Your Most Valuable Possession Your soul, simply put, is your mind to think, your heart to feel, and your will to decide. It's the very deepest part of your humanity, the source of all treasure and talent. Refreshingly honest and keenly insightful, pastor and talk show host Gregory Dickow shows how your mindset is the single most powerful force in shaping your emotions, your decisions--and your destiny. When you discover the power of God's healing love, then fear, anxiety, anger and shame will stop sabotaging your happiness--and your life. Your best days are going to be your next days. Turn your pain into purpose and let God continue your winning story.

Why do physicians who've taken the Hippocratic Oath willingly cut into seemingly healthy patients? How do you measure the success of surgery aimed at making someone happier by altering his or her body? Sander L. Gilman explores such questions in Creating Beauty to Cure the Soul, a cultural history of the connections between beauty of body and happiness of mind. Following these themes through an impressive range of historical moments and players, Gilman traces how aesthetic alterations of the body have been used to "cure" dissatisfied states of mind. In his exploration of the striking parallels between the development of cosmetic surgery and the field of psychiatry, Gilman entertains an array of philosophical and psychological questions that underlie the more practical decisions rountinely made by doctors and potential patients considering these types of surgery. While surveying and incorporating the relevant theories of Sigmund Freud, Alfred Adler, Karl Menninger, Paul Schilder, contemporary feminist critics, and others, Gilman considers the highly unstable nature of cultural notions of health, happiness, and beauty. He reveals how ideas of race and gender structured early understandings of aesthetic surgery in discussions of both the "abnormality" of the Jewish nose and the historical requirement that healthy and virtuous females look "normal," thereby enabling them to achieve invisibility. Reflecting upon historically widespread prejudices, Gilman describes the persecutions, harrassment, attacks, and even murders that continue to result from bodily difference and he encourages readers to question the cultural assumptions that underlie the increasing acceptability of this surgical form of psychotherapy. Synthesizing a vast body of related literature and containing a comprehensive bibliography, Creating Beauty to Cure the Soul will appeal to a broad audience, including those interested in the histories of medicine and psychiatry, and in philosophy, cultural studies, Jewish cultural studies, and race and ethnicity.

Explores the unacknowledged psychological element in Maimonides’ work, one which prefigures the latter insights of Freud.

One of the things that is common to true believers is a sense of unworthiness because of sin. This may cause us to doubt both ourselves and God's love for us. Here is an insightful handling of these matters by one of the most pastoral of the Puritans. Love's conclusion is that the great enemy of our souls will do all he can to take our eyes off of our Savior, even if that means an over-preoccupation with sin and self. This book gives Scriptural guidelines to recover a sense of God's love, to give comfort to those who are convicted, and to convict those who may be falsely comforted. This is important reading for anyone who longs to be more sanctified and satisfied. There is also another work by Christopher Love at the end of this book called "A Treatise of Angels."

Augustine and the Cure of Souls situates Augustine within the ancient philosophical tradition of using words to order emotions. Paul Kolbet uncovers a profound continuity in Augustine’s thought, from his earliest pre-baptismal writings to his final acts as bishop, revealing a man deeply indebted to the Roman past and yet distinctly Christian. Rather than supplanting his classical learning, Augustine’s Christianity reinvigorated precisely those elements of Roman wisdom that he believed were slipping into decadence. In particular, Kolbet addresses the manner in which Augustine not only used classical rhetorical theory to express his theological vision, but also infused it with theological content. This book offers a fresh reading of Augustine’s writings—particularly his numerous, though often neglected, sermons—and provides an accessible point of entry into the great North African bishop’s life and thought.

Drawing on a lifetime of pastoral experience, The Care of Souls is a beautifully written treasury of proven wisdom which pastors will find themselves turning to again and again. Harold Senkbeil helps remind pastors of the essential calling of the ministry: preaching and living out the Word of God while orienting others in the same direction. And he offers practical and fruitful adviceâ€"born out of his five decades as a pastorâ€"that will benefit both new pastors and those with years in the pulpit. In a time when many churches have lost sight of the real purpose of the church, The Care of Souls invites a new generation of pastors to form the godly habits and practical wisdom needed to minister to the hearts and souls of those committed to their care.