Our God is a generous God. However, His kindness, generosity, and blessing do not exclude us from hard times, struggles, or injustices in this life. For many, faith is the coin you put into a 'vending machine God,' obligating Him to dispense your selection. The hard truth is that the tendency toward suffering in this life is more normal for the Christian than the promise of perfect health and extraordinary wealth. There is aProper Pursuit of Prosperity,but it bears little resemblance to the so-called 'good news' being hawked by many of today's 'purveyors of prosperity.' In William Cripe Sr.'s inspirational and informative book, you will discover what the prosperity gospel is, what is wrong with it, and what is right with it. You will also find the answer to the question: Is there a legitimate expectation of prosperity this side of heaven? There is a day of perfect prosperity promised to all who believe, but that day is not in this lifetime. We exist not for the pursuit of our own gratification but to do God's bidding—not the other way around. Dive intoThe Proper Pursuit of Prosperityand discover Cripe's message of how God does not exist for us—we exist for Him. 'Cripe's work is a needed corrective to much of the prosperity preaching and teaching of our day. He combines an emphasis on biblical theology with global realities and personal experience that makes for an extremely effective argument. The goal of seeking and applying balanced truth is instructive for us all.' Dr. Martin Crain, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Director, Professional Doctoral Programs, Associate Professor of Pastoral Theology

In Pursuit of Prosperity provides a much needed exploration of the evolution of environmental sustainability in U.S. foreign policy. Through expert analysis of nine countries and regions of strategic importance, David Reed and his stellar team of experts in foreign policy and environmental affairs identify emerging threats to the prosperity and national security of the United States. They assert that U.S. foreign policy must shift away from its 100-year-old focus on obtaining energy and mineral inputs for the industrial economy. In the new millennium, U.S. foreign policy must be geared toward ensuring the prosperity of the country’s trading and political partners around the globe. To the degree that our partners’ economies and social stability are threatened by the natural resource scarcities and environmental change unfolding within their borders and in neighboring countries, threats to U.S. prosperity and national security increase proportionately. Directed to U.S. foreign policy makers, the intelligence and security communities, and influential think tanks and research organizations, the book proposes specific recommendations the U.S. government should embrace to respond to the disruption of global supply chains, social instability in partner countries, disruptive impacts on regional relations, and expansion of illegal trade and criminal networks. This unique focus establishes In Pursuit of Prosperity as a seminal work in understanding the challenges facing the United States in this period of global environmental change.

Straight-talking CNBC reporter Michelle Caruso-Cabrera demands a modern solution to our nation’s social and economic woes—a return to our political roots: fiscal conservatism, limited government, and personal accountability. Hypocrites and radicals on both sides of the political spectrum have left fiscally conservative, socially liberal Americans like CNBC’s Michelle Caruso-Cabrera people without a party. If you tell your neighbors you’re a card-carrying Republican, they’ll assume you’re opposed to abortion, hostile to gay marriage, and don’t care about the environment or the poor. Democrats are portrayed as union-loving, tree-hugging activists, more concerned with making government big rather than effective. The reality is that both parties have been hijacked by the wrong issues and have abandoned the loyal Americans who believe that government should stay out of our private lives and out of our pocketbooks. Both parties are to blame for the exorbitant spending and excessive social interference over the last ten years that have left our country in a financial disaster. The core principles of Reaganomics rejuvenated an unstable economy and the Clinton-era policy successes took power away from the federal government and put money in our pockets. We must return to the fundamentals of American politics: small, not big, government. Less spending, not more. The first step is to more narrowly define the parties’ platforms away from needlessly divisive social issues and refocus the political discussion on that really matters: economic policies that create jobs. In the smart, tell-it-like-it-is style that has made her popular with Democrats and Republicans like, Caruso-Cabrera outlines forward-thinking free-market solutions for health care, education, and immigration. These ideas will stop our growing deficit, boost our competitive capital, and strengthen our dollar, because an economy that is flexible and free of government interference can grow faster and get the country out of its current malaise. It’s not too late to fix our nation, restore our credibility, and rebuild our political system with the tenets on which it was founded: fiscal conservatism and social liberty. Our future is counting on it.

