Noted as America's most effective book on home security you'll be pleased to learn everything you'd to know about wireless security systems, home security tips, driveway alarms, home security gates, home security companies and much more.

Memories, Hopes, and Conversations is a powerful resource that introduces readers to Appreciative Inquiry—a transformational organizational change process that focuses on the strengths of a group. The second edition has been revised and expanded throughout, featuring important new materials on leadership and missional frameworks, as well as five chapters from pastors describing the transformational experiences of their churches and neighbors using Appreciative Inquiry. The book offers a dy...

We live in a culturally diverse society. As the church continues to heed Christ's call to reflect the multiethnic character of his people, pastors and lay leaders need to gain skills and competencies to serve in multicultural contexts, both inside and beyond their congregations. With this book, Mark Lau Branson and Juan F. Martínez equip leaders to create environments that make God's reconciling initiatives apparent in church life and in missional engagement with their nei...

Leaders in congregations and Christian organizations wrestle with an unraveling of the world in which they have little experience and training. While they are offered unending resources by experts on leadership, some with claims to biblical blueprints, the challenges seem mismatched to those methods. Branson and Roxburgh frame the situation as one in which "modernity's wager"--the conviction that God is not necessary for life and wisdom and meaning--has defined the Western imagination. Bec...

All mission is local—the people of God joining the work of God in a particular place. In Starting Missional Churches Mark Lau Branson and Nicholas Warnes introduce us to seven missional churches while examining common challenges regardingtheir genesis. Using stories, interviews with pastors and a look at common preconceived notions of church planting in the West, this guide brings together resources of the missional church conversation with the creativity and energy of those who a...

The daring flights of the early balloonists that were the first steps on mankind’s upward journey to the Moon and beyond have been strangely neglected, and their names have been largely forgotten. This book helps to redress that situation. James Sadler was an extraordinary English pioneer who overcame many obstacles to achieve his dream of flying. Born the son of an Oxford pastry cook in 1753, he defied his lowly upbringing to become the first Englishman to build an air balloon. When not f...

For many congregations, change creates discomfort. Pastoral leaders are often expected to be experts who manage and control realities beyond their expertise, experience, and ability. That expectation, a product of modern approaches to leadership, views the pastor as responsible for maintaining the status quo. Transforming Pastoral Leadership responds to this context by challenging readers to rediscover key biblical themes around the shepherding metaphor as well as key theological themes st...

Every story entails a way of life and how every way of life implies a big story.In Every Body's Story, Branson Parler focuses on three predominant myths of sexuality in our secular age--individualism, romance, and materialism--and three dominant myths in Christian circles--anti-body theology, legalism, and the sexual prosperity gospel--exploring how those stories shape our practice. Our views of sexuality and our practices around sex are never just about sex. How we use an...

In a time when churches are focusing on finding strategies and techniques to guarantee success, a movement toward the missional church is emerging. Missional churches are communities created by the Spirit with a unique nature and identity. Purpose and strategies of the church are derivative dimensions, the activities that flow naturally from the church that is focused on Spirit-led ministry.The Ministry of the Missional Church leads pastors, ministry leaders, and layperson...

This book develops a theology of childhood both from a theoretical basis in biblical theology (especially the gospel of Mark) and practical experience in children and youth ministry. Mercer builds on classical theologians such as Augustine, Calvin, Barth, and Rahner as well as modern feminist theologians such as Brock and Russell. She gains insights from pastoral theologians such as Capps and Couture and from contemporary cultural criticism. Mercer challenges approaches to educational and ...

Highlights the key elements of the Catholic moral tradition and lays the foundations for Christian ethics through experiential reflections of right action toward persons, communities, and personal choices.

What does it mean to be gay ... and a Christian? Beginning with how the Bible describes the Church, author Nate Collins outlines a vision for community life that challenges Christians to examine obstacles that inhibit spiritual unity. This new vision calls straight and non-straight believers alike to patterns of Christian obedience that respect and honor their similarities and differences.In addition, Collins provides a theological framework for understanding how Genesis 1-2 describes both...