Spiritual Growth Love

Puritan John Flavel (1630-1691) in Keeping the Heart (originally titled: A Saint Indeed or The Great Work of a Christian Opened and Pressed) has proven to be a steady and timely friend to many over the years. Using Proverbs 4:23 ("Keep your heart with all vigilance for from it flow the springs of life."), Flavel creates a treatise designed for all professing Christians.

Single? Looking for the "right person"? Thinking that if you met the "right person" everything would turn out "right"? Think again. In The New Rules for Love, Sex, and Dating, pastor and best-selling author Andy Stanley explores the challenges, assumptions, and land mines associated with dating in the 21st century. Not for the faint of heart, this practical and uncensored guide takes a fresh approach to dating and love in the modern era by turning the search for "the one" or "Mr./Mrs. Right" back onto the searcher themselves.

For years, Christians have argued, debated, and fought one another while "speaking the truth in love," yet we are no closer to the grace-filled life Jesus modeled. Biblical scholar and popular podcast host of The Bible for Normal People, Jared Byas casts a new vision for the Christian life that's built not on certainty, but on the risk of love.

Do you worry that you're messing up your kids? Do you get stressed when you think about their futures? New York Times best-selling author Crystal Paine knows how you feel. A mom of four, Crystal has struggled with anxiety over parenting. She wanted to parent with grace, instead of a system of rules where kids are expected to do all the right things. She wanted to be a safe place for her children, and she definitely didn't want to be remembered as the sort of mom who yelled, wounded her kids with words, or worse, cared more about her reputation than her kids' hearts.

Throughout Keep Showing Up, Karen includes ideas to implement in your marriage right now, such as powerful statements to speak to your spouse, date-night-on-a-shoestring suggestions, and discussion starters. Discover how your "incompatibility" can become the strength of your marital team in this real-life guide to both living with and loving your spouse - differences and all.

This is a book about discovering what we really need. There are a lot of second-best options, but we weren't made to live a second-best life. Finding what we actually need is different than what we are often offered. There are many books full of opinions, steps and programs. This isn't one of them. This is about craving the things that matter. Things that don't just work, but last.

Christmas should be a joyous time. But this year the celebration is overshadowed in sickness, sorrow, and disappointment. Seeing her grandmother struggle with pain and sadness, Emily decided to share a story that she's never told anyone. As old memories live again through her words, two broken hearts find healing and comfort—and the courage to celebrate Christmas once again. Tidings of Comfort & Joy reminds us to share the bonds of faith and family that Christmas represents whatever the circumstances or season.

There is no better way to comprehend our Abba's love for us than through The Parable of the Prodigal Son. However, one might miss significant insights if interpreted from a Western Christian perspective. Studying it from the ancient Jewish biblical context—considering Jesus was a Jewish rabbi in 1st-century Israel—can reveal layers of the parable in unprecedented ways and demonstrate God's unconditional love in ways you've never seen before!

Thomas Keating was a Cistercian monk who founded the worldwide 'Contemplative Outreach', teaching people the art of meditation. Invitation to Love provides a road map for the journey that begins when Centering Prayer is seriously undertaken. Pointing to some of the recognizable landmarks on this journey, as well as to its ultimate destination, Father Keating addresses common questions regarding contemplative practice: How will it affect my life? Where does it lead us spiritually? What obstacles will I encounter along the way? How does it work?

This best-selling book has provided the foundation for a whole new way of thinking about relationships among today’s generation. Rather than chasing after temporary relationships, this book challenges listeners to give the “pen” to God and allow him to script their love story in his own perfect time and way.

It is in the heart of every person to want God, but life gets loud, and we forget Him. We get consumed by our problems, our desires, ourselves. We forget our first encounter with the Savior and how much we once wanted Him. But Lisa Whittle believes that if we calibrate our attention, refocusing on God determines the perspective for everything in our life.

Our culture is obsessed with love and romance--so why are so few women experiencing satisfying, long-term love? In this insightful and encouraging book, sisters Kristen Clark and Bethany Baird help single women of all ages discover a radically better approach to navigating their love lives. Covering topics such as true love, romance, purposeful relationships, purity, boundaries, singleness, and glorifying God in our relationships, Love Defined unpacks God's original design for romance, showing modern women how to experience God's best for them in their relationships.

Dr. Habib Sadeghi provides a compassionately based, scientifically sound approach to the missing ingredient in the weight-loss recipe: self-love. You’ll learn that real self-love is far more than an ethereal concept. It’s a tangible evolutionary force that will create changes in your life that can only be described as miraculous. You’ll discover the exciting emerging science of epigenetics and that fat is not all in the family. You’ve never been doomed by your genes and have far more control over your weight than you ever realized.

Drawing on her experience on America's Next Top Model and her work as a fashion model, Leah Darrow exposes the lies we are told about our worth being tied to our appearance and instead invites us to look again at the real meaning of beauty. She shows how we can reclaim true and lasting beauty - the kind that doesn't depend on self-doubt, exploitation, or comparison - when we reflect God's glory and embrace our value as he made us to be: strong, brave, and free.

From a stranger in a casting office predicting Matt would succeed at a time when he felt like giving up, to deciding to work with Tim Allen after vowing not to work with another comedian after Roseanne, to learning what love really meant after “Spirit” told him he would marry Angelina—Williams realized that these “glimpses of God” have served as the loving, quiet providence that watched over him. Our job, then, is to pay attention to our lives. Regardless of your beliefs Glimpses will inspire you to look for and find God in your daily life.

The key to spiritual and emotional health is to grasp the truth of God's transforming love for us and then let that reality influence our own hearts and relationships. It seems simple, but we are experts at complicating simple things. Instead of living lives characterized by love we find ourselves trapped in cycles of shame, violence, and addiction that steal our joy and keep us from loving others - so much so that, by all indications, Christians are living no differently than anyone else when it comes to abuse rates, use of pornography, alcohol and drug addiction, and more.

If you are longing to experience God more than the shame or hurts of your past, the pressures of your present, or the fear of your future, Brave Surrender offers a soul-healing path forward. As Kim learned in her own life, the first step - and the bravest step - is letting go. Once we let go of anything that gets between us and God, we are freed to take hold of the life that truly matters.

Create a church unchurched people absolutely love to attend. Deep and Wide provides church leaders with an in-depth look into North Point Community Church and its strategy for creating churches unchurched people absolutely love to attend. Andy Stanley shares his strategy for preaching and programming to both mature believers and cynical unbelievers, essential ingredients for creating irresistible environments, and North Point's spiritual formation model (The Five Faith Catalysts).

With little left to tie her to her home state of Texas and yearning for a slower life, Yvonne Wilson jumps at the chance to shake things up with a move to Montgomery, Indiana. A dream job awaits her—managing an Amish bookstore for her good friends Jake and Eva. Besides the slow-paced setting and the comfort of beloved books, Yvonne hopes the change will help distract her from the emptiness she feels after the death of her fiancé.

Everywhere we look, we see evidence that love is in short supply. Terrorists and political corruption, school shootings and troubled marriages, impatient online sniping and character assassination - all point to the fact that we do not know how to love one another as Jesus commanded and modeled. We put our own interests and happiness first, despite the fact that the greatest happiness comes through sacrificial love.