Find Your People: Building Deep Community in a Lonely World by Jennie Allen — In a world that’s both more connected and more isolating than ever before, we’re often tempted to do life alone, whether because we’re so busy or because relationships feel risky and hard. But science confirms that consistent, meaningful connection with others has a powerful impact on our well-being. We are meant to live known and loved. But so many are hiding behind emotional walls that we’re experiencing an epidemic of loneliness.
In Find Your People, bestselling author Jennie Allen draws on fascinating insights from science and history, timeless biblical truth, and vulnerable stories from her own life to help you:
• overcome the barriers to making new friends and learn to initiate with easy-to-follow steps
• find simple ways to press through awkward to get to authentic in conversations
• understand how conflict can strengthen relationships rather than destroy them
• identify the type of friend you are and the types of friends you need
• learn the five practical ingredients you need to have the type of friends you’ve always longed for
You were created to play, engage, adventure, and explore—with others. In Find Your People, you’ll discover exactly how to dive into the deep end and experience the full wonder of community. Because while the ache of loneliness is real, it doesn’t have to be your reality.
The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis — C. S. Lewis takes us on a profound journey through both heaven and hell in this engaging allegorical tale. Using his extraordinary descriptive powers, Lewis introduces us to supernatural beings who will change the way we think about good and evil.
How Africa Shaped the Christian Mind by Thomas C. Oden — Africa has played a decisive role in the formation of Christian culture from its infancy. Some of the most decisive intellectual achievements of Christianity were explored and understood in Africa before they were in Europe. If this is so, why is Christianity so often perceived in Africa as a Western colonial import? How can Christians in Northern and sub-Saharan Africa, indeed how can Christians throughout the world, rediscover and learn from this ancient heritage?
Theologian Thomas C. Oden offers a portrait that challenges prevailing notions of the intellectual development of Christianity from its early roots to its modern expressions.
The pattern, he suggests, is not from north to south from Europe to Africa, but the other way around. He then makes an impassioned plea to uncover the hard data and study in depth the vital role that early African Christians played in developing the modern university, maturing Christian exegesis of Scripture, shaping early Christian dogma, modeling conciliar patterns of ecumenical decision-making, stimulating early monasticism, developing Neoplatonism, and refining rhetorical and dialectical skills.
He calls for a wide-ranging research project to fill out the picture he sketches. It will require, he says, a generation of disciplined investigation, combining intensive language study with a risk-taking commitment to uncover the truth in potentially unreceptive environments. Oden envisions a dedicated consortium of scholars linked by computer technology and a common commitment that will seek to shape not only the scholar’s understanding but the ordinary African Christian’s self-perception.
Healthy relationships across cultures are possible. Dr. Michelle Reyes takes a close look at the concept of cultural accommodation found in Scripture—and especially in the letter of 1 Corinthians—to redefine how Christians interact with cultural narratives that are different from their own.
Christians—whose standard of living is oneness in Christ, whose gospel is radically nonexclusive—should be at the frontlines of justice and of cross-cultural unity. But many of us struggle to reach outside of our own cultural bubbles and form real relationships that move beyond stereotypes and lead to understanding, healing, and solidarity across cultural lines.
Why is that?
- Why is it so difficult to reconcile our call to be united in Christ with a celebration of different cultural expressions?
- What are the reasons for cultural differences and how do they so often lead to stereotyping, appropriation, gentrification, racism, and other forms of injustice?
- What does the Bible say about human beings as cultural image bearers?
- How do we reevaluate our awareness of culture identity in a healthy and constructive way?
These are just some of the questions that Dr. Reyes explores as she faces the challenges surrounding cross-cultural relationships in America today and her thoughts on the way forward.
Spoiler Alert! The way forward does require willingness to change. It requires embracing cultural discomfort. But by engaging with this book, you will be empowered to learn how to become all things to all people—that is: how to reflect Jesus’ love in a multicultural, multiracial body of Christ and to share that love with a hurting world.
The Wisdom Pyramid: Feeding Your Soul in a Post-Truth World by Brett McCracken — We’re facing an information overload.
With the quick tap of a finger we can access an endless stream of addictive information―sports scores, breaking news, political opinions, streaming TV, the latest Instagram posts, and much more. Accessing information has never been easier―but acquiring wisdom is increasingly difficult.
In an effort to help us consume a more balanced, healthy diet of information, Brett McCracken has created the “Wisdom Pyramid.” Inspired by the food pyramid model, the Wisdom Pyramid challenges us to increase our intake of enduring, trustworthy sources (like the Bible) while moderating our consumption of less reliable sources (like the Internet and social media). At a time when so much of our daily media diet is toxic and making us spiritually sick, The Wisdom Pyramid suggests that we become healthy and wise when we reorient our lives around God―the foundation of truth and the eternal source of wisdom.
