Discipleship Books

Blue Like Jazz: Nonreligious Thoughts on Christian Spirituality

Donald Miller

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 448 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

God help us.......... 1 out of 5 stars.
2 of 9 people found this review helpful.

I must say that I am most troubled in my spirit that so many people gave this book a five star rating. I wonder if this guy has ever even picked up a Bible. The only reason I gave it one star is because I could not give it zero.

All I can really say about the book is that the god portrayed in it is not the God of the Bible. When I first began to read, I was impressed with the fact that Donald Miller has actually felt conviction for his sin and I was truly encouraged. Though after continuing on, I realized that it was not a conviction that produced a true repentance which leads to life, but just an emotional and romantic "poor me" story which unfortunately leads to death.

What shocks and concerns me is that someone who hates God as much as Donald Miller does can actually call himself a Christian. This is our fault brothers. This is our fault for being so complacent. If we don't take a stand against this type of humanistic nonsense, this is the "Christianity" that we can expect to keep seeing.

Filled with non-historical half-truths, this is just another postmodern, psychological self-help book which prostitutes Christian terminology to its own demise.

It's time to wake up.

Editorial Review:

"I never liked jazz music because jazz music doesn't resolve. . . . I used to not like God because God didn't resolve. But that was before any of this happened." In Donald Miller's early years, he was vaguely familiar with a distant God. But when he came to know Jesus Christ, he pursued the Christian life with great zeal. Within a few years he had a successful ministry that ultimately left him feeling empty, burned out, and, once again, far away from God. In this intimate, soul-searching account, Miller describes his remarkable journey back to a culturally relevant, infinitely loving God.

He Loves Me! Learning to Live In the Father's Affection

Wayne Jacobsen

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 21 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

I've been a Christian for 40 years... 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

I think this author has been living in my head! He has opened Bible story after Bible story to show me a loving God in a new light. I sense that this amazing relationship is what I have been longing for and looking for in all the wrong places. The problem has not been my church, or a particular style of worship. It has not been my own failures, even though they are many. The problem has been my focus on my persistent personal efforts to earn God's favor, and my lack of understanding that He has loved me all along. May God give me the courage to embrace His acceptance and freedom.

This book is a terrific read, as a standalone, or as a commentary for The Shack. It would make a perfect small group study guide.

Editorial Review:

Do you find yourself picking through circumstances like children plucking daisy petals attempting to figure out whether or not God loves you? If you find yourself least certain of his love in those critical moments when you most need to trust him, there is hope for you. Where? At the one event in human history that forever secured your place in the Father s hear--the cross where Jesus allowed sin and shame to be consumed in his own body so that you could freely embrace a relationship with his Father. There you will discover that what he always wanted was not the fearful subservience of slaves, but the loving affection of sons and daughters. If your spiritual life feels more like performance than freedom, like an empty ritual rather than a joyful journey, let Wayne help you discover a Father who loves you more than anyone on this planet ever has or ever will and how you can rest in the confidence of his affection for you through whatever circumstances you face.

Simple Church: Returning to God's Process for Making Disciples

Thom S. Rainer, Eric Geiger

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 74 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Simple Church 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

The Simple Church gives a good design to implement a simple process in any church that moves people toward spiritual transformation. The book outlines a "clear how" to establish a process to move believers toward spiritual maturity, excellence in our worship of Jesus and the elimination of mediocrity in our worship, love and service to God and others.

Editorial Review:

The simple revolution is here. From the iPod design to Google’s uncluttered homepage, simple ideas are changing the world.

Multi-awarded #1 national bestseller Simple Church guides Christians back to the simple gospel-sharing methods of Jesus. No bells or whistles required. Based on case studies of 400 American churches, Thom Rainer and Eric Geiger prove the disciple-making process is often too complex. Simple churches thrive by taking four ideas to heart: Clarity. Movement. Alignment. Focus.

Simple Church examines each idea, clearly showing why it is time to simplify.

The Return of the Prodigal Son: A Story of Homecoming

Henri J. M. Nouwen

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 93 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

A pricelss book 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

This is an excellent life changing book. Presents the core truth of the Christian Gospel in a way that touches everyday attitudes and struggles. A book so personal and touching you may find that Nouwen is addressing your own unique circumstances. I certainly did. You may find yourself thinking about a new way to live. This book changed my life.

