African-American Interest
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Were You There
$17.00Add to cartValuable not only for their sublime musical expression, the African American spirituals provide profound insights into the human condition and Christian life. Many spirituals focus on the climax of the Christian drama, the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and the ways in which those events bring about the liberation of God’s people.
In these devotions for the season of Lent, Luke A. Powery leads the reader through the spirituals as they confront the mystery of Christ’s atoning death and victory over the grave. Each selection includes the lyrics of the spiritual, a reflection by the author on the spiritual’s meaning, a Scripture verse related to that meaning, and a brief prayer.
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Revives My Soul Again
$40.00Add to cartMLK and the Practice of Spirituality
The scholarship on Martin Luther King Jr. is seriously lacking in terms of richly nuanced and revelatory treatments of his spirituality and spiritual life. This book addresses this neglect by focusing on King’s life as a paradigm of a deep, vital, engaging, balanced, and contagious spirituality. It shows that the essence of the person King was lies in the quality of his own spiritual journey and how that translated into not only a personal devotional life of prayer, meditation, and fasting but also a public ministry that involved the uplift and empowerment of humanity. Much attention is devoted to King’s spiritual leadership, to his sense of the civil rights movement as “a spiritual movement,” and to his efforts to rescue humanity from what he termed a perpetual “death of the spirit.” Readers encounter a figure who took seriously the personal, interpersonal, and sociopolitical aspects of the Christian faith, thereby figuring prominently in recasting the very definition of spirituality in his time. King’s “holistic spirituality” is presented here with a clarity and power fresh for our own generation.
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Sojourners Truth : Choosing Freedom And Courage In A Divided World
$18.99Add to cartPreface
Part I: Formation
1. Pain: Truth Is, Your Identity Can Get You Into Hot Water
2. Grace: Truth Is, Women Are The Unsung Heroes In This World
3. Community: Truth Is, There Is No Place Like Home
4. Purpose: Truth Is, Winners Don’t Quit On ThemselvesPart II: History
5. Consciousness: Truth Is, It’s Time To Wake Up
6. Deliverance: Truth Is, Freedom Comes To Those Who Demand It
7. Trust: Truth Is, We Have A Money ProblemPart III: Wilderness
8. Anger: Truth Is, There’s Something That Can Kill You
9. Death: Truth Is, Remembering Can Bring Us Together
10. Humility: Truth Is, There Is Hope Worth Holding On To
11. War: Truth Is, We Must Prepare To FightPart IV: Redemption
12. Live: Truth Is, We Can Find A Way Out Of The Wilderness
13. Build: Truth Is, You Need The Right People And The Right Perspective
14. Heal: Truth Is, Love Will Lead Us Home
15. Light: Truth Is, Beauty Can Come From Ashes
16. Home: Truth Is, We Need Courage To Live Redeemed
NotesAdditional Info
In A Sojourner’s Truth we are drawn into the journey of a young African American girl from South Carolina to the United States Naval Academy and then into a calling as a speaker, mentor, writer, and teacher.Intertwined with Natasha Sistrunk Robinson’s story is the story of Moses, a leader who was born into a marginalized people group, resisted injustices of Pharaoh, denied the power of Egypt, and trusted God even when he did not fully understand or know where he was going. Along the way we courageously explore the spiritual and physical tensions of truth-telling, character and leadership development, and bridge building across racial/ethnic, socioeconomic, and gender lines.
You are invited to bring along your story as well-to discover your own identity, explore your truth-revealing moments, live unafraid, and gain a deeper sense of purpose.
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Exodus Preaching : Crafting Sermons About Justice And Hope
$23.99Add to cartExodus Preaching is the first of its kind. It is an exploration of the African American prophetic rhetorical traditions in a manner that makes features of these traditions relevant to a broad audience beyond the African American traditions. It provides readers a composite picture of the nature, meaning, and relevance of prophetic preaching as spoken Word of justice and hope in a society of growing pluralism and the world-shaping phenomenon of racial, economic and cultural diversity. African American preachers have distinctively invested great symbolic significance in the Exodus story, the messianic witness of Jesus, and the prophetic literature for developing and shaping prophetic sermons. Kenyatta Gilbert demonstrates how four distinctive features of discourse can shape sermon preparation, for effective preaching in a period of intense social change, racial unrest, and violence. Gilbert includes dozens of practical suggestions and five practical exercises to equip the reader for preaching in new ways and in new environments. He offers an holistic approach, fully equipping the reader with the theological and practical resources needed to preach prophetically.
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Voices In The Wilderness
$48.00Add to cartFINALLY, a scholarly description of the development of Black preaching in the United States that is accessible to the average reader, but also contributes to the academic conversation about both style and theological content. Written from the perspective of a seasoned practitioner and tenured practical theologian, Thomas surveys Black preaching as it has responded to various social and historical time periods. Starting with the brutality of chattel slavery, early formations in segregated Southern life, rapid migration to and urbanization in Northern cities, and various events throughout the post-civil rights era, the book gives convincing details and examples of how the Black preacher helped to guide and sustain the masses of African American people through the wilderness of social change. At the heart of the book, three prime examples are presented as models of the real “”genius”” of Black preaching. The reader will never again think about Reverend Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and the Reverend Jesse Jackson in the same way. A special chapter is devoted to the contributions of Black women preachers along with a closing chapter that makes new proposals for the future. The book is a provocative and critical analysis of why Black preaching still matters.
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Voices In The Wilderness
$28.00Add to cartFINALLY, a scholarly description of the development of Black preaching in the United States that is accessible to the average reader, but also contributes to the academic conversation about both style and theological content. Written from the perspective of a seasoned practitioner and tenured practical theologian, Thomas surveys Black preaching as it has responded to various social and historical time periods. Starting with the brutality of chattel slavery, early formations in segregated Southern life, rapid migration to and urbanization in Northern cities, and various events throughout the post-civil rights era, the book gives convincing details and examples of how the Black preacher helped to guide and sustain the masses of African American people through the wilderness of social change. At the heart of the book, three prime examples are presented as models of the real “”genius”” of Black preaching. The reader will never again think about Reverend Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and the Reverend Jesse Jackson in the same way. A special chapter is devoted to the contributions of Black women preachers along with a closing chapter that makes new proposals for the future. The book is a provocative and critical analysis of why Black preaching still matters.
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Becoming Married Staying Married
$20.00Add to cartIt’s easy to fall in love and to get married. But what does it really mean to be married? And how do you stay married?
In Becoming Married, Staying Married, couples will be encouraged to see marriage as a process that never ends. Together they will reflect on current realities particular to African American couples. They will also discover nine key principles that are required for healthy marriages, including concepts like self-awareness, flexibility, maturity, and forgiveness. Practical suggestions on how to further enhance each quality are included, in addition to African proverbs and biblical Scripture that relate to marriage. Questions for discussion and reflection are included at the end of each chapter.
This insightful resource can be used by African American couples at various stages of their relationship, but it is especially helpful to engaged and newly married couples. Pastor may also choose to use this book as a discussion starter for premarital counseling.
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Insights From African American Interpretation
$29.00Add to cartSeries Foreword
1. Introducing African American Interpretation
2. Twentieth-Century Foundations
3. African American Biblical Interpretation In The Early Twenty-First Century
4. Slavery, Torture, Systemic Oppression, And Kingdom Rhetoric: An African American Reading Of Matthew 25:1-13
5. Dis-membering, Sexual Violence, And Confinement: A Womanist Intersectional Reading Of The Story Of The Levite’s Wife (Judges 19)Bibliography
IndexAdditional Info
Each volume in the Insights series discusses discoveries and insights gained into biblical texts from a particular approach or perspective in current scholarship. Accessible and appealing to today’s students, each Insight volume discusses how this method, approach, or strategy was first developed and how its application has changed over time; what current questions arise from its use; what enduring insights it has produced; and what questions remain for future scholarship.Mitzi J. Smith describes the distinctive African American experience of Scripture, from slavery to Black Liberation Theology and beyond, and the unique angles of perception that an intentional African American interpretation brings to the text for a contemporary generation of scholars. Smith shows how questions of race, ethnicity, and the dynamics of “othering” have been developed in African American biblical scholarship, resulting in new reading of particular texts. Further, Smith describes challenges that scholarship raises for the future of biblical interpretation generally.
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Role Of Faith And Religion In The Life Of African Americans
$10.00Add to cartAfrican-Americans who are highly involved in religion have fewer family problems than those who are not involved. The youths in these families have better emotional control and greater involvement in positive, productive activities.
