Martin R. Delany (1812-1885) was one of the leading and most influential Black activists and nationalists in American history. His ideas have inspired generations of activists and movements, including Booker T. Washington in the late nineteenth century, Marcus Garvey in the early 1920s, Malcolm X and Black Power in 1960s, and even today's Black Lives Matter. Extant scholarship on Delany has focused largely on his Black nationalist and Pan-Africanist ideas. Tunde Adeleke argues that there is so much more about Delany to appreciate. In the Service of God and Humanity reveals and analyzes Delany's contributions to debates and discourses about strategies for elevating Black people and improving race relations in the nineteenth century. Adeleke examines Delany's view of Blacks as Americans who deserved the same rights and privileges accorded Whites. While he spent the greater part of his life pursuing racial equality, his vision for America was much broader. Adeleke argues that Delany was a quintessential humanist who envisioned a social order in which everyone, regardless of race, felt validated and empowered. Through close readings of the discourse of Delany's humanist visions and aspirations, Adeleke illuminates many crucial but undervalued aspects of his thought. He discusses the strategies Delany espoused in his quest to universalize America's most cherished of values--life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness--and highlights his ideological contributions to the internal struggles to reform America. The breadth and versatility of Delany's thought become more evident when analyzed within the context of his American-centered aspirations. In the Service of God and Humanity reveals a complex man whose ideas straddled many complicated social, political, and cultural spaces, and whose voice continues to speak to America today.

These three essays show how Karl Barth's later work moved beyond his revolt against the theology dominant in the first decades of this century.

Explores the role of human disability in the service of God and examines how the participation of people with disabilities relate to the scriptures that speak of sin, disability, and healing. Challenges the current practices within the churches, encourages people with disabilities to press for full inclusion, suggests that congregations should re-envision their actual practices in communal life and worship, and presents a selection entitled "Disabling the Lie." Includes topic and name indices.

Seminary is dangerous. Really dangerous. The hard truth is that many seminarians enter pastoral ministry feeling drained, disillusioned, and dissatisfied. But the problem isn't with the faculty or the material. Rather, the most perilous danger to the soul of the pastor-in-training is the sin residing deep within his own heart. Drawing on their years of pastoral ministry and seminary experience, David Mathis and Jonathan Parnell take a refreshingly honest look at this oft-neglected—yet all too common—experience, offering real-world advice for students eager to survive seminary with their faith intact. In seven short but challenging chapters, the authors remind readers of the foundational role of the gospel in the life of ministry, equipping them with the keys to grow in their faith while making the most of their education.

A Human-Shaped God approaches the humanlike accounts of God in the Old Testament as the starting places for theology and uses them to build a picture of the divine. This understanding of God is then brought into conversation with traditional conceptions that depict God as a being who knows everything that happens, is at every place at the same time, is constant and unchanging, and does not ultimately have material form. But instead of pitting the Old Testament's humanlike view of God against traditional theology and assuming that only one of these understandings is correct, A Human-Shaped God posits that theologians should embrace both of these constructions simultaneously. This is a new way of theological inquiry that embraces both the humanlike characteristics of God and the transcendence of God in traditional theology. By seeing and understanding the humanlike depictions of God in the Old Testament and by using the rich language of traditional theology together in tandem, the reader acquires a much deeper and meaningful understanding of God.

"I pray . . . that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. . . . May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me." --Jesus Christ What if? What if believers of multiple ethnicities manifested the diversity in unity for which Jesus prayed? What if largely separate, homogeneous congregations--which account for nearly 92.5 percent of all churches in the United States--increasingly became connected, multiethnic congregations? What if, at eleven o'clock on Sunday mornings--or whenever believers gather to worship--local congregations were comprised of believing whites, African Americans, Koreans, Hispanics, Romanians, Native Americans, as well as the diverse mosaic of other ethnicities represented in our increasingly multicultural society? Would this not say something about the supernatural character of the gospel of reconciliation we proclaim? Jesus believed it would. That is why after praying for such diversity in unity among his followers, Jesus Christ--the Man for all nations--extended his arms and laid down his life to make it happen. This book, God's New Humanity, examines the biblical-theological vision and motivation for living in response to Jesus' prayer.

Walter Cardinal Kasper has written, “It is time, it is the right time, to speak of God.” This book invites readers to use their God-given ability to work through important questions that many people have about God today: Why is God so angry in the Bible? Is the biblical God male or female (or what)? Who is Satan? Why do people suffer? By exploring the Bible’s answers to these and other biblical questions, people can come to understand better their living and loving God.