We all encounter times when our spirit feels dry, when doubt looms. The opportunity to tour Israel came at a good time. For months, my life has been a mindless plodding through necessary routine, as monotonous as an all-night shift on an assembly line. Life gets that way sometimes, when nothing specific is wrong but the world around us seems drained of color. Even my weekly worship experiences and daily quiet times with God have felt as dry and stale as last year's crackers. I'm ashamed to confess the malaise I've felt. I have been given so much. Shouldn't a Christian's life be an abundant one, as exciting as Christmas morning, as joyful as Easter Sunday? With gripping honesty, Lynn Austin pens her struggles with spiritual dryness in a season of loss and unwanted change. Tracing her travels throughout Israel, Austin seamlessly weaves events and insights from the Word . . . and in doing so finds a renewed passion for prayer and encouragement for her spirit, now full of life and hope.

"What makes us open to mystery, to glimpses of the Transcendent in our daily lives? The power of the imagination, according to Sandra Levy - a power that has been seriously depleted in today's postmodern culture. To address and redress this deficit, Levy explores how the imagination expresses itself - through ritual, music, poetry, art, story - and focuses on specific practices that can exercise and enrich our spiritual capacity, thus opening us up to divine encounter. Imagination and the Journey of Faith will speak to all readers, whether religious believers or not, who wish to strengthen and deepen the imaginative power of their spiritual lives."--BOOK JACKET.

The blend of scholarship and artistry of the DVD documentary Journey of Faith (Maxwell Institute, 2006) continues in expanded form in the book Journey of Faith: From Jerusalem to the Promised Land. Containing numerous threads of historical detail and scholarly insight not included in the DVD, this visually stunning look at the Book of Mormon prophet Lehi's trek through the harsh Arabian desert reflects a synergistic collaboration of talented scholars, artists, and photographers seeking to illuminate an epic event in scriptural history and situate it in a real-world setting. Aside from assembling commentary and images from the DVD, this book includes a foreword by the editors, their reflections on the project in two separate chapters, additional commentary by scholars, an appendix on the famed Incense Trail across the Arabian Peninsula, and a bibliography.

The continuing war in Iraq, Hurricane Katrina, the political sniping engendered by the Supreme Court nominations, Terry Schiavo - contemporary American society is characterized by divisive anger, profound loss, and danger. Wendell Berry, one of the country's foremost cultural critics, addresses the menace, responding with hope and intelligence in a series of essays that tackle the major questions of the day. Whose freedom are we considering when we speak of the ''free market'' or ''free enterprise?'' What is really involved in our National Security? What is the price of ownership without affection? Berry answers in prose that shuns abstraction for clarity, coherence, and passion, giving us essays that may be the finest of his long career.

Analyzes the spiritual formation of young children and calls for renewed attention to scripture and the involvement of families in the process.

Six-year-old Charles Mulli wakes up in his Kenyan hut to discover his parents have abandoned him. Forced to beg from hut to hut in search of food, Charles scrapes out a meagre existence while trying to come to terms with his abusive past and seemingly hopeless future. As a teenager, Charles is invited by a friend to a crusade where he commits his life to Christ. That act begins a unique adventure of faith, miracles, and a passion for reaching street children. After years of struggle, Charles experiences unprecedented success. He finds a wonderful wife, raises a family, excels in business to such a degree that he creates an empire that is noticed by the President of Kenya. Charles becomes a pinnacle in the Church movement, but then his life changes again. In spite of his tremendous achievements, the plight of the growing street children problem in his country remains strong in Charles' heart. He is unable to shut out their cries, the cries he understands so well, and he realizes he must respond. Convicted by God to give away all his possessions, Charles sells everything to pursue his passion of rescuing street children from the slums of Kenya. He battles against corrupt religious establishments, supernatural enemies, and intense financial pressures to bring hope to those whose lives reflect his own childhood. Mully Children's Family (MCF) Orphanage was founded and established by Charles and Esther Mulli in response to the desperate needs of street children, abandoned children, and HIV/AIDS orphans in Kenya in 1989. Father to the Fatherless is the true story of a man whose life begins in desperate poverty, moves to riches, and finally servanthood, where he becomes a real-life demonstration of selfless love and sacrifice that challenges us to evaluate the cost of giving up all to God in the service of others.

The Critical Journey, at its core, is a description of the spiritual journey: our response to our faith in God with the resulting changes that follow. In this book, authors Janet O. Hagberg and Robert A. Guelich address the following issues: the struggle to find meaning and wholeness the crisis of values and identity at mid-life the quest for self-actualization the healing of early religious experiences questions about the spiritual journey Their goal is to help us understand where we are on our individual faith journeys and also appreciate where others are in theirs. The Critical Journey does not reveal exactly how or when we need to move along in our personal pilgrimages, nor does it offer formulas for spiritual growth. Rather, it describes six phases of the spiritual journey and illustrates how people act and think while in these stages. This is an excellent guide for those who are wrestling with their faith and wondering how others have resolved their "dark nights of the soul." Here is an answer for those who have wondered why everyone doesn't respond in the same manner to the message of the Gospel.