White Church

In this simple but powerful book, Pastor David Swanson contends that discipleship, not diversity, lies at the heart of our white churches' racial brokenness. Before white churches can pursue diversity, he argues, we must first take steps to address the faulty discipleship that has led to our segregation in the first place. Drawing on the work of philosopher James K. A. Smith and others, Swanson proposes that we rethink our churches' habits, or liturgies, and imagine together holistic, communal discipleship practices that can reform us as members of Christ's diverse body.

Most Americans were shocked by the violence they witnessed at the nation's Capital on January 6th, 2021. And many were bewildered by the images displayed by the insurrectionists: a wooden cross and wooden gallows; "Jesus saves" and "Don't Tread on Me;" Christian flags and Confederate Flags; even a prayer in Jesus's name after storming the Senate chamber. Where some saw a confusing jumble, Philip S. Gorski and Samuel L. Perry saw a familiar ideology: white Christian nationalism.

Robert P. Jones, CEO of the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI), challenges us to grasp the profound political and cultural consequences of a new reality - that America is no longer a majority white Christian nation.

How did a libertine who lacks even the most basic knowledge of the Christian faith win 81 percent of the white evangelical vote in 2016? And why have white evangelicals become a presidential reprobate's staunchest supporters? Jesus and John Wayne is a sweeping account of the last 75 years of white evangelicalism, showing how American evangelicals have worked for decades to replace the Jesus of the Gospels with an idol of rugged masculinity and Christian nationalism.

As America begins to come to terms with the costs of White privilege to Black lives, this book urges a soul-searching examination of the role American Christianity has played in sustaining everyday white supremacy by assuring White people of their innocence. In Mormonism and White Supremacy, Joanna Brooks offers an unflinching look at her own people's history and culture and finds in them lessons that will hit home for every scholar of American religion and person of faith.

When a skeleton is discovered in the hidden crypt of a deconsecrated church, everyone is convinced the bones must be those of Conor Devitt, a local man who went missing on his wedding day six years previously. But the postmortem reveals otherwise.

Growing up in a deeply evangelical family in the Midwest in the ‘80s and ‘90s, Sarah McCammon was strictly taught to fear God, obey him, and not question the faith. Persistently worried that her gay grandfather would go to hell unless she could reach him, or that her Muslim friend would need to be converted, and that she, too, would go to hell if she did not believe fervently enough, McCammon was a rule-follower. But through it all, she was plagued by fears and deep questions as the belief system she'd been carefully taught clashed with her expanding understanding of the outside world.

Why did southern white evangelical Christians resist the civil rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s? Simply put, they believed the Bible told them so. These white Christians entered the battle certain that God was on their side. Focusing on the case of South Carolina, The Bible Told Them So shows how, despite suffering defeat in the public sphere with the triumph of the civil rights movement, white evangelicals continued to battle for their own institutions, preaching and practicing a segregationist Christianity they continued to believe reflected God's will.

In Powerful Prayers for Troubled Times, Stormie Omartian challenges Christians to pray for the land we call home. In this audio, Stormie tackles genuine questions about praying for our country. She offers sample prayers you can use to pray for government and community leaders, the heroic men and women who protect us (police officers, firefighters, soldiers), and the welfare and healing of our nation. You will also find encouragement for today and hope for the future as you join with other believers and, as one people, offer up our country to God in prayer.

Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, nearly every church in the US has had to adopt new ministry strategies, including digital technologies they may have avoided before. In Hybrid Church, James Emery White asks churches to see this as a positive and keep a dual physical and digital strategy to reach a post-Christian culture in a digital age.

Lauren Daniels had everything planned. She'd go to college, get the degree, settle down, get married, build her career as a sought-after architect and have a family. For the most part, things worked accordingly. Until she decides to change the plans to get what she wants. Now, a chance encounter with a handsome man brings more than just the broken vows of infidelity. Leaving Lauren to wonder if she should have left well enough alone. How quickly we forget that things done in the dark always comes to light. Sometimes the best laid plans can spell disaster or even cost you a life.

Melissa White couldn’t understand the heartbreaking twists and turns that life had dealt her. Losing her mother at a young age, her father’s new wife hated her with a passion. But when her Papa died a few months later, Melissa was suddenly homeless. With nowhere to go, Melissa did what any other woman of a marriageable age did! She found herself a husband quickly, forgoing all her dreams of marrying for love like her parents once had… until she met her charming groom, Alaric. Alaric Chevalier had once served as a soldier in France, but a bitter spat with a commanding officer suddenly ...

When a terrified, bloodied man staggers from a boarded-up shop in broad daylight in the small Suffolk village of Evernam, police are called to the scene. What they find inside the derelict building sends the community into shock: four bodies, their throats savagely cut, arranged in a bizarre formation with objects surrounding them. The survivor, Mark Lingham, insists that the deaths are his fault and is immediately arrested for murder. But police specialist Dr Cora Lael - a woman with the ability to sense emotional echoes from objects - hears a different story...

From Old Testament to New Testament, and through to the present day, Scarlet and White illuminates the ways in which the gospel story is the story of God redeeming sinners to create a Bride for Himself. It seeks to lead the listener along the scarlet tapestry woven throughout Scripture, continually pointing to Christ’s plan to secure His Bride through His own blood. By focusing primarily on one biblical metaphor—that of the Bride of Christ—Scarlet and White is able to help listeners understand the biblical, historical, and practical implications of this doctrine.

You are invited to witness the enormous power of the early church when it connected to the ultimate power. Then you are invited to request and experience it for yourself. You will again witness the enormous power of the early church as you listen to The Acts of the Apostles, a remarkable commentary on the book of Acts. Then you are invited to request it and experience it for yourself and your church.

“An indispensible study” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review) drawing on history, public opinion surveys, and personal experience that presents a provocative examination of the unholy relationship between American Christianity and white supremacy, and issues an urgent call for White Christians to reckon with this legacy for the sake of themselves and the nation.

Ewan Stokes disappeared after a football match in Ipswich 15 years ago. No one knows where he went but every year on the anniversary of his disappearance, random mysterious sightings are reported across Europe. Since Ewan vanished, a fanatical online following has grown up around the mystery. The cult believes Stokesy is coming back. And he wants payback.

In this taut inquiry, Posner digs deep into the radical history of the religious right to reveal how issues of race and xenophobia have always been at the movement’s core, and how religion often cloaked anxieties about perceived threats to a white, Christian America. Fueled by an antidemocratic impulse, and united by this narrative of reverse victimization, the religious right and the alt-right support a common agenda.

American history has profoundly shaped, and been shaped by, Christianity. This engaging introduction provides a brisk and lively yet deeply researched survey of these intertwined forces from the colonial period to the present. Elesha Coffman tells the story of Christianity in the United States by focusing on thirteen key events over four centuries of history. The turning points are as varied as the movements they track, including a naval battle, a revival, a schism, a court case, an outpouring of the Spirit, an act of terrorism, the election of a bishop, and the election of a president.

Jon Ward's life is divided in half: two decades inside the evangelical Christian bubble and two decades outside of it. In Testimony, Ward tells the engaging story of his upbringing in, and eventual break from, an influential evangelical church in the 1980s and 1990s. Ward sheds light on the evangelical movement's troubling political and cultural dimensions, tracing the ways in which the Jesus People movement was seduced by materialism and other factors to become politically captive rather than prophetic.