second Great Awakenings to early twentieth century Pentecostal revivals and contemporary Evangelical movements, conversion in all its extravagant forms is important to the story of religion in America.

L. Henry Whelchel takes up this motif of conversion as it relates particularly to enslaved Africans and Black Americans. He explains the role of conversion in the complex interaction between blacks and whites in America. Beginning with the differences between European and African forms of slavery and the importance of the motif of conversion to white legitimization of the Atlantic slave trade, Whelchel describes the process of slave conversion as one in which slaves were separated from African religion and culture. He counters the myth that Africans had no history and that African religion was entirely effaced in its American context. He demonstrates the contradictory relationship between Afro-American and Euro-American religion: on the one hand whites prohibited demonstrations of African religion and on the other hand they embraced and adopted these demonstrations of religion in transformed modes with their revivalist Christianity. According to Whelchel, "as African religion and culture were exposed to western Christianity," there was forged "a new Afro-American religion."

Whelchel's exposure of the contradiction between the propaganda used to defend slavery and the actual, historical circumstances of slaves in America is most compelling in his treatment of the role of education as an adjunct to conversion. He highlights the emergence of laws prohibiting the teaching of slaves and he explores the emergence of the plantation missions--sponsored by mainline southern denominations--to implement an oral method of religious training. He continues with the role of conversion in post-emancipation relations between black and white religion in America, in both the North and South. Finally, Whelchel chronicles the rise of the CME and the distinctions between the AME and CME, concluding with the seating of the first black CME bishops.