Millions of American Christians see U.S. support for the State of Israel as a God-ordained responsibility. Robert O. Smith provides an in-depth look at the English Protestant tradition of Judeo-centric prophecy interpretation at the heart of this popular affinity.

Millions of American Christians see U.S. support for the State of Israel as a God-ordained responsibility. American sympathies for the State of Israel are consistently and often substantially higher than for Arab states or Palestinians. More Desired than Our Owne Salvation is a compelling historical look at how this consensus came to be. In 2006, John Hagee founded Christians United for Israel. Several high-level policymakers, both Christians and Jews, rushed to endorse the effort. Soon, however, questions arose about anti-Catholic and anti-Islamic ideas contained in Hagee's preaching and writing. More Desired than Our Owne Salvation shows that these ideas draw from a long heritage of Anglo-American Protestant culture. Contemporary Christian Zionism may say more about American culture than most Americans care to admit. The roots of Christian Zionism in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Protestant interpretations of scripture and history formed not only Anglo-American theology but the foundations of American culture itself. Black Protestant views show, for instance, how Christian Zionism is connected intimately with racial identity and American exceptionalism, not just Christian beliefs. Martin Luther and John Calvin's identification of the Pope and the Turk as the two heads of the Antichrist echoes in our world today. Robert O. Smith has identified an English Protestant tradition of Judeo-centric prophecy interpretation that shaped Puritan commitment. In New England, this tradition informed the foundations of American identity. From the Cartwright Petition in 1649 to the Blackstone Memorial in 1891 to the work of John Hagee today, Christian Zionism has prepared the ground for Christians in the U.S. to see the modern State of Israel as a prophetic counterpart, a modern nation-state whose preservation "may be more desired then our owne salvation."

This handbook offers a unique decolonial take on the field of Critical Whiteness Studies by rehistoricising and re-spatialising the study of bodies and identities in the world system of coloniality. Situating the critical study of whiteness as a core intellectual pillar in a broadly based project for racial and social justice, the volume understands whiteness as elaborated in global coloniality through epistemology, ideology and governmentality at the intersections with heteropatriarchy and capitalism. The diverse contributions present Black and other racially diverse scholarship as crucial to the field. The focus of inquiry is expanded beyond Northern Anglophone contexts to challenge centre/margin relations, examining whiteness in the Caribbean, South Africa and the African continent, Asia, the Middle East as well as in the United States and parts of Europe. Providing a transdisciplinary approach and addressing debates about knowledges, black and white subjectivities and newly defensive forms of whiteness, as seen in the rise of the Radical Right, the handbook deepens our understanding of power, place, and culture in coloniality. This book will be an invaluable resource for researchers, advanced students, and scholars in the fields of Education, History, Sociology, Anthropology, Psychology, Political Sciences, Philosophy, Critical Race Theory, Feminist and Gender Studies, Postcolonial and Decolonial Studies, Security Studies, Migration Studies, Media Studies, Indigenous Studies, Cultural Studies, Critical Diversity Studies, and African, Latin American, Asian, American, British and European Studies.

What Wild at Heart did for men, Captivating is doing for women. Setting their hearts free. This groundbreaking book shows readers the glorious design of women before the fall, describes how the feminine heart can be restored, and casts a vision for the power, freedom, and beauty of a woman released to be all she was meant to be.

