Whatever Happened to the Gospel? PDF Download

Author: David Nicholas
Publisher: Cross Books Pub
ISBN: 9781615071548
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 160

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Book Description
Too many Christian leaders act as though the Gospel is not a topic worthy of discussion. They speak on the wonders of knowing Christ, but never explain why a person needs Christ, who Christ is, and what Christ accomplished to make it possible for us to be given the gift of life with God. In Whatever Happened to the Gospel?, author Dr. David Nicholas addresses why the absence of Gospel teaching in a huge majority of modern evangelical churches is a problem and how to solve it. Citing the results of a LifeWay Research survey, Dr. David Nicholas shows how the Bad News and the Good News of the Gospel is often left out of sermons, and yet pastors still invite people to receive Jesus into their hearts. Whatever Happened to the Gospel? uses Scriptural passages to explain the Bad and Good News in a way that cuts through the confusion that exists in the minds of many. The church at large is in sad shape today because many who call themselves Christians have no idea what they believe. This confusion can be resolved through sharing the Gospel and making the Gospel part of every message. Evangelism and true discipleship begin with a clear, complete, logical, and sequential presentation of the Bad News and Good News. By following the lessons and examples presented in Whatever Happened to the Gospel?, believers are strengthened and empowered, knowing they are part of the Lord's great eternal plan. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Author: R.T. Kendall
Publisher: Charisma Media
ISBN: 1629994723
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 240

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Book Description
Let’s Get Down to the Truth You know the “prosperity gospel.” The “name it and claim it gospel.” The "political gospel". The messages being preached on at least 90 percent of religious television. But what about the Gospel? What was it the apostle Paul was “unashamed” of? Most Christians don’t understand what the true Gospel of Jesus is. In our church sanctuaries pastors neglect to preach the fear of God and eternal punishment. Church communities have grown to believe that all are saved and none will be lost. Meanwhile many other Christians lack assurance of their own salvation and focus on sanctification as their only ticket to Heaven. They ignore what was historically introduced by Jesus, filled out by the apostle Paul, and articulated by the sixteenth-century Reformers. The Gospel has been brushed to one side, and evidence of this is seen in how churches are misleading and even mistreating people. IT'S TIME TO BRING BACK WHAT IT REALLY MEANS TO BE SAVED. Respected author and theologian R. T. Kendall sounds a wake-up call for churches across the globe. Whatever Happened to the Gospel? seeks to reacquaint you with the Gospel and reignite a passion in your heart to know more of God.

Author: R. T. Kendall
Publisher: Charisma Media
ISBN: 1629994715
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 244

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Book Description
Let's Get Down to the Truth

Author: David F. Wells
Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing
ISBN: 9780802807472
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 334

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Book Description
Evangelicals, argues Wells, have largely lost the truth that God also stands outside all human experience, that he still summons sinners to repentance and belief regardless of their self-image, and that he calls his church to stand fast in his truth against the blandishments of the modern world.

Author: James Montgomery Boice
Publisher: Crossway
ISBN: 1433523833
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 224

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Book Description
Combines a serious examination of the state of today's church and a powerful solution: reclaiming the gospel of grace found in the confessional truths of the Reformation. Though the Christian church has achieved a worldly sort of success-big numbers, big budgets, big outreaches-these are not good days for evangelicalism. Attendance is down, and it is increasingly difficult to distinguish so-called "believers" from their non-Christian neighbors-all because the gospel of grace has been neglected. In this work, now in paperback, the late James Montgomery Boice identifies what's happened within evangelicalism and suggests how the confessional statements of the Reformation-Scripture alone, Christ alone, grace alone, faith alone, and glory to God alone-can ignite full-scale revival. "A church without these convictions has ceased to be a true church, whatever else it may be," he wrote, but "if we hold to these doctrines, our churches and those we influence will grow strong."

Author: Philip Yancey
Publisher: Zondervan
ISBN: 0310339359
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 166

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Book Description
“Why does the church stir up such negative feelings?” Philip Yancey has been asking this all his life as a journalist. His perennial question is more relevant now than ever: in a twenty-year span starting in the mid-nineties, research shows that favorable opinions of Christianity have plummeted drastically—and opinions of Evangelicals have taken even deeper dives. The end of the politics-oriented Evangelicalism that was so dominant in the second half of the 20th century is a strong example that we are living in a post-Christian culture. Yet while the opinions about Christianity are dropping, interest in spirituality is rising. Why the disconnect? Why are so many asking, “What’s so good about the “Good News?” Yancey’s writing has focused on the search for honest faith that makes a difference for a world in pain. In his landmark book What’s So Amazing about Grace he issued a call for Christians to be as grace-filled in their behavior as they are in declaring their beliefs. But people inside and outside the church are still thirsty for grace. What the church lacked in its heyday is now exactly what it needs to recover to thrive. Grace can bring together Christianity and our post-Christian culture, inviting outsiders as well as insiders to take a deep second look at why our faith matters and about what could reignite its appeal to future generations. How can Christians offer grace in a way that is compelling to a jaded society? And how can they make a difference in a world that cries out in need? Yancey aims this book at Christian readers, showing them how Christians have lost respect, influence, and reputation in a newly post-Christian culture. “Why do they hate us so much?” mystified Americans ask about the rest of the world. A similar question applies to evangelicals in America. Yancey explores what may have contributed to hostility toward Evangelicals, especially in their mixing of faith and politics instead of embracing more grace-filled ways of presenting the gospel. He offers illuminating stories of how faith can be expressed in ways that disarm even the most cynical critics. Then he explores what is Good News and what is worth preserving in a culture that thinks it has rejected Christian faith.

