Does heaven exist? If so, what is it like? And how does one get in? Throughout history, painters, poets, philosophers, pastors, and many ordinary people have pondered these questions. Perhaps no other topic captures the popular imagination quite like heaven. Gary Scott Smith examines how Americans from the Puritans to the present have imagined heaven. He argues that whether Americans have perceived heaven as reality or fantasy, as God's home or a human invention, as a source of inspiration and comfort or an opiate that distracts from earthly life, or as a place of worship or a perpetual playground has varied largely according to the spirit of the age. In the colonial era, conceptions of heaven focused primarily on the glory of God. For the Victorians, heaven was a warm, comfortable home where people would live forever with their family and friends. Today, heaven is often less distinctively Christian and more of a celestial entertainment center or a paradise where everyone can reach his full potential. Drawing on an astounding array of sources, including works of art, music, sociology, psychology, folklore, liturgy, sermons, poetry, fiction, jokes, and devotional books, Smith paints a sweeping, provocative portrait of what Americans-from Jonathan Edwards to Mitch Albom-have thought about heaven.
This book provides excerpts from many events or moments throughout history that Christian believers treasure more than any others. These may be related to events pertaining to specific individuals, leaders, or those linked to denominational affiliations or other forms of doctrinal identification or history. It lists one momentous moment from Christianity's history for each day of the calendar year. That event is linked to that date by its actual occurrence or by the date of its reporting. Included are natural disasters that brought about a search for religious solace, awakenings, revivals, denominational events, and ecclesiastical histories. As such, it may be useful as a daily devotional, a historical reference, or a source of motivation and inspiration. It will, for a full year, remind the reader that "this is the day that the Lord has made.
Continuing the work of Faith and the Presidency (OUP 2006), Gary Scott Smith takes on eleven more US presidents and examines the role religion played in their policies, personal lives, and decisions.
During the revolutionary era, in the midst of the struggle for liberty from Great Britain, Americans up and down the Atlantic seaboard confronted the injustice of holding slaves. Lawmakers debated abolition, masters considered freeing their slaves, and slaves emancipated themselves by running away. But by 1800, of states south of New England, only Pennsylvania had extricated itself from slavery, the triumph, historians have argued, of Quaker moralism and the philosophy of natural rights. With exhaustive research of individual acts of freedom, slave escapes, legislative action, and anti-slavery appeals, Nash and Soderlund penetrate beneath such broad generalizations and find a more complicated process at work. Defiant runaway slaves joined Quaker abolitionists like Anthony Benezet and members of the Pennsylvania Abolition Society to end slavery and slave owners shrewdly calculated how to remove themselves from a morally bankrupt institution without suffering financial loss by freeing slaves as indentured servants, laborers, and cottagers.
This book addresses how Christian leaders integrate faith into the workplace, through a love-based altruistic system of Christian Servant Leadership Spiritual Intelligence (CSLSI). It hypothesizes how CSLSI positively influences a range of desirable employee attitudes and behaviors including servant leadership and followership, organizational citizenship, and positive stress coping and adaptation strategies. This book embraces an interdisciplinary approach to present the global attributes of CSLSI, which includes following God’s will and Golden Rule workplace love expression, with specific workplace applications. The empirical research is supplemented by approximately 100 interviews with Christian leaders providing workplace exemplars and a compelling overview of how Christians honor God in the marketplace. This book will appeal to academics and practitioners in business, psychology, medicine, management, leadership, and theology looking to develop a God-honoring work life. Readers will benefit from the principles and the self-diagnostic surveys that assess spiritual intelligence and ways to enhance it.