This book is a discussion of the history of African-Americans–through hundreds of years of cruelty and brutality in slavery, war, and segregation–and the role of Christian faith and churches in helping black people survive and overcome such enormous challenges. These facts offer powerful testament to the role of faith and religion in the lives of African-Americans.
Encouragement, hope, faith, and determination will help us receive what God has for us if we serve Him! Author Florence Van Liew Crain hopes and prays that those who think they cannot make it will be able to get up, brush themselves off, and move forward.
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Purple Pennies
$11.99Add to cartSometimes, things are not what they seem, and the things that we carve the most are not always what we need. This story is centered around the life of a young lady named Trish who from the looks of things has it all: a great job, an ideal marriage, nice house, and other luxuries of life. But it’s not until she fights her way to the top that she actually realizes how lonely being at the top can be.
As life would have it, it’s through a weird twists of events that she gets the chance to see her marriage, her career, and her life for what it really is, a sham of happiness coated with a tint of perfection.
In just 48 hours, she gets the opportunity to have a second chance at life, happiness, and love.
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Introduction To African American Preaching
$38.99Add to cartThis book by Frank A. Thomas serves as an introduction and primer on African American preaching. He sets out to answer six questions: 1) What is the historical study and scholarly treatment of black preaching? The formal study of black preaching matured in the 1990s from Abingdon Press, through the books Black Preaching by Henry Mitchell (Interdenominational Theological Center) and The Hum by Evans Crawford (Howard University). The initial chapter traces how and why black preaching evolved. 2) What is black preaching? What makes black preaching distinctive? What are the substantive methodologies and content of black preaching? Does black preaching include the preaching of the African Diaspora or is it limited to American shores? How does black preaching correlate with the preaching methodologies of other communities, i.e. Euro-American, Latino/Latina, Korean, etc. 3) What are the benchmarks of excellence in black preaching? In every preaching tradition, models and styles or examples emerge based on community recognition and acclaim within the cultural preaching tradition. These models are built on criteria that point to “excellence” in oral practice. The goal in the classroom is to surface conscious and unconscious codes of excellence, which the student can then adapt in a particular congregation. 4) What methods are practiced in African American preaching? Three methods are explored from “folk” and “educated” preaching. Methods of “old-time Negro Preaching,” are compared to the Hegelian method of Samuel DeWitt Proctor and the celebrative preaching method of Henry H. Mitchell, Frank A. Thomas, and Luke Powery. 5) What are the future trends in black preaching? What cultural and media forces are changing black preaching? 6) What are the best bibliographic resources in African American preaching?
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Rethinking Celebration : From Rhetoric To Praise In African American Preach
$28.00Add to cart“This book is a clarion call for African American preachers to think more deeply about the aims and ends of their preaching-namely to stop putting so much emphasis on celebratory endings to our sermons and focus more on the substantive content in our sermons. Our so-called celebratory preaching, designed to excite the congregation into action through a highly emotional closing of the sermon, has had the opposite effect. Rather than inducing action, it has lulled generations of black congregants to sleep. While we are jumping up and down, shouting, and waving our hands in the air every Sunday during the worship hour, we seem not to notice the growing number of churched and unchurched alike who are becoming powerfully alienated from any form of institutional religion.”
-from the introduction“Celebration” is a term that has long been used to describe African American preaching, characterized by content that affirms the goodness and powerful intervention of God as well as style that builds from quiet beginnings to an emotionally rich crescendo in conclusion. Cleophus J. LaRue argues that while celebration is one of African American preaching’s greatest gifts to the larger church, too many black preachers have become content with the form of celebration-volume, vocabulary, pitch, speed, rhythm, and the like-to the neglect of its essence-the proclamation of the mighty acts of God in the lives of their congregations and communities. This kind of preaching, LaRue contends, fails to address the ongoing problems of the African American community and is powerless to prevent the growing disaffection of black America with the black church. In words both prophetic and practical, LaRue suggests ways to improve black preaching that honor both the form and the power of the African American homiletical practice of celebration. Preachers will learn how to use celebration more selectively and as part of a fully formed preaching practice rather than as a means of distracting the congregation from pressing social and theological questions. The book includes six illustrative sermons from LaRue as well as Paschal Sampson Wilkinson Sr., Brian K. Blount, and Claudette Anderson Copeland.
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African American Theology
$35.00Add to cartThis book presents a substantial introduction to the major methodologies, figures, and themes within African American theology. Frederick L. Ware explores African American theology from its inception and places it within dual contexts: first, the African American struggle for dignity and full humanity; and second, the broader scope of Christian belief. Readers will appreciate Ware’s demonstration of how black theology is expressed in a wide range of sources that includes not only scholarly publications but also African American sermons, music, news and editorials, biography, literature, popular periodicals, folklore, and philosophy. Each chapter concludes with questions for discussion and suggested resources for further study. Ware provides a seasoned perspective on where African American theology has been and where it is going, and he demonstrates its creativity within the chorus of Christian theology.
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Stewardship In African American Churches
$14.00Add to cartStewardship in African American Churches: A New Paradigm offers practical ideas to help church leaders lead in stewardship effectively. Based on both scripture and tradition, Melvin Amerson draws upon his experience as a stewardship consultant to help churches accomplish the following: Develop a theology of generosity Define stewardship leadership roles Celebrate the offering each week Establish endowment giving
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Crossover Preaching : Intercultural Improvisational Homiletics In Conversat
$45.99Add to cartAcknowledgments
Abbreviations
Introduction: “Time Is Filled With Swift Transition”
1. Gardner C. Taylor: Case Study In Crossover Preaching
2. Turning Ink To Blood: Performative Improvisation
3. Rooted, But Not Restricted: Metaphorical Improvisation
4. Transgressing The Divides: Intercultural Competence
5. Putting Flesh To Bones: Homiletical Strategies
Conclusion: Crossing La Frontera (the Border)
Bibliography
Author Index
Subject IndexAdditional Info
As society becomes more culturally diverse and globally connected, churches and seminaries are rapidly changing. And as the church changes, preaching must change too.Crossover Preaching proposes a way forward through conversation with the “dean of the nation’s black preachers,” Gardner C. Taylor, senior pastor emeritus of Concord Baptist Church in Brooklyn, New York. In this richly interdisciplinary study, Jared E. Alcantara argues that an analysis of Taylor’s preaching reveals an improvisational-intercultural approach that recovers his contemporary significance and equips U. S. churches and seminary classrooms for the future.
Alcantara argues that preachers and homileticians need to develop intercultural and improvisational proficiencies to reach an increasingly intercultural church. Crossover Preaching equips them with concrete practices designed to help them cultivate these competencies and thus communicate effectively in a changing world.
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Reflect Reclaim Rejoice Study Guide
$7.99Add to cartThis small-group study serves as a companion resource for the 2015 Emmy-winning DVD, Reflect, Reclaim, Rejoice: Preserving the Gift of Black Sacred Music. Four centuries ago, Blacks enslaved in America created a music form that gave solace even during the most inhumane conditions. Reflect, Reclaim, Rejoice: Preserving the Gift of Black Sacred Music traces the music’s history and invites readers to see and experience the ways it is being kept alive.
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Breaking Bread Breaking Beats
$29.00Add to cartContents:
Getting Started
1. Moments In The History Of Black Churches And Hip-Hop
2. Black Churches, Hip-Hop, And The Body
3. Black Churches, Hip-Hop, Race, And Ethnicity
4. Black Churches, Hip-Hop, And Poverty
5. Black Churches, Hip-Hop, And Gender
6. Black Churches, Hip-Hop, And Sexuality
7. Black Churches, Hip-Hop, And Ethics
8. Black Churches, Hip-Hop, And Globalization
9. A Relationship Between Black Churches And Hip-Hop?
10. The Cipher
The CERCL Writing Collective Members
Glossary
Selected Bibliography
NotesAdditional Info
What is hip-hop, and how does it impact the Black Church? How does the Black Church integrate hip-hop? How do black churches think about hip-hop? How do these different, yet deeply interrelated communities think about the key topics of modern life-be it gender, sex, race, or globalization?These questions and more are the concern of the CERCL Writing Collective, under the mentorship of Anthony Pinn. In this innovative project, ten individuals write as one voice to illuminate the ways that hip-hop and the Black Church agree, disagree, and inform each other on key topics.
