A Lenten invitation to discover purpose and love through the Gospel of MarkThe Gospel of Mark begins not with a birth story but with a different sort of beginning: God’s voice from heaven calling Jesus “my Beloved Son.” Empowered by this divine affirmation, Jesus embarks on a mission to bring everyone into a community of loving neighbors, starting with his closest friends and followers and continuing through time and space to include each of us.This Lenten journey through the G...
What does it mean to follow Jesus? This Lent, learn from those who did it first.The commitment to follow Jesus means choosing the way of a disciple every day, in matters both major and mundane. This path is sure to bring challenges, even sacrifices, but the joy to be found makes every step worthwhile. This Lent, learn from the successes and trials of Jesus’s earliest isciples—not only the Twelve, but Mary and Martha, others who stepped into leadership after Jesus’s death, and even the apostle Pa...
When the night is long, the light still comes. Find hope this Advent through the words of the prophets.For many, Advent and Christmas are celebrated in the darkest time of the year. The experience of waiting and longing for the first glimmer of sunlight over the horizon serves as a poignant and perennial metaphor for the human quest to find hope amid sorrow, hardship, and fear.The prophets knew this feeling well and spoke hope to God’s people with the power to sustain them—and us—through uncerta...
Find sacred stillness in the Psalms amid the rush of Advent.The season of Advent, meant to be a time of waiting, all too often hurtles headlong into Christmas without allowing us to take a breath. The poetry of the Psalms, on the other hand, invites us to slow down, pause, and connect with the thoughts, feelings, and images the psalmist has offered. To help readers carve out time for reflection and meditation during this ironically hectic time, noted Christian educator and best-selling author El...
Take a meaningful walk with Jesus this Lent that invites reflection, inspires spiritual attentiveness, and opens your heart to the many forms discipleship can take in daily life.In Meeting Jesus on the Road, readers are invited to journey alongside Christ through the Gospel stories that define his earthly path. Gathering a group of disciples around him, Jesus travelled the region, teaching, healing, and proclaiming that the reign of God is at hand. He met them all with compassion. He brought the...
Jesus may have been born to an obscure young couple in a backwater town, but his family tree told a greater story.
Jesus was born into the rich legacy and sacred history of the Jewish people, with lineage said to go back to King David and rooted in the whole history of the Hebrew Bible. This Advent, find out how this little baby we worship became the savior that he was and discover your place with Jesus in the big story of God and God’s people.
Inspired by the centuries-old Jesse Tree tradition,...
With keen insight and unwavering conviction, visionary pastor Kathy Escobar guides readers on a Lenten journey inspired by the ways of Jesus to dismantle the systems that perpetuate inequality and injustice.From flipping the moneychangers’ tables in the temple to uplifting the poor and marginalized, Jesus’ actions and words turn the world’s idea of power on its head.With each week of Lent, readers will dig deeper into Jesus’ challenge to the pervasive influence of privilege and oppression that h...
Think, pray, and reflect through the stories of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection.The church has always known, intuitively even, that the best way for us to be shaped into the people God wants us to be—the people whose difference from the world around is vital to our witness—is to think and pray slowly and carefully through the stories of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection. In From Wilderness to Glory, best-selling and beloved author N. T. Wright encourages readers to do just that throughout...
Step into Advent with this captivating study and devotional, where angelic encounters come to life, echoing the timeless message of overcoming fear.
What would you do if you were not afraid?
Life can be daunting, filled with uncertainty and fears. It wasn't any different two thousand years ago when Jesus was born. An aged priest is told he is about to become a father for the first time. A young woman is told she is going to give birth - outside the protection of marriage. A simple carpenter is...
Are we paying attention to the holy ground beneath our feet? Where do we see burning bushes in our world today, and what are they calling us to do? Do spiritual encounters in our lives have holy consequences in the world around us?Many of us want to understand how to integrate our personal spiritual lives more actively with our engagement in working for justice and the liberation of the oppressed and marginalized. Hard and Holy Work provides a space for just that, helping readers participate in ...
Lent is an ideal time to step back and reflect on the deeper movements of the spirit, and Elizabeth Caldwell helps readers do this through a simple but profound approach.Pause: Spending Lent with the Psalms invites us to take up the spiritual practice of encountering, sinking into, and deeply engaging with one psalm each week during Lent and Holy Week.
The season of Lent encourages Christians to consider a different pace—one of slowing down, noticing, pausing—than what our dominant culture val...
While the world tries to rush us into Christmas, decorating the day after Halloween and packing it all up once the gifts are opened on December 25, Advent is a season of preparation that—like our holiday gatherings themselves—takes time and care. Think of the anticipation that comes with hosting loved ones for Christmas dinner: We begin by extending an invitation. We make plans, and as the event draws closer, we begin our preparations. Ultimately, we open the door and welcome our guests, and tha...
The desert, a landscape both severe and beautiful, embodies spiritual struggle and divine support. Jesus experienced forty days of testing and transformation in the rugged Judean desert. Whether disease, social injustice, personal loss, or other challenges have led you to the spiritual desert, it may seem doubtful that any good can come from hardship. Yet it was the arid wilderness of physical deprivation and soul-deep testing that prepared Jesus to live a life of devotion, courage, and merciful...