SEVEN YEARS IN SODOM SEVEN FRANCISCO, AN URBAN MISSION REVEALS: - A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF AN URBAN MISSIONARY AND HIS FAMILY. - A HISTORY OF THE CITY AND ITS CHURCHES - A RISE AND FALL OF MANY. - A PLANTING OF A CHURCH - A PATHWAY FEW WOULD DARE TROD. - A DIVIDED CITY - A CHOICE AND A CALL. - A LOOK AT ITS BEAUTY AND ITS DARKSIDE. - A VIEW OF THE CITY'S HEART OR PERHAPS THAT OF A NATION. - A FAITHFUL GOD IN THE MIDST OF HIS PEOPLE. AS TOLD BY THE FORMER "CHAPLAIN OF BROADWAY
Published to accompany a major exhibition of Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot's paintings held in Paris and Ottawa during 1996, and forthcoming to New York. From nearly 3,000 paintings by this poetic 19th-century artist, the curators chose 163 works, which are reproduced here along with full art-historical discussions of each. Three major essays chronicle Corot's life and the development of his art; additional essays elucidate the subject of forgeries and describe the collecting of his works. Much original new scholarship is included along with a review of the scholarly literature, a concordance, and a chronology. 9.5x12.5"Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
In the earliest days of the United States as settlers made their way west and into what would eventually become Kentucky, they were faced with many challenges in the task of surveying and claiming new and unknown land. Among the highest priorities for new residents was to determine if their chosen homestead could provide the fertile soil and fresh water they needed to sustain life and service their agricultural needs. Kentucky, with its underlying base of predominantly limestone rock—perfectly suited to the natural formation of caves, sinking streams, and springs of cool water—proved the ideal location on which to build their new lives. In Bluegrass Paradise: Royal Spring and the Birth of Georgetown, Kentucky, author Gary A. O'Dell tells the story of the Royal Spring, the largest spring in central Kentucky. Practical and essential to the creation of a successful settlement, the spring and its location became the primary reason pioneers would eventually congregate here and found the city of Georgetown as one of the earliest Kentucky communities. In the ensuing 250 years, the Royal Spring has faithfully served the water needs of the community and the locale remains a cherished cultural and historical asset that provides greenspace within a rapidly growing city.
For worldwide intercultural services, here is one-stop shopping at its best. This easy-to-use guide gives you practical advice to locate, evaluate, purchase, and oversee intercultural services. It describes and provides easy access (including websites and e-mail addresses) to the world's leading intercultural services. These high-impact, productive, and cost-effective service providers are critical to your operation's growth strategy and global success. This handy guide covers the gamut of intercultural services. Whether you are managing a multi-cultural workplace, preparing to enter the global business arena, or are already competing internationally, you'll find valuable, practical insights and information on: * exploring intercultural services * key intercultural concept * cross-border roles and organizations * choosing service providers * working with suppliers * types and qualities of products Based on the author's 30+ years of being a user, purchaser, manager, evaluator, designer, and provider of intercultural services, this book presents a helpful, in-depth review of all you must know to make the right decisions about intercultural services. Clear examples and checklists lead managers step-by-step through virtually all aspects of understanding, assessing, and acquiring intercultural services.
Cometography is a four-volume catalog of every comet observed throughout history. Volume II provides a complete discussion of every comet seen during the nineteenth century. Cometography uses the most reliable orbits known to determine the distances from the Earth and Sun at the time a comet was discovered and last observed, as well as the largest and smallest angular distance to the Sun, most northerly and southerly declination, closest distance to the Earth, and other details to enable the reader to understand the physical appearance of each well-observed comet. The book also provides non-technical details to help the reader better appreciate how the comet may have influenced various cultures at the time of its appearance. Cometography will be valuable to historians of science as well as providing amateur and professional astronomers with a definitive reference on comets through the ages.
This book is the first to trace the fortunes of the earliest large free black community in the U.S. Nash shows how black Philadelphians struggled to shape a family life, gain occupational competence, organize churches, establish social networks, advance cultural institutions, educate their children, and train leaders who would help abolish slavery.