This book grows out of the popular religion and Hip-Hop course, soon to be offered as an open enrollment online course, at Rice University by Anthony B. Pinn and Bernard ‘Bun B’ Freeman. Like the course, the book offers engaging insights into one of today’s most important musical genres and reflects on its broad cultural impact.
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Mary Had A Baby (Revised)
$14.99Add to cartIn this 2014 revised edition, Mary Had a Baby has four sessions, one for each week of Advent, and is perfect for small groups, Sunday School, mid-week sessions, and choir workshops. Each lesson utilizes Scripture, song lyrics, devotional and contextual information, and discussion questions to stimulate deepening faith and a sense of community. The four spirituals featured are “Mary Had a Baby,” “Rise Up Shepherd and Follow,” “Children, Go Where I Send Thee,” and “Go, Tell It on the Mountain.”
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Child Shall Lead Them
$19.00Add to cartForeword
Preface
Introduction
1. Montgomery: Just To See Empty Bus, After Empty Bus Go By
2. Sitting-in And Riding For Freedom
3. Birmingham And The Children’s Crusade
4. Mississippi: Made To Disappear
5. Selma: What We Talk About Has Also To Do With The Children
6. Who Will Carry The Freedom Struggle Forward?
Notes
IndexAdditional Info
Half a century after some of its most important moments, the assessment of the Civil Rights Era continues. In this exciting volume, Dr. Rufus Burrow turns his attention to a less investigated but critically important byway in this powerful story-the role of children and young people in the Civil Rights Movement.What role did young people play, and how did they support the efforts of their elders? What did they see-and what did they do?-that their elders were unable to envision? How did children play their part in the liberation of their people?
In this project, Burrow reveals the surprising power of youth to change the world.
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Liberating Black Church History
$20.99Add to cart“No serious scholar in biblical studies today can introduce students to his or her field without taking into account the contributions of African American scholarship. The long traditions of biblical interpretation in the black church, and the innovative research and writing performed by African-American scholars in recent years are now essential components of a critical study of the Bible.
Yet up to now, knowing how best to introduce the fruits of African American biblical scholarship to students, particularly those in the survey class, has been difficult. Good resources exist, yet too often they were not written with the needs of introductory students in mind. This book meets that need by providing an overview of the most important developments in African American approaches to biblical scholarship. Written with the needs of beginning students in mind, it will offer insight into the particular ways that African American scholarship has shaped the world of biblical study.”
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Help It Still Hurts
$23.99Add to cartWhen the relationship between the pastor and the congregation is good, the hope of the congregation is that the pastor never leaves from serving the church. The reality of the Scripture and life reveals that serving a church forever is not possible. Transition is an inevitable phenomenon.
Cynthia Hinson Graham remembers being sad as a child when her pastor did not return to church after his illness. She recalls, “The church never came together as a family to talk about what happened or how they felt.” Forty years later, the senior pastor at her church announced his retirement, but offered no guidance “for the church family to come together and process their reactions or responses to the impending transition.”
In this study, Hinson Graham examines how a congregation deals spiritually and emotionally with the loss of its long-time pastor, as well as how the exiting pastor should prepare for his or her departure. She focuses on five independent African-American churches, which are significant because they were led by a single senior pastor, rather than by a board of governance or denominational order.
During her research, Hinson Graham explored the answers to four core questions: What were the spiritual and emotional responses to the transition of a long-term pastor? How were congregants able to express these feelings? What mindsets were most common when faced with the transition? And what, if any, processes were followed to ease the transition for the church body?
The author acknowledges the logical concern with the reasons for the current pastor’s departure and the uncertainty concerning the incoming pastor, but these are before and after issues. The emotional and spiritual well-being of church members during the transition, however, is of concern here. In a clear and approachable voice, Hinson Graham cites extensive biblical precedents for managing such matters.
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Birmingham Revolution : Martin Luther King Jrs Epic Challenge To The Church
$16.99Add to cartFrom time to time prophetic Christian voices rise to challenge our nations “original sin.” In the twentieth century, compelled by the Spirit of God and a yearning for freedom, the African American church took the lead in heralding the effort. Like almost no other movement before or since, Christian people gave force to a social mission. And, remarkably, they did it largely through nonviolent actions. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.s words and historic efforts as the Moses of this civil rights movement stand out as perhaps the most significant instance of a modern Christian leader acting in a prophetic role to instigate political change. In many ways “The Letter from Birmingham Jail” stands at the center of that movement. In this book African American journalist Edward Gilbreath explores the place of that letter in the life and work of Dr. King. Birmingham Revolution is not simply a work of historical reflection. Gilbreath encourages us to reflect on the relevance of King’s work for the church and culture of our day. Whether its in debates about immigration, economic redistribution or presidential birth certificates, race continues to play a role in shaping society. What part will the church play in the ongoing struggle?
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Israels Poetry Of Resistance
$32.00Add to cartNoting that Israel’s earliest responses to earth-shaking changes were cast in the powerfully expressive language of poetry, Hugh R. Page Jr. argues that the careful collection and preservation of these traditions-now found in every part of the Hebrew Bible-was an act of resistance, a communal no to the forces of despair and a yes to the creative power of the Spirit.
Further, Page argues, the power of these poems to craft and shape a future for a people who had suffered acute displacement and marginalization offers a rich spiritual repertoire for Africana peoples today, and for all who find themselves perennially outside the social or political mainstream. Here Page offers fresh translations and brief commentary on the Bible’s fifteen earliest poems, and explores the power and relevance of these poems, and the ancient mythic themes behind them, for contemporary life at the margins. -
African American Church
$14.99Add to cartIn the pages of this book, Rev. Leonidas A. Johnson eloquently shares how God’s missionary call, like an aromatic stew, has been simmering within the African American church. According to him, “The African American church will play a critical role in spreading the gospel message to people groups living in areas of the world that represent the last strongholds and citadels of satanic power attempting to stop God’s Mission.”
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Postcolonializing God : An African Practical Theology
$40.00Add to cartPostcolonializing God examines how African Christianity especially as a practical spirituality can be truly a postcolonial reality. The book offers thoughts as to how African Christians and by that token others who were colonial subjects, may practice a spirituality that bears the hallmarks of their authentic cultural heritage, even if that makes them distinctly different from Christians from the colonizing nations.
There are themes in both the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Scriptures in which God’s activities result in shattering hegemony, overthrowing the powerful, diversifying communities and affirming pluralism. These have by and large been ignored or downplayed in the formation of Christian communities by western and westernized Christians in Africa. The effect of this is that much of the practice of African Christians imitates that of a European Christianity of bygone times.
Postcolonializing God charts a different course uplifting these ignored readings of scripture and identifying how they are expressed again by Africans who courageously seek through the practices of mysticism and African culture to portray a God whose actions liberate and diversify human experience.
Postcolonializing God seeks to express the human diversity that seems to be the Creator’s ongoing desire for the world and thereby to continue to manifest the manifold and diverse nature and wisdom of God. It is only as humans refuse to be created in the image of any other human beings, that the richness and complexity of the divine image will be more closely viewed throughout the world.
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Cut Dead But Still Alive
$24.99Add to cartTo cut dead means to refuse to acknowledge another with the intent to punish. Gregory Ellison says that this is the plight of African American young men. They are stigmatized with limited opportunity for education and disproportionate incarceration. At the same time, they are often resistant to help from social institutions including the church. They are mute and invisible to society but also in their inward being. Their voice and physical selves are not acknowledged, leaving them ripe for hopelessness and volatility. So if the need is so great yet the desire for help wanes, where is the remedy?
Healing can begin by reframing the problem. While to cut dead is destructive, it also refers to pruning and repotting a disfigured plant-giving it new possibilities for life. In this provocative book, Ellison shows how caregivers can sow seeds of life, nurturing the neophyte with guidance, admonition, training, and support in order to become a community of reliable others, serving as an extended family.
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Embodied Spirits : Stories Of Spiritual Directors Of Color
$20.95Add to cart* A solid new addition to the Morehouse collection for spiritual directors
* First book addressing the concerns and issues of people of color in spiritual direction
* Wide ecumenical appeal
“These essays speak of how we have incorporated our contemplative practices into our family life; our urban, non-religious background; how we have been nurtured in struggles for health and life through our contemplative prayer practices and our courage to survive and even thrive in the midst of dire circumstances. We speak of the unfolding bridge between faith and culture; our conflicts with an Interspiritual journey with a Christian foundation; our sexuality; our journey to healing and authenticity; and how we are taking this practice that began in the first centuries of the church with the desert mothers and fathers to the present and into the future with spiritual direction through the Internet across the world.” -from the Introduction -
Raise Him Up
$22.99Add to cartThere is no greater hope for single mothers than to watch their sons succeed, and African-American single mothers face more adversity than most. Raise Him Up delves into the challenges faced by African-American single moms and offers advice, scriptural support, and helpful prayers. Each chapter relates a spiritual point taken from the book of Acts, a mother’s story, and draws parallels to the struggles of the modern day African-American mother. Chapters also offer stories of African-American athletes who were raised by single moms, and against all odds, succeeded.