Editorial Review:

The Return of the Prodigal Son: A Story of Homecoming is a spiritual adventure story. A chance encounter with a poster depicting a detail of Rembrandt's The Return of the Prodigal Son set in motion a chain of events that enabled Nouwen to redefine and claim his vocation late in his life. In this book, which interweaves elements of art history, memoir, Midrash, and self-help, Nouwen brings the parable to life with empathic analyses of each character. Nouwen's absorption in the story (and the painting) is so complete that the father's challenge to love the son, and the son's challenge to receive that love, become Nouwen's own. And Nouwen's writing is so clear and his tone is so appealingly frank and humble that readers--no matter how far from home--will find hope for themselves in the prodigal peace Nouwen ultimately achieves. --Michael Joseph Gross

Knowing God

J. I. Packer

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 77 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

A lifelong pursuit of knowing God should embody the Christian's existence. According to eminent theologian J.I. Packer, however, Christians have become enchanted by modern skepticism and have joined the "gigantic conspiracy of misdirection" by failing to put first things first. Knowing God aims to redirect our attention to the simple, deep truth that to know God is to love His Word. What began as a number of consecutive articles angled for "honest, no-nonsense readers who were fed up with facile Christian verbiage" in 1973, Knowing God has become a contemporary classic by creating "small studies out of great subjects." Each chapter is so specific in focus (covering topics such as the trinity, election, God's wrath, and God's sovereignty), that each succeeding chapter's theology seems to rival the next, until one's mind is so expanded that one's entire view of God has changed. Author Elizabeth Eliot wrote that amid the lofty content Packer "puts the hay where the sheep can reach it--plainly shows us ordinary folks what it means to know God." Having rescued us from the individual hunches of our ultra-tolerant theological age, Packer points the reader to the true character of God with his theological competence and compassionate heart. The lazy and faint-hearted should be warned about this timeless work--God is magnified, the sinner is humbled, and the saint encouraged. --Jill Heatherly

The Cost of Discipleship

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 87 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

"When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die." With these words, in The Cost of Discipleship, Dietrich Bonhoeffer gave powerful voice to the millions of Christians who believe personal sacrifice is an essential component of faith. Bonhoeffer, a German Lutheran pastor and theologian, was an exemplar of sacrificial faith: he opposed the Nazis from the first and was eventually imprisoned in Buchenwald and hung by the Gestapo in 1945. The Cost of Discipleship, first published in German in 1937, was Bonhoeffer's answer to the questions, "What did Jesus mean to say to us? What is his will for us to-day?" Bonhoeffer's answers are rooted in Lutheran grace and derived from Christian scripture (almost a third of the book consists of an extended meditation on the Sermon on the Mount). The book builds to a stunning conclusion: its closing chapter, "The Image of Christ," describes the believer's spiritual life as participation in Christ's incarnation, with a rare and epigrammatic confidence: "Through fellowship and communion with the incarnate Lord," Bonhoeffer writes, "we recover our true humanity, and at the same time we are delivered from that individualism which is the consequence of sin, and retrieve our solidarity with the whole human race." --Michael Joseph Gross

Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life

Donald S. Whitney

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 32 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Every Christian Should Be More Disciplined 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

Few books have proven to be as practical to me as Spiritual Disciplines For the Christian Life. Donald Whitney writes with both precision and perspicuity. Even naming a large group of spiritual disciplines might prove difficult for many today. If you find yourself among the many who are eager to more effectively walk with Christ I heartily suggest obtaining this classic Navigators book. (my full review is here: http://stilltruth.com/2007/spiritual-disciplines-christian-life)

Solid. 4 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

This book is a solid read and works well as a go-to-guide to spiritual disicplines. The section on journaling is dated, but perhaps you could draw a correltation to bloggin. Either way, it is worth a read.

Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

Outstanding book to read, re-reread and meditate over. Scripturally-based. Gives practical suggestions to implement each discipline. We have used it in small-group Bible study with great success!

Editorial Review:

Drawn from Scripture and godly Christian lives, this book is a guide to disciplines that can deepen readers' walk with God.

Awareness

Anthony De Mello

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 108 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Real Eye Opener 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

This book will definately give you a fresh perspective on life and your relationships, with those around you and yourself. The short chapters make it easy to read just a few minutes at a time.

Are you aware that you are aware right now? 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

I was raised Catholic, which is fine, but I never was blessed to meet a single priest who was really aware. Of course, what do I mean by what I just said? Everybody is aware, right?

