Social Ministry

The 2012 killing of Trayvon Martin, an African American teenager in Florida, and the subsequent acquittal of his killer, brought public attention to controversial "Stand Your Ground" laws. The verdict, as much as the killing, sent shock waves through the African American community, recalling a history of similar deaths, and the long struggle for justice. On the Sunday morning following the verdict, black preachers around the country addressed the question, "Where is the justice of God? What are we to hope for?"

The proclaimed hope of America rings most hollow for Native peoples, people of color, the rural poor, and other communities pressed to the margins. Author Jonathan Walton exposes the cultural myths and misconceptions about America's identity. Focusing on its manipulation of Scripture and the person of Jesus, he redirects us to the true promises found in the gospel. Walton identifies how American ideology and way of life has become a false religion and reveals that orienting our lives around American nationalism is idolatry.

Stephen Asma argues that, like art, religion has direct access to our emotional lives in ways that science does not. No theorist of religion has failed to notice the importance of emotions in spiritual and ritual life, but truly systematic research has only recently delivered concrete data on the neurology, psychology, and anthropology of the emotional systems. This very recent "affective turn" has begun to map out a powerful territory of embodied cognition. Why We Need Religion incorporates new data from these affective sciences into the philosophy of religion.

Drawing from the history of social movements in the US, especially the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s Poor People’s Campaign, Rev. Barber and the contributors to this volume speak to the most pressing issues of our time, including Black Lives Matter, the fight for a $15 minimum wage, the struggle to protect voting rights, the march for women’s rights, and the movement to overcome poverty and unite the dispossessed across all dividing lines.

Mass incarceration has become a lucrative industry, and the criminal justice system is plagued with bias and unjust practices. And the church has unwittingly contributed to these problems. Dominique Gilliard explores the history and foundation of mass incarceration, examining Christianity's role in its evolution and expansion. He assesses our nation's ethic of meritocratic justice in light of Scripture and exposes the theologies that embolden mass incarceration.

There are three types of people when it comes to the future: those who will watch what happens, those who will make it happen, and those who will wonder what happened. Which will you be? Our society has widespread and unprecedented access to information, but what do we do with it all? Who do we trust to accurately track our societal trends, interpret them, and see possibilities for the future - and how can we help to shape that future? The answers lie in Futurecast, an insider glimpse of today’s world - and tomorrow’s.

Jesus Christ delivered the Sermon on the Mount to his disciples over 2,000 years ago, yet today people quote it so often that it has become idiomatic in our language. This author's task is to discover the meaning behind all of the words Jesus Christ spoke to his disciples in the sermon and to find out how we can apply them in today's world.

Through a thought-provoking, journalistic voice, Billy Hallowell, faith editor for theblaze.com, provides objective one-on-one interviews with various leading voices in Christian ministry to explain what they believe the Bible teaches us about the last days. From its easy-to-understand writing style to its glossary of terms and other helpful tools, everything about this book was created to allow you to educate yourself on what the Bible says, compare what the experts believe, and draw your own conclusions about the end.

In this book we present the greatness of God as the father of all goodness, and show the pilgrim how to know him. We have thought over these messages for over 10 years. We send them out with prayer that they bring great blessings to God's people.

In this simple but powerful book, Pastor David Swanson contends that discipleship, not diversity, lies at the heart of our white churches' racial brokenness. Before white churches can pursue diversity, he argues, we must first take steps to address the faulty discipleship that has led to our segregation in the first place. Drawing on the work of philosopher James K. A. Smith and others, Swanson proposes that we rethink our churches' habits, or liturgies, and imagine together holistic, communal discipleship practices that can reform us as members of Christ's diverse body.

In this book, Jake Meador diagnoses our society's decline as the failure of a particular story we've told about ourselves: the story of modern liberalism. He shows us how that story has led to our collective loss of meaning, wonder, and good work, and then recovers each of these by grounding them in a different story - a story rooted in the deep tradition of the Christian faith.

Charles E. Curran explores the social mission of the U.S. Catholic Church from a theological perspective, analyzing and assessing four aspects: the importance of social mission, who carries it out, how it is carried out, and the roles that the Church and individual Catholics play in supporting these efforts. In the early and mid-twentieth century the Catholic Church in the United States tended to focus its social mission on its own charities, hospitals, and schools.

Your church needs orphans as much as orphans need your church. Find out why and how you can get involved in Until Every Child Is Home.

A slave runs away from his master. A mutual friend steps in to mediate between the two of them. Can there be healing in such a scarred relationship? This is the situation faced in the book of Philemon. From this short New Testament letter, pastor and author Dhati Lewis (Among Wolves) unpacks key principles that Paul applied to being an advocate in the midst of division.

An expert on youth and youth culture, McKee shares his own heart-rending story and offers a sobering glimpse into the rapidly changing world of bullies, bystanders, and the bullied while providing helpful ways to connect with these kids, open doors of dialogue, and give them the encouragement they need and the validation they're searching for...too often in all the wrong places.

Governor Huckabee guides listeners through multiple facets of life and how to be an example that others will follow and carry forward to the future. Also includes reflection questions and discussion prompts.

Pastor Bryan Loritts dives deep into what it's like to be a person of color in predominantly white evangelical spaces today and where we can go from here.

You have a voice. And you have God's permission to use it. In some communities, certain voices are amplified and elevated while others are erased and suppressed. It can be hard to speak up, especially in the ugliness of social media. Power dynamics keep us silent and marginalized, especially when race, ethnicity, and gender are factors. What can we do about it? Activist Kathy Khang roots our voice and identity in the image of God. Because God created us in our ethnicity and gender, our voice is uniquely expressed through the totality of who we are.

In a day when church membership has decreased, evangelistic zeal has cooled, and budgets are disappearing, ReClaimed Church is the tool that struggling churches need. Having previously written and taught seminary courses on church revitalization, Bill Henard uses his expertise to provide all the practical insights and instructions needed to reclaim your church.

The world is fractured. Tensions are high, patience is low, and goodwill is hard to come by. In The Genius of One, author and pastor Greg Holder reminds us of the high value Jesus and his early followers placed on community and offers guidance for how to see and relate to one another in emotionally and spiritually healthy ways so that we, the church, can fulfill Jesus' prayer for us and model a better way of loving one another in a fractured world.