Moms will learn to give encouragement, push their boys to try new things, and keep them out of trouble. Raise Him Up is essential reading for single African-American moms who want nothing more than to see their sons grow into happy, successful men.
Features include:
Helpful tips and tools for raising successful men
Hopeful stories of success in the face of adversity
Scripture from the book of Acts -
Black Theology
$44.99Add to cartThe SCM Core Text Black Theology is an accessible introduction to the teaching and learning of Black theology in Higher Education and theological educational training establishments.aaThis text aims to sensitize readers to the inherited legacy of race, ethnicity, difference and racism, which has exerted a profound influence upon the lives of all people since the Enlightenment.aaThe book shows the diversity and vibrancy of Black Theology as an international movement that emerged not in the context of the academe but from the lived experiences of Black people and yet has gained recognition as an academic discipline.
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African American Experience In World Mission (Revised)
$17.99Add to cartVenture into the world of overseas missions from an African-American perspective. This collection of articles takes you deep into the history of missions in the African-American community. You will learn of the struggles to stay connected to the world of missions in spite of great obstacles. You will read of unique cultural experiences while traveling abroad. You will feel the heart for fulfilling the Great Commission both in the African-American community and beyond. All text remains the same in this revised edition, with the exception of new study guide questions at the close of each chapter. The questions can be used to help facilitate discussions in Sunday School, Bible study, seminary classes, conference workshops and other group or individual studies.
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We Have Been Believers (Expanded)
$29.00Add to cartSeeking to overcome the chasm between church practice and theological reflection, James H. Evans Jr., a major and distinctive voice in American religion, situates theology squarely in the nexus of faith with freedom. There, with a sure touch, he uplifts revelatory aspects of black religious experience that reanimate classical areas of theology, and he creates a theology with a heart, soul, and voice that speak directly to our condition. Edited and introduced by Stephen G. Ray Jr., the second edition, published on the twentieth anniversary of the first, includes three new essays that identify the value of the book for womanist, evangelical, and black church audiences. The new edition concludes with an Afterword by the author himself.
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Womanist Theological Ethics
$45.00Add to cartWriting across theological disciplines, nine African American women scholars reflect on what it means to live as responsible doers of justice. With some classic essays and some contributions published here for the first time, each chapter in this new volume in the Library of Theological Ethics series presents analytical strategies for understanding the story of womanist scholarship in the service of the black community.
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African Memory Of Mark
$35.99Add to cartPreface: Not For Africans Alone
Part 1: The African Memory Of St. Mark
Part 2: The Identity Of The Biblical Mark Viewed From African Tradition
Part 3: Mark In Africa
Part 4: Mark In The Historical Record
Part 5: The Ubiquity Of Mark
ConclusionAdditional Info
We often regard the author of the Gospel of Mark as an obscure figure about whom we know little. Many would be surprised to learn how much fuller a picture of Mark exists within widespread African tradition, tradition that holds that Mark himself was from North Africa, that he founded the church in Alexandria, that he was an eyewitness to the Last Supper and Pentecost, that he was related not only to Barnabas but to Peter as well and accompanied him on many of his travels.In this provocative reassessment of early church tradition, Thomas C. Oden begins with the palette of New Testament evidence and adds to it the range of colors from traditional African sources, including synaxaries (compilations of short biographies of saints to be read on feast days), archaeological sites, non-Western historical documents and ancient churches.
The result is a fresh and illuminating portrait of Mark, one that is deeply rooted in African memory and seldom viewed appreciatively in the West.
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Black Fire : One Hundred Years Of African American Pentecostalism
$40.99Add to cartWhether you come from an African American Pentecostal background or you just want to learn more, this book will unfold all the demensions of this important denomination’s history and contribution to the life of the church.
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Singing The Lords Song In A Strange Land
$18.99Add to cartFrom the earliest meetings of the Civil Rights Movement to offering the benediction for the first African American President of the United States, Rev. Dr. Joseph Lowery has been an eyewitness to some of the most significant events in our history. But, more important, he has been a voice that speaks truth to power–inspiring change that moves us forward. In Singing the Lord’s Song in a Strange Land, you will find Dr. Lowery’s most enduring speeches and messages from the past fifty years including Coretta Scott King’s funeral and the benediction given at President Obama’s inauguration. This book, however, is not simply a collection of words. It is the heart of a movement and a call to a new generation to carry the mantle–for all people.
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Black United Methodists
$27.99Add to cartFor those desiring to read a concise but accurate historical outline of African Americans in The United Methodist Church, this is the book. For those desiring tidbits of data not included in typical history books, commingled with insertions of American history, this book will serves as a rich resource. – From the Foreword by Bishop Forrest C. Stith
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Courageous Compassion : A Prophetic Homiletic In Service To The Church
$19.99Add to cartA wonderfully intelligent, forceful book, bringing together masterful sermons by noted preacher Jerry Taylor and responses by world-renowned scholars.
Jerry Taylor’s preaching is characterized as a ”Compassionate Prophetic Voice” delivered in the traditional African American form: ”Start slow, stay low, rise higher, and end in fire.” His preaching is intelligent and wedded to the biblical text, effectively engaging listeners before exploding with persuasion.
COURAGEOUS COMPASSION provides examples of ten of Taylor’s best-crafted sermons, including ”The Curse of Babel,” ”They That Wait upon the Lord,” ”Alive to God,” and ”Courageous Compassion.” Respected theorists, biblical scholars, and denominational leaders have responded to each sermon, providing analysis, homiletic insight, reflections from the tradition of Black preaching, and comments on what Taylor is ”doing right.”
This volume accents the work of one homiletic practitioner whose work demands careful reflection and wide distribution. Its lively writing style, and its use of concrete images and examples to connect serious reflections with Taylor’s sermons, also serves as an example of how listeners and readers can interact with such rich preaching.
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Quest For A Black Theology
$15.00Add to cartThe late 1960s witnessed tumult over the Vietnam War, the deaths of Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr., rioting by African Americans in major U.S. cities, and the rise of the Black Power Movement. At the same time there emerged, even amid serious controversy in the black churches, black liberation theology and its radical critique not only of white power structures but of historic Christianity itself. This classic volume, a gathering of essays from a pivotal conference of black churchmen, ethicists, and theologians at Georgetown University in 1969, reflects the urgency, contention, and energy of that time. Debating black consciousness, pride, power, and liberation in relation to Christianity, the chapters of this volume speak of and to the pain and possibility experienced by African Americans at the time, as well as to the deep divisions-and deep faith-within the black churches of the day.
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Long Time Coming
$16.99Add to cartFaithful Christian Deidre Clark-Morris is a professional career-minded woman with a loving husband, but no children. Kenisha Smalls has lived in poverty all her life. She has three children by three different men and has just been diagnosed with inoperable cervical cancer. While the meeting between these two women appears accidental, it becomes their catalyst of hope. Neither woman expects the blessing that God has in store for them. While Deidre guides Kenisha on the path to eternal life with Jesus Christ, Kenisha teaches Deidre how to stand strong against the hard knocks of life.
Kenisha and Deidre come to terms with the bleakness of their situations while still climbing that high mountain of faith and hope. Long Time Coming presents readers with the question: What would you do when there is nothing left to do? Can you still trust God even when faced with infertility and the impending demise of a loved one? It is a story of hope and inspiration that will leave readers profoundly touched.
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How Africa Shaped The Christian Mind
$25.99Add to cartIntroduction
Toward A Half Billion African Christians
An Epic Story
Out Of Africa
The Pivotal Place Of Africa On The Ancient Map
Two Rivers: The Nile And The Medjerda–Seedbed Of Early Christian Thought
Affirming Oral And Written Traditions
Self-Effacement And The Recovery Of Dignity
The Missing Link: The Early African Written Intellectual Tradition Forgotten
Why Africa Has Seemed To The West To Lack Intellectual History
InterludePart One: The African Seedbed Of Western Christianity
1 A Forgotten Story
Who Can Tell It?
