Joseph's assured debut novel explores the lives of two Georgia families soon to be linked by a marriage. While Joseph tackles several dark themes, the core of the story is a hopeful portrait of the different and often elusive faces of salvation.

In the summer of 1998, I began to preach at East Pearl Street Methodist Church. I came to East Pearl fresh off the plane from a year as a missionary doctor to India and Honduras. I had delivered babies, sutured machete wounds, and even contracted malaria during a cholera epidemic. With my head full of stories and my heart on fire, I returned to Yale for residency. When I heard East Pearl needed a Minister, I leapt at the chance. We are an urban church in a struggling neighborhood. The city's great challenges are our shared ministry: poverty, housing, illness, imprisonment, HIV, psychiatric problems. Despite a gouty boiler, and a wheezy organ (masterfully coddled by our long-time organist Willis Copeland), we thrive with a tireless hope. As an urban pastor and a young doctor, this sermon collection is my attempt to stoke the fires of hope in a world wired with technology and anxiety. For those wrestling with their faith, doubting their role in the world, or just curious about Christianity, I believe these meditations offer hope and perspective for our modern times.

Since the inception of the HIPC Initiative, the story of the design and implementation of poverty alleviation strategies has largely been told through the filters of development partners and the Bretton Woods Institutions. Poverty Reduction Strategies in Action examines the efforts in Ghana to reduce poverty and initiate changes that it believes are essential to ensure a prosperous future for its citizens in the 21st century. It chronicles the achievements, pitfalls, and looming challenges of a government, its people, and its external partners in fashioning out and implementing anti-poverty and pro-growth policies. This edited volume, by a group of independent researchers, examines Ghana's experience: what was done, how it was done, what was left undone, the lessons learned, and fills the void in the development literature.

Joseph Smith's First Vision of the Father and the Son in 1820 was the first of many visions the Prophet and early Church members experienced. This volume brings together some of the finest presentations from the 2020 BYU Church History Symposium honoring the bicentennial of the First Vision. Explore the influence of the First Vision, as well as teachings of other visionaries.

Includes entries for maps and atlases.

When Barbra Streisand sends Dick Gephardt a personal fax, it makes headline news. When international relations expert Sean Penn leads his own "tour of peace" in Baghdad, every news desk across the country reports it. It's no secret that Hollywood has a leftward tilt when it comes to politics. But what the celebrity-fawning media fail to show is how Hollywood's liberal bias affects actors, movies, and even public policy. In Tales from the Left Coast, author and political commentator James Hirsen digs deep into the liberal underbelly of Hollywood to reveal how biased politics have corrupted the entire entertainment industry. Through extensive research and scores of interviews, Hirsen uncovers some of the most ridiculous, infuriating, and damning political stunts pulled by celebrities of yesterday and today, and he traces the tangled web of influence the Hollywood elite have over politicians in Washington, D.C.