This dissertation seeks to show that popular American affinity for the State of Israel draws from the taproot of apocalyptic hope informing American identity and national vocation from the revolutionary era to the present. The English Protestant tradition of Judeo-centric prophecy interpretation informing these American adaptations of apocalyptic hope was first developed in the early Elizabethan period and refined through the first half of the seventeenth century. Brought to North America by English colonists with Puritan commitments, the tradition provided a foundational framework for American self-understanding. Given this Judeo-centric tradition's direct contribution to American popular Christianity and civil religion--through varying degrees of national-covenantalism, premillennial dispensationalism and cultural fundamentalism--claims that American popular affinity for the State of Israel is generated primarily by external manipulations or lobbies strain the bounds of credulity. Grounded, in part, in the Protestant historiography developed by Lutheran and Calvinist reformers, this English Protestant tradition of Judeo-centric prophecy interpretation was from its inception a political theology. The tradition openly constructed friends (Jews) as well as enemies (Muslims and Roman Catholics), while cultivating an occidentocentric discourse that discounted Eastern Christians. The tradition's most visible and direct impulses are manifested in Christian Zionism, understood as political action, informed by specifically Christian commitments, to promote or preserve Jewish control over the geographic area now containing Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories. The conviction that Jews had a central role to play in God's end-times drama led English and Anglo-American interpreters to construct Jews as allies while constructing Catholics and Muslims as Antichrist. Despite the banishment of Jews from England, Judeo-centric content became common within English Protestant articulations of apocalyptic hope. These hermeneutics, adapted by English colonists, were transposed into the apocalyptic foundations of American national identity and vocation. This historical trajectory, rather than the premillennial dispensationalism of John Nelson Darby, best explains the foundations of American popular affinity for the State of Israel and the characteristics of contemporary American Christian Zionism.

Are There Two Wills in God? Divine Election and God's Desire for All to Be Saved In this short, theological essay, John Piper builds a scriptural case that God's unconditional election unto salvation is compatible with God's genuine desire and offer for all to be saved. Helping us to make sense of this seemingly paradoxical relationship, Piper wisely holds both truths in tension as he explores the Bible's teaching on this challenging topic, graciously responds to those who disagree, and motivates us to passionately proclaim the free offer of the gospel to all people.

The Bible reveals glorious things. And yet we often miss its power because we read it the same way we read any other book. In Reading the Bible Supernaturally, best-selling author John Piper teaches us how to read the Bible in light of its divine author. In doing so, he highlights the Bible's unique ability to reveal God to humanity in a way that informs our minds, transforms our hearts, and ignites our love. With insights into the biblical text drawn from decades of experience studying, preaching, and teaching Scripture, Piper helps us experience the transformative power of God's Word—a power that extends beyond the mere words on the page. Ultimately, Piper shows us that in the seemingly ordinary act of reading the Bible, something supernatural happens: we encounter the living God.

This dissertation seeks to show that popular American affinity for the State of Israel draws from the taproot of apocalyptic hope informing American identity and national vocation from the revolutionary era to the present. The English Protestant tradition of Judeo-centric prophecy interpretation informing these American adaptations of apocalyptic hope was first developed in the early Elizabethan period and refined through the first half of the seventeenth century. Brought to North America by English colonists with Puritan commitments, the tradition provided a foundational framework for American self-understanding. Given this Judeo-centric tradition's direct contribution to American popular Christianity and civil religion--through varying degrees of national-covenantalism, premillennial dispensationalism and cultural fundamentalism--claims that American popular affinity for the State of Israel is generated primarily by external manipulations or lobbies strain the bounds of credulity. Grounded, in part, in the Protestant historiography developed by Lutheran and Calvinist reformers, this English Protestant tradition of Judeo-centric prophecy interpretation was from its inception a political theology. The tradition openly constructed friends (Jews) as well as enemies (Muslims and Roman Catholics), while cultivating an occidentocentric discourse that discounted Eastern Christians. The tradition's most visible and direct impulses are manifested in Christian Zionism, understood as political action, informed by specifically Christian commitments, to promote or preserve Jewish control over the geographic area now containing Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories. The conviction that Jews had a central role to play in God's end-times drama led English and Anglo-American interpreters to construct Jews as allies while constructing Catholics and Muslims as Antichrist. Despite the banishment of Jews from England, Judeo-centric content became common within English Protestant articulations of apocalyptic hope. These hermeneutics, adapted by English colonists, were transposed into the apocalyptic foundations of American national identity and vocation. This historical trajectory, rather than the premillennial dispensationalism of John Nelson Darby, best explains the foundations of American popular affinity for the State of Israel and the characteristics of contemporary American Christian Zionism.