Pilgrimage Sites Neglected
Under Sands: The Burial Of Ancient Christian Texts And Basilicas
2 Seven Ways Africa Shaped The Christian Mind
How The Western Idea Of A University Was Born In The Crucible Of Africa
How Christian Exegesis Of Scripture First Matured In Africa
How African Sources Shaped Early Christian Dogma
How Early Ecumenical Decision Making Followed African Conciliar Patterns
How The African Desert Gave Birth To Worldwide Monasticism
How Christian Neoplatonism Emerged In Africa
How Rhetorical And Dialectical Skills Were Refined In Africa And Introduced To Europe
Interlude: Harnack?s Folly
Overview
3 Defining Africa
Establishing The Indigenous Depth Of Early African Christianity
The Stereotyping Of Hellenism As Non-African
Scientific Inquiry Into The Ethnicity Of Early African Christian Writers
The Purveyors Of Myopia
The African-Priority Hypothesis Requires Textual Demonstration
The South-to-North Hypothesis
A Case In Point: The Circuitous Path From Africa To Ireland To Europe And Then Back To Africa
A Caveat Against Afrocentric Exaggeration
4 One Faith, Two Africas
The Hazards Of Bridge Building
The Challenge Of Reconciliation Of Black Africa And North Africa
Overcoming The Ingrained Lack Of Awareness
The Roots Of The Term Africa
Excommunicating The North
Arguing For African Unity
Defining “Early African Christianity” As A Descriptive Category Of A Period Of History
How African Is The Nile Valley?
5 Temptations
The Emerging Task Of Historical Inquiry
The Catholic Limits Of Afrocentrism
The Inflexible Habit Of Ignoring African Sources
The Cost Of The Forgetfulness
Overlooking African Voices Already Present In Scripture
How Protestants Can Celebrate The Apostolic Charisma Of The Copts
The Christian Ancestry Of AfricaPart Two: African Orthodox Recovery
6 The Opportunity For Retrieval
Surviving Modernity
The Steadiness Of African Orthodoxy
The New AfricanAdditional Info
Africa has played a decisive role in the formation of Christian culture from its infancy. Some of the most decisive intellectual achievements of Christianity were explored and understood in Africa before they were in Europe. If this is so, why is Christianity so often perceived in Africa as a Western colonial import? How can Christians in Northern and sub-Saharan Africa, indeed how can Christians throughout the world, rediscover and learn from this ancient heritage? Theologian Thomas C. Oden offers a portrait that challenges prevailing notions of the intellectual development of Christianity from its early roots to its modern expressions. The pattern, he suggests, is not from north to south from Europe to Africa, but the other way around. He then makes an impassioned plea to uncover the hard data and study in depth the vital role that early African Christians played in developing the modern university, maturing Christian exegesis of Scripture, shaping early Christian dogma, modeling conciliar patterns of ecumenical decision-making, stimulating early monasticism, developing Neoplatonism, and refining rhetorical and dialectical skills. He calls for a wide-ranging research project to fill out the picture he sketches. It will require, he says, a generation of disciplined investigation, combining intensive language study with a risk-taking commitment to uncover the truth in potentially unreceptive environments. Oden envisions a dedicated consortium of scholars linked by computer technology and a common commitment that will seek to shape not only the scholar’s understanding but the ordinary African Christian’s self-perception. -
1 Mans Thougths
$13.49Add to cartHave you ever wondered what happened to the African American society, why are we so different from long ago and then again why haven’t we changed.
One Man’s Thoughts is a thought provoking piece that reflect the thoughts of one Black man whose words of inspiration and encouragement may very well be just what the African American society needs to read.
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Guide To Spiritual And Economic Empowerment
$14.99Add to cartThis project is the result of a study on economic and spiritual empowerment in the black church. This topic began with a focus group in the Doctor of Ministry program at United Theological Seminary, led by mentors Drs. Lewis V. Baldwin and Victor Anderson. One of the major hindrances to the economic empowerment of the black church and community is economic management.
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Liberating Black Theology
$19.99Add to cartWhen the beliefs of Barack Obama’s former pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, assumed the spotlight during the 2008 presidential campaign, the influence of black liberation theology became hotly debated not just within theological circles but across cultural lines. How many of today’s African-American congregations-and how many Americans in general-have been shaped by its view of blacks as perpetual victims of white oppression?
In this interdisciplinary, biblical critique of the black experience in America, Anthony Bradley introduces audiences to black liberation theology and its spiritual and social impact. He starts with James Cone’s proposition that the “victim” mind-set is inherent within black consciousness. Bradley then explores how such biblical misinterpretation has historically hindered black churches in addressing the diverse issues of their communities and prevented adherents from experiencing the freedoms of the gospel. Yet Liberating Black Theology does more than consider the ramifications of this belief system; it suggests an alternate approach to the black experience that can truly liberate all Christ-followers.
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Moving The Rock
$59.00Add to cartPreface
Introduction: A Short HistoryPart I. Morning Sun Missionary Baptist Church
Chapter 1. Morning Sun Church And Its Leaders
Chapter 2. The Family
Chapter 3. MotherhoodPart II. The Women Of Morning Sun Church
Chapter 4. Molly Lake Lander: “I Guess I Have To Go To Jesus”
Chapter 5. Caren Lake: “Having A Dream”
Chapter 6. Mahalia Lake: “I Don’t Ask The Lord To Move The Mountain, Just Give Me The Strength To Climb It”
Chapter 7. Mable Jackson: “All I Asked The Lord For Was A Man With A Cigarette And A Job”
Chapter 8. Betty Jones: “I Like To Go!”
Chapter 9. Joann Jones Newton: “When God Comes, He’s Getting Some Of Every Race”
Chapter 10. Marie Jones Smith: “Getting That Made-Up Mind”
Chapter 11. Linda Wilson, Marie’s Daughter: “All These Years I Have Become Stronger”Part III. The Research Process
Chapter 12. The Research, The Women, And MeAppendix: The Research Questions, Theories, And Methods
Additional Info
Moving the Rock portrays several generations of African American women whose families migrated from the South to the Pacific Northwest in the 1940s and 1950s. As members of a small storefront church in central Seattle, these women-grandmothers, mothers, daughters-lean on their faith and church to face the challenges of poverty, racism, ignorance, and health. In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, it is painfully obvious that many of us know little about what it is like to be poor and Black in the United States. These powerful, profound stories bring this group of women and their problems (and joys) vividly and movingly to life. -
More Power In The Pulpit
$28.00Add to cartIn this companion and sequel to the best-selling Power in the Pulpit (Westminster John Knox, 2002), which has sold over 11,000 copies, more of Americas best-known and most influential African American preachers describe how they prepare their sermons. Each preacher also presents a sermon that highlights his or her particular method of sermon preparation.
Contributors to this volume include: Willette Alyce Burgie-Bryant, William S. Epps, C. E. McLain, Otis Moss Jr., Otis Moss III, Veronica R. Goines, Cynthia L. Hale, Melvin V. Wade Sr., Raquel A. St. Clair, and Walter S. Thomas Sr.
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Moral State Of Black America
$14.99Add to cartAdvantage Inspirational Title
Our community can be restored spiritually and naturally through an unhindered work of the powerful Holy Spirit. We must remove the stumbling blocks that inhibit our calling others to the faith and our growth within the Kingdom.
May the reader be moved to heed the call to show the world yet another great work by Christ Jesus, as intractable problems get solved and many who doubted the power will find it irresistible. We can only look upward for our salvation now, tomorrow and forevermore.
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Reconciliation Blues : A Black Evangelicals Inside View Of White Christiani
$18.99Add to cartJournalist Edward Gilbreath gives an insightful, honest picture of both the history and the present state of racial reconciliation in evangelical churches. He looks at a wide range of figures, such as Howard O. Jones, Tom Skinner, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Jesse Jackson and John Perkins.
Charting progress as well as setbacks, his words offer encouragement for black evangelicals feeling alone, clarity for white evangelicals who want to understand more deeply, and fresh vision for all who want to move forward toward Christ’s prayer “that all of them may be one.”
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Experiencing The Truth
$22.50Add to cartCommunicates the need of a vibrant, experiential, Reformed Christianity among African-American and all believers.
The authors lay out the biblical basis for choosing and attending a church and demonstrate how the historic Reformed expression has been the most biblically accurate and experientially consistent expression of Christianity.
