Unlike most childhoods, mine was far from being a happy one. My siblings and I, as well as the generation before us, were born at a time when warplanes, gunfire, foreign men in uniform, constant evacuations, and locals hiding under bunkers or war tunnels were commonplace. Now whenever I see playgrounds that are lush with trees and green grasses and filled with children on swings who are laughing while being pushed by their parents, I cannot help but feel a tinge of envy. They are so young, yet already they are having the time of their lives. As a child, I never imagined such scenarios to be remotely possible. Even the idea of playing and having fun were strange to me. I was filled with questions, many of which were answered much, much later.

Hebrews is a thorough and wide-ranging look at Jesus' fulfillment of the expectations and religious requirements of the Old Testament. Dr. Pentecost guides the reader through the rich historical meaning and contemporary applications of Hebrews.

An unplanned pregnancy. An absent father. Can love really endure all things? Danielle Kent is anything but Amish. But as destiny would have it, she has fallen in love with an Amish man. Now she’s 18, pregnant, and hopeful that the child’s Amish father—Matthew Lapp—will do the right thing and marry her. She knows Matthew plans to leave his Colorado settlement for a life in the Englisch world. But that plan never included a baby. When Matthew walks away from her and their unborn child, she has nowhere to turn. Her unlikely friendship with Levi offers some comfort—yet they have so little in common. This wasn’t the plan she had for her life, and she has never felt so alone. She doesn’t want to be pregnant. Doesn’t want to be Amish. Doesn’t want to trust God. And yet. God has plans beyond what her mind can imagine . . . loving plans to show a lost young woman that His love never fails but endures forever. “Wiseman is among the best at writing moving Amish fiction.” —Booklist review of The Wonder of His Love

The searing memoir of an extraordinary woman who served as a nun for eleven years in Mother Teresa's order, Hope Endures is a compelling chronicle of idealistic determination, rigid discipline, and shattering disillusionment. InÊher life's journey from certainty to doubt, Colette Livermore enters the Missionaries of Charity order in 1973 with unwavering faith and total surrender ofÊher will and intellect after seeing a documentary on the order's work in India. Only eighteen at the time, Livermore has been studying to enter medical school -- a lifelong goal -- but virtually overnight severs her many ties with family, friends, and the life she's known in beautiful, rural New South Wales in order to train as a sister to aid the poor. In the process, she also gives herself over to the order's unexpectedly severe, ascetic regime, which demands blind obedience and submission. Given the religious name Sister Tobit, Livermore serves in some of the poorest places in the world -- the garbage dump slums of Manila, Papua New Guinea, and Calcutta -- bringing hope and care to people who are desperately ill, hungry, abandoned, and even dying, and comforting whomever she can. Although she draws inspiration and strength from her humanitarian work, Livermore and other nuns risk their own physical health, as they are sent to dangerous areas while being unschooled in the languages and cultures, untrained in medical care, and sometimes unprotected by vaccines. Livermore herself succumbs to bouts of drug-resistant cerebral malaria that almost kill her and to a new strain of hepatitis. Over time she also beginsÊto notice that the order's rigid insistence on unquestioning obedience harms the young sisters mentally, emotionally, and spiritually -- and she experiences a terrible inner struggle to find the right path for herself. As she tries to respond to the suffering around her, she often falls into an incomprehensible conflict between her vow to obey and her vow to serve, between religious strictures and the practice of compassion, between authority and personal conscience. Pressured to stay with the order by Mother Teresa and other superiors, as well as by the younger nuns, Livermore nonetheless decides to leave at age thirty and attain her medical degree, continuing to take health care and relief to impoverished people in remote areas -- the isolated aboriginal communities of the Outback and war-torn East Timor. Even as she serves others as a medical doctor, she continues in a crisis of faith thatÊeventually leads her to become an agnostic. Hope Endures is the eye-opening, deeply affecting story of a brave woman's search for meaning in a world that is rent with tragedies and contradictions. It is also an unflinching critique of any faith that insists on blind obedience. For true hope to endure, Dr. Livermore demonstrates, we must always strive to question, to face the hard truths, and to discover the courage to follow our convictions.

'A blend of clear-eyed science and poetic eloquence The Earth Only Endures follows in the tradition of Jared Diamond and E.O. Wilson. Jules Pretty too is hopeful but on the condition that we understand the nature of the self-imposed threats to our future and the rational basis for human survival. To say that this is essential reading is rather like saying that a compass is essential to navigation.' David W Orr author of Design on the Edge 'Jules Pretty?s remarkable new book is both universal and parochial by turn and beautifully written. It is a philosophical inventory of what we have recentl.

David J. Costa presents a collection of almost all of the known Native texts in Miami-Illinois, from speakers of Myaamia, Peoria, and Wea.

God is love—there are few more quoted statements from all of Scripture. Although wonderfully simple, the idea that God is fundamentally loving is incredibly profound. And yet, sometimes we confuse God’s love with our human understanding of love—an understanding that is inherently imperfect, sometimes self-serving, and often fickle. Helping us walk in the belief that God is love—not that love is God—this book explores what the Bible actually teaches about how and what God loves. Readers will discover that, although we often misunderstand, misuse, and take for granted God’s love, it’s actually more wonderful, pure, and satisfying than we ever imagined.