The nature of Ramblings of the Brethren allows men to join in on good wholesome discussions and feel apart of the actual fellowship. Week by week different perspectives are shared on any given topic, creating an atmosphere of not only encouragement but diverse learning as well. At the close of each week there is a "Brethren's Challenge" intended to encourage us to apply that week's discussion to everyday life. Sometimes we need an outlet through which we can express what's happening in our lives, or share what we've learned through our own personal walk with Jesus. Ramblings of the Brethren provides that outlet.

From its inception in the nineteenth century, the Wesleyan/Holiness religious tradition has offered an alternative construction of gender and supported the equality of the sexes. In Holy Boldness, Susie C. Stanley provides a comprehensive analysis of spiritual autobiographies by thirty-four American Wesleyan/Holiness women preachers, published between the mid-nineteenth and mid-twentieth centuries. While a few of these women, primarily African Americans, have been added to the canon of American women's autobiography, Stanley argues for the expansion of the canon to incorporate the majority of the women in her study. She reveals how these empowered women carried out public ministries on behalf of evangelism and social justice. The defining doctrine of the Wesleyan/Holiness tradition is the belief in sanctification, or experiencing a state of holiness. Stanley's analysis illuminates how the concept of the sanctified self inspired women to break out of the narrow confines of the traditional "women's sphere" and engage in public ministries, from preaching at camp meetings and revivals to ministering in prisons and tenements. Moreover, as a result of the Wesleyan/Holiness emphasis on experience as a valid source of theology, many women preachers turned to autobiography as a way to share their spiritual quest and religiously motivated activities with others. In such writings, these preachers focused on the events that shaped their spiritual growth and their calling to ministry, often giving only the barest details of their personal lives. Thus, Holy Boldness is not a collective biography of these women but rather an exploration of how sanctification influenced their evangelistic and social ministries. Using the tools of feminist theory and autobiographical analysis in addition to historical and theological interpretation, Stanley traces a trajectory of Christian women's autobiographies and introduces many previously unknown spiritual autobiographies that will expand our understanding of Christian spirituality in nineteenth- and twentieth-century America. The Author: Susie C. Stanley is professor of historical theology at Messiah College. She is the author of Feminist Pillar of Fire: The Life of Alma White.

Essays, fiction, and poetry reflecting on truth and illusion in a world filled with deceptions both treacherous and benign. Children deceive, as do grownups, and many are the moments when all of us even deceive ourselves. People of every age and stripe, whether rarely or often, dissimulate, bluff, and beguile. The writer who fabricates and populates worlds is a deceiver, as is the artist whose triumph is to trick the eye, to alter perception. The honest magician's livelihood is based on deception; so is the dishonest thief's. And consider the great Russian poet Marina Tsvetaeva who wrote, "A deception that elevates us is dearer than a legion of low truths," thus complicating the subject entirely. This special issue of Conjunctions gathers a wide spectrum of essays, fiction, and poetry on the classic subject of deception, exploring in original and thought-provoking ways a world in which truth is a most fragile, elaborate, and mercurial thing. Contributors include Edie Meidav, Terese Svoboda, Yannick Murphy, Paul Hoover, Bim Ramke, Eleni Sikelianos, Magdalena Zyzak, and many others.

This volume focuses on the various phenomena of religious encounters in a transcultural society where religion or religious traditions play a significant role in a multi-cultural concept. Religious Encounters in Transcultural Society is divided into three parts: Islamic encounters with regional religions, East Asian religious encounters, and alternative religious encounters. This book evokes the fact that religious encounters exist in every transcultural society even though they often remain hidden behind socio-cultural issues. The situation can be changed, but one culture cannot harmoniously and always contain two or multi-beliefs. The issue of religious encounters mostly arises in the transnational process of religious globalization.

Gladiator. Assassin. Thief. Princess. And the Slave. The Five Warrior Angels have been revealed, one by one the mystical weapons they once wielded are being found, and an ancient prophecy is finally being fulfilled. Or is it? For when it comes to recorded history, much is intended to manipulate and deceive. Returning to the kingdom of Gul Kana, Princess Jondralyn has suffered a devastating loss, discovering that not all prophecy is to be assumed, not all scripture to be trusted. At the same time, her younger sister, Tala, has found faith within herself while facing off against villains, who are using her for their devices. Hawkwood, the former Bloodwood Assassin, is captured. And the knight, Gault, betrayed by the Angel Prince, can only wonder of the fate of his daughter who has fallen into terrible hands. All while Nail embarks upon the deadliest quest the Five Isles has ever known.

When Abraham Lincoln expressed gratitude for the northern churches in the spring of 1864, it had nothing to do with his appreciation of doctrine, liturgy, or Christian fellowship. Collectively, the churches earned the president's admiration with rabid patriotism and support for the war. Ministers publicly proclaimed the righteousness of the Union, condemned slavery, and asserted that God favored the federal army. Yet all of this would have amounted to nothing more than empty bravado without the support of the men and women sitting in the pews. This outstanding book examines the Civil War from the perspective of the northern laity, those religious civilians whose personal faith influenced their views on politics and slavery, helped them cope with physical separation and death engendered by the war, and ultimately enabled them to discern the hand of God in the struggle to preserve the national Union.From Lincoln's election to his assassination, the book weaves together political, military, social, and intellectual history into a religious narrative of the Civil War on the northern home front. Packed with compelling human interest stories, this account draws on letters, diaries, newspapers and church records along with published sources to conclusively demonstrate that many devout civilians regarded the Civil War as a contest imbued with religious meaning. In the process of giving their loyal support to the government as individual citizens, religious Northerners politicized the church as a collective institution and used it to uphold the Union so the purified nation could promote Christianity around the world. Christian patriotism helped win the war, but the politicization of religion did not lead to the redemption of the state.

She'll do anything to forget one horrific night. He'll do all in his power to help her. Sebastian “Bas” Broussard has the perfect life. His work as an undercover Navy SEAL presents constant mental and physical challenges. The occasional hookups give him all the female companionship he requires. His home is the ideal retreat to relax and unwind. The one snag in his plans is a local detective who’s determined to prove he and Eternal Brethren are criminals. A beautiful detective he can’t stop thinking about. Darilyn Romero’s career is right on track. She’s climbed the ranks from patrol officer to detective in a short period of time. Transferring to Liberty Lake is one more step in a path leading to her ultimate goal—police chief of her own small town. To get there, her resume needs a few big wins. Bringing down Eternal Brethren will do just fine. There’s one problem. The rugged biker who haunts her days and fills her dreams. The same man she intends to put behind bars. Bas’s amusement at her attempts to catch him breaking the law fades when real threats are focused on him and the gorgeous detective. As the danger mounts, they’re forced to forge a grudging alliance intent on identifying the source of the danger. As attempts on their lives increase, can they locate and eliminate the threat? Or will they fall victim to those who want them dead? Defiant is book eleven in the Eternal Brethren Military Romantic Suspense Series by best seller Shirleen Davies. It is a stand-alone, full-length novel with no cliffhanger and a guaranteed HEA. Book 1: Steadfast Book 2: Shattered Book 3: Haunted Book 4: Untamed Book 5: Devoted Book 6: Faithful Book 7: Exposed Book 8: Undaunted Book 9: Resolute Book 10: Unspoken Book 11: Defiant Book 12: Consumed, Coming Next in the Series!