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Rise And Demise Of Black Theology
$44.99Add to cartBlack Theology emerged in the 1960s as a response to black consciousness. In South Africa, it is a critique of power; in the UK it is a political theology of black culture. The dominant form of Black Theology has been in the USA, originally influenced by Black Power and the critique of white racism. Since then, it claims to have broadened its perspective to include oppression on the grounds of race, gender and class. In this book, Alistair Kee contests this claim, arguing that Black and Womanist Theologies present inadequate analysis of race and gender and no account at all of class or economic oppression.With a few notable exceptions, Black Theology in the USA repeats the mantras of the 1970s, the discourse of modernity. Content with American capitalism, it fails to address the source of the impoverishment of black Americans at home. Content with a romantic image of Africa, this ‘African-American’ movement fails to defend contemporary Africa against predatory American global ambitions. Blacks in the West, Kee claims here,
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Heavenly Places : A Novel
$13.99Add to cartWhen Treva Langston loses her high-powered job and moves back to her home town, only God can help her start a new life in an all too familiar place!
“Walk Worthy Press books remind us that in every area of our lives He truly cares for us.”
T.D. JakesWalk Worthy Press introduces another compelling African American fiction novel following a long line of successful books including What a Sista Should Do by Tiffany Warren, Forgivin Ain’t Forgettin’ by Mata Elliot, and Church Folk by Michele Andrea Bowen.
Heavenly Places takes Treva Langston to her home town full of memories of heartache and uncertainty about what makes her worthy. To her husband, she is blind to the blessings of their young family; to her mother, her awkward homecoming is just another reason why she’ll never be a success. Unable to shake her fears, Treva feels nothing can save her….
Treva’s sister understands the trials that come with self-doubt. So with the help of her women’s prayer group, she invites Treva to ask God for what she can’t do alone. Despite herself, Treva rediscovers the gifts and the people she never took time to value. She finds that the promised Heavenly Places she’s always looked for have been in front of her all along.
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Creative Exchange : A Constructive Theology Of African American Religious E
$23.00Add to cartAt least until recently, most African Americans would know what is meant by “the black church” or by “African American religion.” But now, Victor Anderson argues, that tradition is undergoing radical change and harbors great ambiguities and unresolved dilemmas. Anderson’s new book seeks to provide a pragmatic but principled way forward for African American religion and life.
Anderson’s work is two-sided: on one hand, he seeks to deconstruct an older, monolithic idea of African American religion as the stereotypical “black church” experience with one relationship to the larger cultural scene. If that picture was ever accurate, it was always partial, he argues. Constructively, Anderson argues that African American religion experience “is fundamentally understood as relational, processive, open, fluid, and irreducible.” The tradition is actually an ongoing creative exchange that relates in many ways to its history, religious institutions, and faith communities. In that creative exchange, he argues, we find here and now instances or moments or events that actualize Martin Luther King’s notion of the “beloved community.” That image, and the flexibility and pragmatism it implies, best captures the legacy and future of African American religion. Anderson offers it here not just as a nostalgic image but also as an ongoing regulative ideal for African American life and religion.
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Loving Home : Spirituality Sexuality And Healing Black Life
$16.00Add to cart“When one journeys to Ghana, one is confronted with the origins of the European-driven slave industry, symbolized by the dungeons of Elmina and Cape Coast…. Each time I have made the pilgrimage to these dungeons … what came to me as tears ran down my face was the realization that this is probably where the difficulties in our collective relational history between African American women and men began. What stands between us? Lee Butler sends out a clarion call for us to come home. He sees our African understandings of God and humanity as foundational to our fully embracing who we are as an African (American) people – as the whole people of God.”
– The Rev. Dr. Marsha Foster Boyd, President of Ecumenical Theological Seminary, Detroit, Michigan“Dr. Lee Butler has written an important work that every minister engaged in Pastoral Care needs to read. He provides culturally specific tools, hints, suggestions, and resources for working with families using love as the guiding principle and the foundation upon which meaningful Pastoral Care is built. His book is a must read for any and everyone in ministry who is serious about working with families from a position of cultural strengths and not from the usual ‘deficit’ model that has crippled so many African American families. I highly endorse his work, his scholarship, his insights, his sensitivity, his experience, and his expertise as a minister of the Gospel whose integrity is awesome.”
– The Rev. Dr. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., Senior Pastor, Trinity United Church of Christ, Chicago, Illinois. -
African American Christian Worship (Expanded)
$20.99Add to cartCosten again delights readers with a lively history and theology of the African American worship experience.
An update of the 1993 classic, with an expanded discussion of ritual practices in African communities and clarification of the ritual use of music in worship. -
Religious Education In The African American Tradition
$27.99Add to cartThis book is a comprehensive survey of African American Christian Religious Education (AACRE). It addresses historical, theological, and ministerial issues. The book defines concepts and explores history, considers the diverse voices that are addressing AACRE, and then focuses on educational theory and practice. Religious Education in the African American Tradition considers a diversity of voices, including those in evangelical, Pentecostal, liberation, and womanist theologians.
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Faithful Preacher : Recapturing The Vision Of Three Pioneering African Amer
$18.99Add to cartThe cliche is that those who do not learn from the mistakes of the past are doomed to repeat them. But Thabiti Anyabwile contends that it is not the mistakes we must study; it is the people who have overcome them. So he presents three of the most influential African-American pastors in American history who can teach us what faithful ministry entails.
Lemuel Haynes (1753-1833) reminds pastors that eternity must shape our ministry. Daniel A. Payne (1811-1893) stresses the importance of character and preparation to faithful shepherding. And Francis J. Grimke (1850-1937) provides a vision for engaging the world with the gospel. While they are from the African-American tradition, they, like all true saints, belong to all Christians of every background and era. Distinctive for its use of rare and out-of-print messages, Anaybwile’s work is valuable as a reference as well as a devotional resource.
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Africana Worship Book Year A
$27.00Add to cartWhat is worship? For the Africana community, worship is the time or place where God “shows up and shows out,” affirming that an active God embodies human lives through companionship and communion. This type of worship allows God to enter into worshipper’s lives with an openness to respond with swaying of the body, tapping feet, weeping eyes, and heartfelt emotion.
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Liberating Our Dignity Saving Our Souls
$27.99Add to cartIn Lee Butlers own words, “This book is an attempt to answer the question, Who are we as African Americans?’ Attempting to answer this question is one way we participate in the works of salvation.
Liberating Our Dignity, Saving Our Souls is a study of African American identity aimed at pointing a way out of a current crisis into a new liberation and salvation. Butler combines insights and methodologies from developmental psychology, liberation theology, and African and African American history to plot a new course for contemporary African Americans to gain a sense of identity that will guide them away from the identity the European and American cultures have traditionally forced upon them. This involves determining identity by personal worth, not by occupation, economic class, or social class.
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Disruptive Christian Ethics
$40.00Add to cartBringing to the fore the difficult realities of racism and the sexual violation of women, Traci West argues for a liberative method of Christian social ethics in which the discussion begins not with generic philosophical concepts but in the concrete realities of the lives of the socially and economically marginalized. She writes, “The idea that we’ve ‘moved beyond’ our society’s need for concretely identifying these concerns is a costly lie.”
Presenting conscience-jarring stories of individual women’s experience and endurance of prejudice, violation, and subjugation, West demonstrates how racism can impact key ideas in Christian ethics, influence government policy on welfare, infect public practice, and invade worship. Concluding with hope-filled testimonies of black women ministers and activists confronting heterosexism in their communities, Disruptive Christian Ethics is a virtual toolkit for how to “do” ethics. It enables readers to hone their skills at recognizing racial subjugation and demonstrates how to make the transformation of unjust, marginalizing conditions for women a key criterion for evaluating society’s health.
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Curse Of Ham Satans Vicious Cycle
$13.49Add to cartWhether we ask them aloud or silently, there are those silent questions that have been asked and unanswered from generation to generation. Why is the black race always seen as the subservient race to all other races? We have been emancipated, highly educated, and applauded for our talents. Yet there is still a silent force that continues to push us back and remind us that we belong in our place. Can we ever supersede this? Questions like these and many more are answered in this intriguing book.
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Soul Stories : African American Christian Education (Revised)
$23.99Add to cartStories take on a fresh cross-generational orientation with emphasis on linking stories of family identities, events, relationships, and story plot with Bible stories and exemplary Christian faith stories in the African Diaspora.
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Being Human : Race Culture And Religion
$29.00Add to cartIntroduction: Who Are We?