This book is relevant for language testers, listening researchers, and oral proficiency teachers, in that it explores four broad themes related to the assessment of L2 listening ability: the use of authentic, real-world spoken texts; the effects of different speech varieties of listening inputs; the use of audio-visual texts; and assessing listening as part of an interactive speaking/listening construct. Each theme is introduced with a review of the relevant literature, and then is examined through either two or three empirical studies. The notion of authenticity underlies each of these four themes. By creating more authentic test tasks that are similar to real world language tasks, test developers can create listening assessments that not only more effectively assess test takers’ communicative competence, but can also have a positive washback effect on educational systems.
The critical literary world has spent a wealth of thought and words on the question of Hawthorne himself: Where does he stand in his works? In history? In literary tradition? In this major new study, G. R. Thompson recasts the "Hawthorne question" to show how authorial presence in the writer's works is as much a matter of art as the writing itself. The Hawthorne who emerges from this masterful analysis is not, as has been supposed, identical to the provincial narrator of his early tales; instead he is revealed to be the skillful manipulator of that narrative voice, an author at an ironic distance from the tales he tells. By focusing on the provincial tales as they were originally conceived--as a narrative cycle--Thompson is able to recover intertextual references that reveal Hawthorne's preoccupation with framing strategies and variations on authorial presence. The author shows how Hawthorne deliberately constructs sentimental narratives, only to deconstruct them. Thompson's analysis provides a new aesthetic context for understanding the whole shape of Hawthorne's career as well as the narrative, ethical, and historical issues within individual works. Revisionary in its view of one of America's greatest authors, The Art of Authorial Presence also offers invaluable insight into the problems of narratology and historiography, ethics and psychology, romanticism and idealism, and the cultural myths of America.
SING UNTO HIM A NEW SONG!!...(psalm 33:3) Did you ever wish you had permission to change the way you "do church"? Well, now you have it. You have permission to: Welcome His presence Grow in Christ as He has desired Experience a God-orchestrated meeting Become the Church, not attend the church Grow in intercessory prayer This "how to" book provides proven tactics to move your church into a "Third Day" realm fully committed to worship. Follow along with authors Graham Cooke and Gary Goodell as they share their years of experience developing new ways to welcome His presence into your church, home, community, your life and the lives of those in the congregation. God gives all of His children His permission to become the Bride He loves and adores. Remember, "...on the third day, anything can happen.
This book explores the lively chemistry culture that arose during the 17th century in Colonial New England. This was chiefly due to the efforts of John Winthrop, Jr. who brought both chemical knowledge and the largest library of chemical books in the New World to Boston. He founded towns, such as Ipswich and New London, and industrial enterprises, such as salt works and ironworks, while also serving as the primary source of Paracelsian medicines, which led him to become the most famous physician in Colonial New England. Moreover, the book covers topics such as the founding of Harvard College, and the life and works of Cotton Mather, especially Magnalia Christi Americana, one of the most important vanity volumes in the history of scholarly publication.
According to the author, it "pleased God" and "seemed good" to Him that man could not know God through human wisdom or education. Instead, man can only know God through His Holy Spirit.
The Urban Crucible boldly reinterprets colonial life and the origins of the American Revolution. Through a century-long history of three seaport towns--Boston, New York, and Philadelphia--Gary Nash discovers subtle changes in social and political awareness and describes the coming of the revolution through popular collective action and challenges to rule by custom, law and divine will. A reordering of political power required a new consciousness to challenge the model of social relations inherited from the past and defended by higher classes. While retaining all the main points of analysis and interpretation, the author has reduced the full complement of statistics, sources, and technical data contained in the original edition to serve the needs of general readers and undergraduates.
Gathers Poe's essays on the theory of poetry, the art of fiction, the role of the critic, leading nineteenth-century writers, and the New York literary world.
