What if you could ask God anything? What would you ask, and how would He answer? Chelsea Chambers is on her own. After a public split from her NFL superstar husband, Chelsea takes a bold step out of the limelight and behind the counter of the Higher Grounds Café, an old-fashioned coffee shop in dire need of reinvention. But when her courage, expert planning, and out-of-this-world cupcakes fail to pay the bills, this newly single mom finds herself desperate for help. Better yet, a miracle. Then a curious stranger lands on Chelsea’s doorstep, and with him, an even more curious string of events. Soon, customers are flocking to the Higher Grounds Café, and not just for the cupcakes and cappuccino. They’ve come for the internet connection to the divine. Now the café has become the go-to place for people in search of answers to life’s biggest questions. When a catastrophe strikes and her ex comes calling, Chelsea begins to wonder if the whole universe is conspiring against her quest to make it on her own. After a shocking discovery opens her eyes to the unseen world around her, Chelsea finds the courage to ask God a question of her own—and heaven answers in a most unexpected way. “Max Lucado’s remarkable gift of storytelling brings the pages to life in his novel Miracle at the Higher Grounds Café. This highly relatable story of working through heartache and standing firm on your faith is intertwined with a good dose of humor and overflowing with biblical truth. This message will stay with you long after you’ve read the last page.” —Lysa TerKeurst, New York Times bestselling author of The Best Yes and It’s Not Supposed to Be This Way “Step inside the Higher Grounds Café, a place brimming with whop, a heaping helping of comfort food, and a direct line to heaven. Where faith lives, all things are possible, for a family, a community, and one woman who wasn’t sure she had the courage to believe again.” —Lisa Wingate, New York Times bestselling author of Before We Were Yours “Now, here is the in-depth breakdown on why YOU will love it: First of all, Max Lucado is the best. Of course, angels, miracles and neighborhood cafés are also at the top of the list. Most of us love stories and according to statistics, 54% of us actually love coffee. So, there! Read Miracle at the Higher Grounds Café immediately. It’s a story by Max Lucado about an angel and the miracle performed for some folks (who drink coffee) in a cool neighborhood café. Can a book even get any better than this? I don’t think so.” —Andy Andrews, New York Times bestselling author of The Noticer and The Traveler’s Gift Full-length inspirational novel USA TODAY bestseller Includes discussion questions for book clubs

Coffee is the soma of the nineties, and Higher Grounds is your guidebook to the zeitgeist, whether it's truck-stop "Swedish gasoline" or a "half-double decaffeinated half-caf with a twist of lemon." Includes quotations, recipes, definitions, and a lexicon of essential coffeeisms.

In this beautiful book, Pulitzer Prize—winning musician and composer Wynton Marsalis draws upon lessons he’s learned from a lifetime in jazz–lessons that can help us all move to higher ground. With wit and candor he demystifies the music that is the birthright of every American and demonstrates how a real understanding of the central idea of jazz–the unique balance between self-expression and sacrifice for the common good exemplified on the bandstand–can enrich every aspect of our lives, from the bedroom to the boardroom, from the schoolroom to City Hall. Along the way, Marsalis helps us understand the life-changing message of the blues, reveals secrets about playing–and listening–and passes on wisdom he has gleaned from working with three generations of great musicians. Illuminating and inspiring, Moving to Higher Ground is a master class on jazz and life, conducted by a brilliant American artist.

Hurricane Katrina of August-September 2005, one of the most destructive natural disasters in U.S. history, dramatically illustrated the continuing racial and class inequalities of America. In this powerful reader, Seeking Higher Ground, prominent scholars and writers examine the racial impact of the disaster and the failure of governmental, corporate and private agencies to respond to the plight of the New Orleans black community. Contributing authors include Julianne Malveaux, Melissa Harris-Lacewell, Ronald Walters, Chester Hartman, Gregory D. Squires, Mindy Thompson Fullilove, Alan Stein, and Gene Preuss. This reader is the second volume of the Souls Critical Black Studies Series, edited by Manning Marable, and produced by the institute for Research in African-American Studies of Columbia University.