1.Contemporary Models Of Theological Anthropology
2.Culture: Labor, Aesthetic, And Spirit
3.Selves And The Self: I Am Because We Are
4.Race: Nature And Nurture
5.Conclusion As IntroductionAdditional Info
Dwight Hopkins, whose important work in Black Theology has mediated class theological concerns through the prism of African American culture, here offers a fresh take on theological anthropology. Rather than defined “the human” as one eternal or inviolable essence, however, Hopkins looks to the multiple and conflicting notions of the human in contemporary thought, and particularly three key variables: culture, self, and race. Hopkins’ critical reframing of these concepts firmly locates human endeavor, development, transcendence, and liberation in the particular messiness of struggle and strife. -
Black Pearls For Parents
$13.95Add to cartEric V. Copage’s Black Perls became an instant best-seller and was the winner of the Blackboard African-American Bestsellers award for best nonfiction book of 1994. Now he has created a book of inspirational thoughts, practical advice, and pearls of wisdom specifically for African-American parents. The 365 quotes that begin each day’s entry range from African proverbs to wisdom and insight from Ida B. Wells, Martin Luther King, Jr., Maya Angelou, Oprah Winfrey, Willie Mays, Marva Collins, and Marian Wright Edelman, among hundreds of other diverse and accomplished people of African descent.
Each day’s entry covers a topic that affects parents (and their children)-including Role Models, Friends, Procrastination, Affection, Priorities, Independence, Stress, Faith and hundreds more. From the daily inspirations, author Eric V. Copage suggests meditations and specific actions that will provide guidance, comfort, and inspiration to African-American parents as they deal with the pressures and joys of raising children in today’s world.
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Showing Mary : How Women Can Share Prayers Wisdom And The Blessings Of God
$19.99Add to cartThe story of a young pregnant Virgin Mary visiting her older pregnant cousin Elizabeth, told in Luke 1:39-56, is one of the most profound examples in the Bible of an empowered mentoring relationship between women. Drawing upon the Hail Mary and The Magnificat prayers, SHOWING MARY retells this touching story, revealing how both mentor and protege use their respective gifts and energies to support each other. This relationship is then applied to modern life, emphasizing the importance of women mentoring women, nurturing each other’s dreams, sharing wisdom and experiences, and building networks of mutually rewarding friendships between older and younger women.
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Through The Valley Of The Shadow Of Death
$15.99Add to cartThis book is not only about the brutal civil war in the West African Republic of Liberia, it is especially about how the Church in Liberia became involved in the peace process at a tremendous cost. This is a true story of what Christians can do in times of conflict, and of one minister whose faith and courage helped him survive as he made his way out of Liberia’s capital, Monrovia, and traveled through the “valley of the shadow of death.”
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Liberation And Reconciliation (Expanded)
$28.00Add to cartAn expansion of the 1971 classic text, this second edition of Liberation and Reconciliation argues for a balance between the quest for liberation and the need for reconciliation in black-white relations. Written by one of the pioneers of Black Theology, it examines biblical and theological themes from the perspective of Black experience and concludes that nonviolent reconciliation is the best response to racial oppression.
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Quest For Liberation And Reconciliation
$40.00Add to cartLeading contemporary theologians and scholars present essays on the themes of liberation and reconciliation in tribute to J. Deotis Roberts. The essays are divided into the following sections: Theological Reflection, Faith in Dialogue, and Shaping the Practice of Ministry. The compilation presents an interesting array of perspectives on the ways in which Christian theology, ethics, and ministry are involved in the quests for liberation and reconciliation in North America and the rest of the world.
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This Is My Story
$28.00Add to cartAfrican American women continue to confess their call to ministry even when they know such a confession may cause them to face criticism and even ostracism from many of the same men and women who nurtured them in the faith. In This Is My Story, thirteen successful African American women clergy tell the powerful, inspirational, and sometimes heartbreaking stories of their calls and ministerial journeys, which they experienced in the midst of anguish, uncertainty, and in many cases unfriendly leadership environments. Each of the women includes a sermon of particular importance to her.
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Heaven Sent
$21.99Add to cartAndrew Turner seems like your average small-town teenager. He struggles with his grades; he helps his mother make ends meet; he longs for the prettiest girl in school to see him as more than a friend. But when his mother succumbs to a mysterious disease, this quiet teen discovers his life–and his family–are anything but ordinary.
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Black Political Theology
$45.00Add to cartHow do black political needs and goals relate to black religious experience? What is the meaning of religion–and of Christ–in a racist society? In this classic early articulation of black theology, first published in 1974, J. Deotis Roberts argues that reconciliation is the essence of the good news, but it must be in conjunction with liberation. Ethnicity and theology, he contends, must meet in the specific black religious experience by recognizing the liberal, activist, and even revolutionary role of Christ in the cause of freedom. Discussing human nature and destiny in the black perspective, the nature of the gospel, and the black experience of community, Roberts presents the place of the black church as the main institution poised to implement the liberation of whole persons and a whole people.
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Daughters Of Imani Bible Studies (Student/Study Guide)
$9.99Add to cartDaughters of Imani: Christian Rites of Passage for African American Young Women by Rev. Richelle White, the creator of a comprehensive mentoring program for African American girls ages 8-18 that ran for nine years at a prominent African American church. This Planning Guide will provide step-by-step guidelines for setting up a mentoring and rites of passage program for your church. The curriculum in the Planning Guide will help you bolster self-esteem; encourage peer, family, and community interactions; explore career development; and address topics that impact the survival of the 21st century African American female. Eight multiple-session Bible lessons that focus on life concerns and feature female biblical characters are also available in Daughters of Imani Bible Study for Young Women by Rev. Richelle White and Rev. Tamara Lewis. Additionally, Daughters of Imani: Celebration of Women by Rev. Tamara Lewis lifts up the lives and contributions of eighteen historical and contemporary women. This complete package will give you everything you need to build up the faith of your church’s young women!
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Can I Get A Witness
$32.00Add to cartBlount contends that Revelation is essentially a story of suffering and struggle amidst oppressive assimilation. He examines the image of the lamb as a model for witness and shows how Revelation’s hymns can be glimpsed as coded calls to champion God’s cause and the cause of transformative liberation.
In this accessible and provocative study, Brian Blount reads the book of Revelation through the lens of African American culture, drawing correspondences between Revelation’s context and the long-standing suffering of African Americans. Applying the African American social, political, and religious experience as an interpretive cipher for the book’s complicated imagery, he contends that Revelation is essentially a story of suffering and struggle amid oppressive assimilation. He examines the language of “martyr” and the image of the lamb, and shows that the thread of resistance to oppressive power that runs through John’s hymns resonates with a parallel theme in the music of African America.
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Blow The Trumpet In Zion
$26.00Add to cart1.The Continuing Legacy Of Samuel DeWitt Proctor
2.The Sheep And The Goats: Black And Christian In A Global Context
3.From Vision To Action: Principles Of Organizing A Theologically Grounded And Vision-driven Church To Effectively Implement Ministries At The Local, National, And Global Levels
4.Piety And Liberation: A Historical Exploration Of African American Religion And Social Justice
5.Loving God With Our Heart, Soul, And Mind
6.Liberating The Ancient Utterances Of African People
7.The Prophetic Imperative: Reclaiming The Gospel By Speaking Truth To Power
8.Freeing The Captives: The Imperative Of Womanist Theology
9.The Biblical Basis For A Political Theology Of Liberation
10.And The Bible Says: Methodological Tyranny Of Biblical Fundamentalism And Historical Criticism
11.The Priestly Faithful And Prophetically Courageous
12.Running The Race For Future Generations: Can You Handle The Faith Without The Fulfillment?
13.Keep The Pressure On: When You Are The Only One In The Watchtower
14.Communion: An Act Of Revolution And A Call To Solidarity
15.A Prophetic Witness In An Anti-prophetic Age
16.Born To Be A Witness
17.Just Load The Wagon
18.Black Church Leadership In The Age Of AIDS: What Must We Do To Be Saved?
19.At The Table: The Next Generation
20.The Black Church In The Age Of False ProphetsAdditional Info
This volume’s contributors – dynamic and progressive African American church leaders – advocate the prophetic powers of black theology, preaching, and evangelism in support of community and economic development, ministerial and lay leadership, and enhancement of church life.Among the writers are Charles G. Adams, Randall C. Bailey, James H. Cone, James A. Forbes, Jacquelyn Grant, Obery Hendricks, Asa G. Hilliard, Dwight N. Hopkins, Cecil Murray, and Gayraud Wilmore. All were presenters in 2004 at the first Samuel DeWitt Proctor Conference, established to reinvigorate the social justice agenda of America’s black churches.