Brilliant and engagingly written, Why Nations Fail answers the question that has stumped the experts for centuries: Why are some nations rich and others poor, divided by wealth and poverty, health and sickness, food and famine? Is it culture, the weather, geography? Perhaps ignorance of what the right policies are? Simply, no. None of these factors is either definitive or destiny. Otherwise, how to explain why Botswana has become one of the fastest growing countries in the world, while other African nations, such as Zimbabwe, the Congo, and Sierra Leone, are mired in poverty and violence? Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson conclusively show that it is man-made political and economic institutions that underlie economic success (or lack of it). Korea, to take just one of their fascinating examples, is a remarkably homogeneous nation, yet the people of North Korea are among the poorest on earth while their brothers and sisters in South Korea are among the richest. The south forged a society that created incentives, rewarded innovation, and allowed everyone to participate in economic opportunities. The economic success thus spurred was sustained because the government became accountable and responsive to citizens and the great mass of people. Sadly, the people of the north have endured decades of famine, political repression, and very different economic institutions—with no end in sight. The differences between the Koreas is due to the politics that created these completely different institutional trajectories. Based on fifteen years of original research Acemoglu and Robinson marshall extraordinary historical evidence from the Roman Empire, the Mayan city-states, medieval Venice, the Soviet Union, Latin America, England, Europe, the United States, and Africa to build a new theory of political economy with great relevance for the big questions of today, including: - China has built an authoritarian growth machine. Will it continue to grow at such high speed and overwhelm the West? - Are America’s best days behind it? Are we moving from a virtuous circle in which efforts by elites to aggrandize power are resisted to a vicious one that enriches and empowers a small minority? - What is the most effective way to help move billions of people from the rut of poverty to prosperity? More philanthropy from the wealthy nations of the West? Or learning the hard-won lessons of Acemoglu and Robinson’s breakthrough ideas on the interplay between inclusive political and economic institutions? Why Nations Fail will change the way you look at—and understand—the world.

“Compact and immensely readable . . . a tour de force. Prepare to be amazed.” John C. Bogle, Founder and Former CEO, The Vanguard Group Bernstein is widely respected as author of the bestseller, The Intelligent Asset Allocator Identifies and explains the four conditions necessary for human progress

In The Path to Free College, Michelle Miller-Adams argues that tuition-free college, if pursued strategically and in alignment with other sectors, can be a powerful agent of change. She makes the case that broadly accessible and affordable higher education is in the public interest, yielding dividends not just for individuals but also for the communities, states, and nation in which they reside. Miller-Adams offers a comprehensive analysis of the College Promise movement--its history, impacts, and unintended consequences--and its relationship to access, affordability, and workforce readiness. These factors are explored through data, analysis, and case studies of existing place-based scholarship programs. She also examines historical precursors of the free-college movement and evaluates the possibility of national action. The Path to Free College outlines how the design of free-college programs should relate to programmatic goals and explores the suitability of different approaches. In addition, the book describes both the need for and the challenges of implementing a nationwide free-college program, as well as the variety of models and research-based evidence. Given the raging national debate about tuition-free college, the moment is right for a book that assesses state and local efforts and offers policy leaders and practitioners guidance going forward. The Path to Free College asserts that the promise of private and public gains warrants public investment in tuition-free college.

In his bestseller Affluenza, David Wann and his co-authors diagnosed the debilitating disease of over-consumption. In Simple Prosperity he shows readers how we can overcome this disease by investing in a variety of real wealth sources. To recapture a more abundant and sustainable lifestyle, try: - Creating a richer life story through personal growth incentives - Forming higher-yield friendships and stronger bonds through social capital - Taking preventive healthcare measures to build up wellness reserves - Balancing the biological budget through "greener" currency - Caring for people, not just cars, to improve your neighborhood wealth index - Resolving that pesky carbon conundrum through energy savings - Celebrating instead of desecrating! Cultural prosperity futures value the earth as a sacred place In our age of hedge fund hysteria, Simple Prosperity is a new way of investing that will save our sanity and the planet.