Author: Kristin Kobes Du Mez
Publisher: Liveright Publishing
ISBN: 1631495747
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 384

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Book Description
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER The “paradigm-influencing” book (Christianity Today) that is fundamentally transforming our understanding of white evangelicalism in America. Jesus and John Wayne is a sweeping, revisionist history of the last seventy-five years of white evangelicalism, revealing how evangelicals have worked to replace the Jesus of the Gospels with an idol of rugged masculinity and Christian nationalism—or in the words of one modern chaplain, with “a spiritual badass.” As acclaimed scholar Kristin Du Mez explains, the key to understanding this transformation is to recognize the centrality of popular culture in contemporary American evangelicalism. Many of today’s evangelicals might not be theologically astute, but they know their VeggieTales, they’ve read John Eldredge’s Wild at Heart, and they learned about purity before they learned about sex—and they have a silver ring to prove it. Evangelical books, films, music, clothing, and merchandise shape the beliefs of millions. And evangelical culture is teeming with muscular heroes—mythical warriors and rugged soldiers, men like Oliver North, Ronald Reagan, Mel Gibson, and the Duck Dynasty clan, who assert white masculine power in defense of “Christian America.” Chief among these evangelical legends is John Wayne, an icon of a lost time when men were uncowed by political correctness, unafraid to tell it like it was, and did what needed to be done. Challenging the commonly held assumption that the “moral majority” backed Donald Trump in 2016 and 2020 for purely pragmatic reasons, Du Mez reveals that Trump in fact represented the fulfillment, rather than the betrayal, of white evangelicals’ most deeply held values: patriarchy, authoritarian rule, aggressive foreign policy, fear of Islam, ambivalence toward #MeToo, and opposition to Black Lives Matter and the LGBTQ community. A much-needed reexamination of perhaps the most influential subculture in this country, Jesus and John Wayne shows that, far from adhering to biblical principles, modern white evangelicals have remade their faith, with enduring consequences for all Americans.

Author: Kate Bowler
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190876735
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 350

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Book Description
'Blessed' offers a comprehensive history of the rise of the American prosperity gospel. What began as diverse metaphysical, pentecostal, and self-help conceptions about the power of the mind became one of the most influential popular religious movements of the last century. The book follows how the movement took shape after World War II in pentecostal healing revivals and exploded onto the national scene through televangelists with big hair and bigger promises. It survived the scandals of the late 1980s and remade its image as a therapeutic and effective theology of modern living. Now thriving in the 21st century megachurch movement, the prosperity gospel reigns as a full-fledged cultural phenomenon.

Author: James Montgomery Boice
Publisher: Crossway
ISBN: 1433517353
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 242

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Book Description
There is no question that we live in an age of weak theology and casual Christianity. We have substituted intuition for truth, feeling for belief and immediate gratification for enduring hope. Evangelicalism desperately needs to return to the doctrines that once before reformed the world: radical depravity, unconditional election, particular redemption, efficacious grace and persevering grace. James Boice and Philip Ryken not only provide a compelling exposition on these doctrines of grace, but also look briefly at their historical impact. The authors leave no doubt that the church suffers when these foundational truths are neglected and that she must return to a Christianity that is practical-minded, kind-hearted, and most importantly, biblically based.

Author: David Platt
Publisher: Multnomah
ISBN: 1601422210
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 242

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Book Description
New York Times bestseller What is Jesus worth to you? It's easy for American Christians to forget how Jesus said his followers would actually live, what their new lifestyle would actually look like. They would, he said, leave behind security, money, convenience, even family for him. They would abandon everything for the gospel. They would take up their crosses daily... But who do you know who lives like that? Do you? In Radical, David Platt challenges you to consider with an open heart how we have manipulated the gospel to fit our cultural preferences. He shows what Jesus actually said about being his disciple--then invites you to believe and obey what you have heard. And he tells the dramatic story of what is happening as a "successful" suburban church decides to get serious about the gospel according to Jesus. Finally, he urges you to join in The Radical Experiment -- a one-year journey in authentic discipleship that will transform how you live in a world that desperately needs the Good News Jesus came to bring.