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Black Church Beginnings
$25.99Add to cartAfrican American slaves (and freedmen) turned wholeheartedly to Christianity for their lifeblood’s sustenance, but how this occurred has always been something of a mystery. In exhaustively reviewing all that’s known about the period, Mitchell dispels a number of misconceptions.
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In Spirit And In Truth
$47.00Add to cartMelva Wilson Costen examines various genres of music used in African American worship and current practices and emerging trends in music ministry in African American churches. In addition, she explores the use of global songs by African American congregations and provides suggestions to worship planners for listening for the Holy Spirit as they prepare for worship.
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Jazz Of Preaching
$20.99Add to cartWhat if preachers were as contagiously joyful in their preaching as Louis Armstrong was in his playing and singing? As rich in their sermonic renderings as Sarah Vaughan was in her musical vocals? As honest about heartache as Billie Holiday was every time she sang about the blues of life? As alluringly clear as the angelic voice of Ella Fitzgerald? As tenaciously uninhibited in the action of creating as Duke Ellington?
Of course, this is too much to ask of people, even those called by God. However, it is not too much to ask this question: Can preaching be enhanced through the metaphor of jazz? Can an understanding of the inner dynamics of jazz–its particular forms, rules, and styles–inform one’s practice of preaching as well? Can jazz’s simultaneous structure and spontaneity help preachers better understand their own art? The answer to these questions, says Jones, is an unqualified yes. He explains how one can dramatically improve one’s preaching through understanding and applying key elements of the musical art form known as jazz. No musical background is necessary; all examples are well explained and tied in with preaching.
The key elements include innovation (what one commentator refers to as “the experimental disposition of jazz”), improvisation, rhythm, call and response, honesty about heartaches, and delight. After discussing the reality and role of each of these elements in jazz, and how they can be important for preaching as well, each chapter concludes with five exercises for applying the jazz element to preaching preparation and performance.
Drawing on a deep love of jazz and enlivening the discussion with insights drawn from the realities of African American preaching, Jones introduces readers to rich and rewarding possibilities for constructing and delivering the sermon.
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End To This Strife
$19.00Add to cartWilliams’s important work argues that taking the New Testament and particularly Galatians 3:28 seriously should lead black churches to challenge sexism and racism not only in society at large but also in African American churches and denominational bodies. By addressing oppressive practices in African American and other churches, they remain true to the liberation principle of the Bible the equality of all people before God which has been used effectively by black churches.
His argument unfolds first through looking at the biblical text, especially the figure of Jesus and his ministry and how he broke the social barriers of his day. It then shows how African American Christians have historically appropriated this lens and legacy in their own religious and social experience and explains how this vision pertains to the state of black women in the churches today.
Williams’s book will help all Christian churches reappropriate the biblical text and serve as a model for how the Bible can be responsibly employed in the churches and the public arena to promote equality for all people.
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Black Religious Experience
$37.99Add to cartBlack Religious Experience is an examination of the role Christian education has played in the African American community, as seen in the work of one of its greatest interpreters, Grant Shockley.
In 1903, W. E. B. DuBois coined the term “double consciousness” to refer to the fact that African Americans always view the world through two lenses. First, they see it from their own perspectives as members of an oppressed community, living out the consequences of a particular history. Second, they perceive life from the point of view of a dominant culture that seeks to impose on African Americans its own false understanding of their status and worth.
Christian educators working in the African American community have often drawn on this idea as they seek to apply the gospel to the spiritual formation of members of that community. The heart of the work of Grant Shockley, the preeminent African American religious educator of the twentieth century, was combating the negative attitudes and perspectives that the larger society would dictate to African Americans, while providing positive and powerful images of their self-worth drawn from the Christian story.
Charles R. Foster and Fred Smith, friends and colleagues of Shockley, seek in this book to interpret the significance of his work for Christian education, both in the African American community and beyond it, for the twenty-first century. They draw on personal encounters as well as Shockley’s written and published materials to indicate how this seminal thinker continues to speak to the need for faith formation in Christian congregations today.
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Its Not About You Its About God
$25.99Add to cartMaybe you have relied on your own strength for far too long. You haven’t been able to count on other people, so you just do your own thing. But God has bigger plans for you. God wants to use you to change the world. Rebecca Osaigbovo, conference speaker and author of Chosen Vessels, shows how black women can stand up to Satan’s lies and face tough problems, not in your own strength but by finding God’s strength in the midst of your weaknesses. She says this to women who want to be the keys to change in their homes, churches and communities: “If you want things to be different, then stop going your own way and follow God’s lead. Lean not on your own understanding, and he’ll make your paths straight.”
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New Global Missions
$25.99Add to cartEscobar has produced a highly readable introduction to Christian mission as well as a cogently presented biblical missiology in this important volume. Taking into account the new realities and challenges of globalization in this post-Christian and postmodern world, Escobar utilizes trinitarian theology in order to construct a holistic and relevant theology of mission. An informative and inspiring work, addressing our contemporary situation, yet calling us to participate in the global mission of the triune God.
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Living Stones In The Household Of God
$29.00Add to cartWith contributions from notable scholars such as James Cone, Rosemary Radford Ruether, Emilie Townes, D. Stephen Long, and Dwight Hopkins, this intriguing volume invites sustained reflection on the legacy and future of black theology. Given the new ecclesial, social, global, and interreligious contexts shaping and challenging black theology, the contributors respond with their own insights and visions into how black theology relates to black and white churches as well as to various ecumenical, ecological, and existential concerns. This important collection of essays functions as both a tribute and a challenge to black theology as it opens new vistas for African Americans persevering in faith.
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African American Religious Thought
$78.00Add to cartBelieving that African American Religious studies has reached a crossroads, Cornel West and Eddie Glaude seek, in this landmark anthology, to steer the discipline into the future. Arguing that the complexity of beliefs, choices, and actions of African Americans need not be reduced to expressions of black religion, West and Glaude call for more careful reflection on the complex relationships of African American religious studies to conceptions of class, gender, sexual orientation, race, empire, and other values that continue to challenge our democratic ideals.
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Weary Throats And New Songs
$31.99Add to cartExamines the rich heritage of African American women who have proclaimed–and still proclaim–God’s word. Against all odds, African American women have passionately proclaimed the goodness of God and lifted up Jesus’ name despite barriers of race, class, denomination, education and gender. In response to a sense of deliverance from evil and in gratitude for answered prayers, these women have related their faith and trust in God in sacred places such as ships, fields, homes, barns, factories, hospitals, schools, pulpits, missionary societies, and over kitchen sinks. Even when disenfranchised in the religious communities they helped create, African American women continue to “say a word” about God, whether they are ordained or not.
This book provides a brief review of the rich heritage of African American female proclaimers and examines contemporary African American women’s sermon preparation, content, delivery, and personhood. Brown draws heavily on interviews and conversations, as well as audio and video tapes of women proclaiming God’s word to relate how and why African American women tell others about God despite resistance (weary throats) and with the help of support (new songs) in religious and social communities. -
Mercy Mercy Me
$36.00Add to cartUnable to get over the death of his wife, psychotherapist Dwayne Gradison meets former actress and Christian Nina Jordan but finds he is unable to pursue his feelings for her, a situation that is tested by his subsequent relationship with a scandalous evangelistic performer.
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Cut Loose Your Stammering Tongue (Expanded)
$35.00Add to cartDrawing on slave narratives found in forty-one volumes of interviews and one hundred autobiographies by former slaves, these contributors explore how enslaved African Americans received the often oppressive faith of their masters but transformed it into a gospel of liberation. This classic work demonstrates how an authentic black theology of liberation today must listen to the divine spirit that once fed and continues to feed the black religious experience. This second edition includes three additional provocative essays.
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Contemporary African American Preaching
$34.99Add to cartL. Susan Bond reveals the full range and diversity of African American preaching in this exploration of African American homiletical theories. Portraying the many approaches that are empowering preaching in African American churches today, Bond shows how different theological perspectives produce different methods of sermon preparation and delivery, different strategies for selecting illustrative material, and even different ways of beginning and ending sermons. Her goal is not to lift up the “right way” to preach in the African American tradition, but to show the richness and nuance contained within this powerful cultural expression.