To be successful in all aspects of life we can use two basic things: God — the Creator of the universe, and your brain — the fastest and most powerful supercomputer on the face of the planet. People are endowed with amazing capabilities and spiritual power when they keep in constant contact with God, but we are held back by the daily barrage of negative programming we receive and all of the years of stored up negative baggage. Your supercomputer mind uses the negative programming as instructions to create fear and doubt within you that leads to an ordinary and sometimes difficult life. Using the four cornerstones presented will help us to diminish and disregard the negative programming and reduce the fear and doubt that holds us in bondage. Only then will we experience life as God had intended... ...strong, confident, kind, compassionate, humble, and full of joy... EXTRAORDINARY!
Put your bookworm reputation on the line and prove your literary knowledge with this collection of quizzes for book whizzes. Book lovers can answer questions by themselves or host a quiz among friends with twenty-four quizzes to keep you guessing with a variety of question styles including: - 'Blankety Books', where you must fill in the missing word in each title - Anagrams to decipher - 'Two of a Kind', where you must identify a character and author who share the same initials - Guess the book with 'Say What You See' pictures and badly drawn covers - 'Book Bingo' The quizzes are carefully weighted so avid bookworms will get a workout, while more casual readers can still have lots of fun having a go. All questions are designed to aid guessing, with multiple-choice answers and hints, and make the reader smile with amusing wrong answers, clever red herrings, little-known facts and footnotes.
The perfect gift for quizzers' VAL McDERMID 'Outside of a dog, The Book Lover's Quiz Book is every bookworm's best friend -- inside of a dog . . . well, if you know the rest, you're going to love this book' PETER HANINGTON, author of A Dying Breed, peterhanington.co.uk 'Brilliantly inventive and entertaining questions from the bookworm's bookworm' MARK MASON, author of Walk the Lines, Question Time and many more 'A book quiz quiz book what more could lovers of books, quizzes and quizzes about books desire? And marvellous it is too, Wiggleworth proving himself quite the literary Magnus Magnussen of our social media age' TRAVIS ELBOROUGH traviselborough.co.uk 'This is the ultimate literary quiz book and Gary Wigglesworth is the quizmaster to end all quizmasters' DAVID QUANTICK davidquantick.com This is a literary quiz book with a difference. Rather than basic sets of questions, The Book Lover's Quiz Book mirrors the format of Gary's live quizzes, at the Betsey Trotwood in London and elsewhere. So, there are lots of multiple-choice questions, some amusing answers, clever red herrings, little-known facts about authors and some of the much-loved Say What You See picture round. Also, there are fixed and variable rounds - fixed ones include 'Blankety Books' (one word missing from the title - always with a theme), 'Literary Links and lists' (what connects/next in the list etc.) and '2 of a Kind' (name the character and the author that share the same initials). The changeable rounds keep the quizzes fresh and include 'What the Dickens?' (real or made-up Dickens names), 'RomeNo or JuliYess' (real or made-up Shakespearian insults) and 'Book Bingo!' (identify the correct number). There are also more standard rounds such as 'First Lines', 'Working Titles' and 'Banned Books'. The aim of all Gary's quizzes, and this book, is that people should have fun and be able to guess (if they don't know) as much as possible.
When Andrew returns to his Taylor family roots in Magnolia County, Tennessee, to attend graduate school, he unexpectedly finds himself at the very center of the burgeoning American existentialist movement and facing painful choices of both head and heart. He walks the Pantheon University campus among the giants of the 1950's movement--the novelist, Walter Talley; the sensual poet, Donald Sanders; the avant-garde dramatist, Jeffrey Kline; and Kline's tempestuous lover, Bianca, the alluring Portuguese poetess. But within months of arriving on campus, Andrew's association with Bianca threatens to destroy his promising academic career and his relationship with his first love, Catherine. This fifth book in the ten-part Your Winding Daybreak Ways series begins where author Gary Bargatze's fourth novel, Hollow Rock, leaves off. It follows this young scholar's decades-long descent into hell and his subsequent heroic climb out seeking professional success and redemption.
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