"Maybe you and I have been there where Jesus was. Abandoned by others at the very time we craved connection. Misunderstood in terms of wanting to be with others and not "just left alone" to get over it by ourselves. Maybe we've entered our own age of loneliness. Maybe we've felt as if we, too, were sweating blood while others were off taking it easy. Maybe we've had our own Gethsemane moments. And, then again, maybe we've been where Peter, James and John were. Tired. Sleepy. Oblivious to the cries of another person who we've interpreted as being "alone" instead of "lonely." Maybe you and I have also been the Church asleep at the switch during someone else's worst ever time of fear, loneliness, temptation. If so, there is hope. There is redemption available for our Gethsemanes in this world. Redemption for us when we are living in our own age of loneliness. And redemption from us when we are called to wake up and change our own response to others during their times of fear, loneliness, and temptation.""Redeeming Gethsemane relates real life experiences to scripture to overcome loneliness and challenges us to wake up and live out the Gospel. Dan Held skillfully weaves these experiences to make the scripture come alive in new ways. A great study book!" -- Donald L. Hayashi, past Associate General Secretary, General Council on Ministries of the United Methodist Church "Dan Held offers an antidote to loneliness: hope. Using Gethsemane, the stories of Scripture, and the words of Jesus, Held paints a portrait of renewal desperately needed today. As a bonus, discussion questions make the book ideal for group study. Gethsemane gives hope!" -- Thomas Jay Oord, author of The Uncontrolling Love of God and numerous other books

As the Vietnam War divided the nation, a network of antiwar coffeehouses appeared in the towns and cities outside American military bases. Owned and operated by civilian activists, GI coffeehouses served as off-base refuges for the growing number of active-duty soldiers resisting the war. In the first history of this network, David L. Parsons shows how antiwar GIs and civilians united to battle local authorities, vigilante groups, and the military establishment itself by building a dynamic peace movement within the armed forces. Peopled with lively characters and set in the tense environs of base towns around the country, this book complicates the often misunderstood relationship between the civilian antiwar movement, U.S. soldiers, and military officials during the Vietnam era. Using a broad set of primary and secondary sources, Parsons shows us a critical moment in the history of the Vietnam-era antiwar movement, when a chain of counterculture coffeehouses brought the war's turbulent politics directly to the American military's doorstep.

A powerful movement is happening in farming today—farmers are reconnecting with their roots to fight climate change. For one woman, that’s meant learning her tribe’s history to help bring back the buffalo. For another, it’s meant preserving forest purchased by her great-great-uncle, among the first wave of African Americans to buy land. Others are rejecting monoculture to grow corn, beans, and squash the way farmers in Mexico have done for centuries. Still others are rotating crops for the native cuisines of those who fled the “American wars” in Southeast Asia. In Healing Grounds, Liz Carlisle tells the stories of Indigenous, Black, Latinx, and Asian American farmers who are reviving their ancestors’ methods of growing food—techniques long suppressed by the industrial food system. These farmers are restoring native prairies, nurturing beneficial fungi, and enriching soil health. While feeding their communities and revitalizing cultural ties to land, they are steadily stitching ecosystems back together and repairing the natural carbon cycle. This, Carlisle shows, is the true regenerative agriculture – not merely a set of technical tricks for storing CO2 in the ground, but a holistic approach that values diversity in both plants and people. Cultivating this kind of regenerative farming will require reckoning with our nation’s agricultural history—a history marked by discrimination and displacement. And it will ultimately require dismantling power structures that have blocked many farmers of color from owning land or building wealth. The task is great, but so is its promise. By coming together to restore these farmlands, we can not only heal our planet, we can heal our communities and ourselves.

Rising sea level will be tomorrow's global economic and humanitarian crisis--if we don't start adapting now. Around the world, rising sea level threatens coastal communities. It is unstoppable, requiring bold planning to avoid catastrophe. Though often seen as an environmental issue, it's more about our security and economy--and the impacts on our homes and communities. In his previous book, the bestselling High Tide on Main Street: Rising Sea Level and the Coming Coastal Crisis, renowned oceanographer John Englander clearly explained the science. In Moving to Higher Ground: Rising Sea Level and the Path Forward, he updates the latest scientific information and presents a visionary outlook for what we need to do--showing the world how to survive, and even thrive, for ourselves and future generations. Englander explains: -Why sea level will rise regardless of efforts to reduce CO2 emissions -How high the sea could rise in the coming decades and the effects on assets and infrastructure -What you need to know to prepare and adapt for long-term sea level rise and short term flooding events -Why rising sea level and the massive adaptation required could be the greatest economic engine of this century