The Gospels are full of stories of Jesus sharing meals with disciples, friends, even tax collectors and Pharisees. Whether multiplying bread to feed a whole crowd, relaxing with his inner circle, or telling curious elites stories about even greater banquets, Jesus imparts wisdom as he shares the wine and grants forgiveness as he distributes the fish. This eight-chapter resource provides biblical insights along with thought-provoking queries regarding our own time, such as whom should we invite t...
Where’s the baby? The Gospel of Mark doesn’t have a nativity story—so where’s the Advent message? It’s in every aspect of Jesus’ life, to his death and beyond. The Incarnation—God come to earth in human form to be baptized, teach, heal, eat, and die—is what we celebrate at Christmas, and Mark shows us just how radical and celebration-worthy it is! Holy Disruption presents a fresh understanding of the holiness of Christmas grounded, not in a conventional cozy Christmas message, but thro...
From Eden to Gethsemane to the garden in which Jesus was buried and raised, our story of faith wanders through much fertile soil. But in our current world of fast food and to-go meals, we often do not make time to explore where our food comes from and how we break bread together. Journeying through the season of Lent with this in mind, A Time to Grow encourages readers to slow down, move through the painstaking process of growth, and end together with great feasting and celebration of ...
At Christmas, God came into our ordinary world in the form of a child, and still today, God is at work through the ordinary stuff of life, if we train our eyes to see.
In this daily devotional for Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany, Jill J. Duffield draws readers’ attention to ten ordinary objects that appear in the biblical narratives of messianic prophesy and incarnation—objects we encounter in our own lives. Through objects such as gates, trees, cloth, light, and water, readers will find new me...
The world is slowly emerging from the worst global emergency in a century, and the myriad struggles of the contemporary moment—division, isolation, illness, and uncertainty—make living our faith a challenge. For Christians, a number of questions have gained new urgency: Where do we find hope when it seems in such short supply? Where are the signs of God’s peace in this divided world? Where do we find a deeper sense of joy?
Thomas G. Long and Donyelle C. McCray remind us that these are the ques...
This Lenten devotional invites readers to learn more about the brutal institution of slavery and its impact on Black people in America and recognize how its evolution and legacy continue to harm their descendants in the United States today. Each of the forty devotions includes the testimony of a person who escaped slavery through the Underground Railroad, a Scripture passage, and a reflection connecting biblical and historical themes to challenge modern readers to work for liberation. Reflecting...
During the holidays, so many of us can suffer for all kinds of reasons. The magnitude of our weary world weighs on our hearts and minds. We wrestle with chronic pain, broken relationships, shattered dreams, fragile faith, and unexpected losses. Our grief and sorrow feel particularly acute when compared to the festivity and joy everyone else seems to be feeling. More and more churches are acknowledging this fact with “Blue Christmas” services (also called “Longest Night” services) and offering re...
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This book bundle features five picture books that can help inspire positive character development, including: No One Else like You by Siska Goeminne and illustrator Merel Eyckerman The Story of AND: The Little Word That Changed the World by Sandy Eisenberg Sasso and ill...
Buy our Bible Stories and Parables Picture Book Bundle today and save! With this bundle, you save 40% on the retail price of each book, which means that you save an additional 5% versus purchasing each book separately on this site.
This book bundle features resources that explore various Bible stories and parables, including:
Who Counts? 100 Sheep, 10 Coins, and 2 Sons by Amy-Jill Levine and Sandy Eisenberg Sasso and illustrator Margaux Meganck
The Marvelous Mustard Seed by Amy-Jill Levine and ...
Buy our Christmas Picture Book Bundle today and save! With this bundle, you save 40% on the retail price of each book, which means that you save an additional 5% versus purchasing each book separately on this site.
This book bundle features three picture books that are perfect for the Christmas season, including:
Home by Another Way: A Christmas Story by Barbara Brown Taylor and illustrator Melanie Cataldo
The Night of His Birth by Katherine Paterson and illustrator Lisa Aisato
The Worst Christ...
Buy our Growing Up and Emotions Picture Book Bundle today and save! With this bundle, you save 40% on the retail price of each book, which means that you save an additional 5% versus purchasing each book separately on this site.
This book bundle features five picture books that cover important topics like anger management, moving, bullying, and accepting others. Featured picture books include:
Simon and the Big, Bad, Angry Beasts: A Book about Anger by Ian De Haes
What in the World Is Wrong wit...
God is often at work through the ordinary: ordinary people, ordinary objects, ordinary grace. Through the ordinary, God communicates epiphanies, salvation, revelation, and reconciliation. It is through the mundane that we hear God’s quiet voice.In this devotional for the season of Lent, Jill J. Duffield draws readers’ attention to ten ordinary objects that Jesus would have encountered on his way to Jerusalem: dust, bread, the cross, coins, shoes, oil, coats, towels, thorns, and stones. In ...