Wrong...almost no one is aware, because "everybody is thinking that they are somebody" when if they were truly aware they would clearly know that an idea of self is just an idea and nothing more. Please excuse me when I say,"Oh my goodness, the mind has taken over the world and we are all prisoners who are being subjected to brainmaking techniques that are causing us to believe that the things we see and perceive define who we are and what everything is." Nonsense. "I Am" is all that can truly be said about who or what I am or anyone is. Anthony De Mello realized this Truth and he passionately and concisely shares it. Apparently the Vatican wasn't pleased that one of its fellows was awake like Jesus. Can't afford another Jesus running around while the church is busy telling you to wait for his future return to save you.

Does Awareness need to be saved from anything? Is awareness threatened by what it is aware of (the come and go offerings of life experience)? Since you are that essence of knowing power, do you need to be saved? No, unless you would prefer to give up your obvious freedom for something limited that can only be known as such because Awareness Is. Yes Tony, boy are we asleep. I love Anthony's direct uncompromising style of exposition. Why not blurt the truth out directly. The clergy and its followers have missed the boat to reality by living in the mind, the past, the future, the image-nation. Wake up wanna-be holy ones, holiness is right here, right now.

Thank you Anthony for speaking gracefully about the One awareness that loves all beings and their things. After all, how does all of this drama appear in the first place?

Yes, I agree, through the You that is I for all...Awareness. Nothing is more fun than being aware and being That Alone, thus Awareness in any form is the best form that I know, simply because...I know I know etc.etc.etc.eternally

Sundance Burke, Author, Free Spirit: A Guide to Enlightened Being

Editorial Review:

Using humor, compassion, and insight, the beloved and best-selling Anthony de Mello teaches us to welcome the challenge of knowing ourselves and living the "aware" life.

Emotionally Healthy Church, The

Peter Scazzero

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 29 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

"40 Days of Therapy?" 2 out of 5 stars.
8 of 13 people found this review helpful.

Well, this book came highly recommended by a fellow pastor, and I approched it with positive anticipation. I am very aware of how the emotional state of our church members effects not only their own personal journey, but how it can even dominate the workings of an entire congregation.
However,I cannot go as far as Rev. Scazzero in seeing the emotional health of the person as the "starting place" of their spiritual health. Indeed, it is by the grace of the Holy Spirit that we may rise above our individual foibles, look beyond our own personal concerns, and remember that we are not the center of everything. I fear there is too much encouragement to dig deeper, ever deeper into what has been really bothering us since childhood without the accountability and good relationship with good counselors.
We will not find salvation by "restoring ourselves" to an excruciatingly described and idealistic state of emotional wonderfulness.
The book is written, I do believe, with the best of intention, and out of heart-felt personal experience. It is unfortunate that many of Rev. Scazzero's suggestions for The Journey may lead to trecherous ground without responsible support.
Respectfully submitted,
Rich Moore

Editorial Review:

Something is desperately wrong with most churches today. Many sincere followers of Christ who are passionate for God and his work are unaware of the crucial link between emotional health and spiritual maturity. They present themselves as spiritually mature but are stuck at a level of immaturity that current models of discipleship have not addressed. Discipleship that really transforms a church must integrate emotional health with spiritual maturity. The Emotionally Healthy Church, winner of the Gold Medallion Book Award, offers a strategy for discipleship that accomplishes healthy living and actually changes lives.

Five Practices of Fruitful Congregations

Robert Schnase

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 4 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Superb book! 5 out of 5 stars.
5 of 10 people found this review helpful.

One of the most practical and inspiring resources I have found in many decades of church work. Beautifully & engagingly written.

Thought Provoking and Insightful 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 2 people found this review helpful.

This book is very insightful and gives a lot of food for thought. I highly recommend it for anyone who is seeking a deeper, more obedient relationship with Christ for themselves and their church.

Good for your church ... and your business 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

The five practices apply to your congregation, but they also apply without much difficulty to most businesses. This is a great good book ... written well with valuable specific examples. Pick it up! Books like this don't come along that often.

Editorial Review:

Schnase contends that sucessful congregations often have certain characteristics in common. These fundamental practices demonstrate congregational health, vitality, and fruitfulness. They also help churches fulfill their mission to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the tranformation of the world.

The five practices of fruitful congregations:
-Radical Hospitality
-Passionate Worship
-Intentional Faith Development
-Risk-Taking Mission and Service
-Estravagant Generosity