Poverty is much more than simply a lack of material resources, and it takes much more than donations and handouts to solve it. When Helping Hurts shows how some alleviation efforts, failing to consider the complexities of poverty, have actually (and unintentionally) done more harm than good. But it looks ahead. It encourages us to see the dignity in everyone, to empower the materially poor, and to know that we are all uniquely needy - and that God in the gospel is reconciling all things to himself.

Thirty years ago, Gregory Boyle founded Homeboy Industries, a gang-intervention, rehabilitation, and reentry program in Los Angeles, the gang capital of the world. In Tattoos on the Heart, his debut book, he distills his experience working with gang members into a breathtaking series of parables inspired by faith.

As David Brooks observes, “There is one skill that lies at the heart of any healthy person, family, school, community organization, or society: the ability to see someone else deeply and make them feel seen—to accurately know another person, to let them feel valued, heard, and understood.” And yet we humans don’t do this well. All around us are people who feel invisible, unseen, misunderstood. In How to Know a Person, Brooks sets out to help us do better, posing questions that are essential for all of us: If you want to know a person, what kind of attention should you cast on them?

In this classic theological treatise, the acclaimed theologian and religious leader Howard Thurman (1900-1981) demonstrates how the gospel may be read as a manual of resistance for the poor and disenfranchised. Jesus is a partner in the pain of the oppressed and the example of His life offers a solution to ending the descent into moral nihilism. Hatred does not empower—it decays. Only through self-love and love of one another can God's justice prevail.

Explorers Lewis and Clark had to adapt. While they had prepared to find a waterway to the Pacific Ocean, instead they found themselves in the Rocky Mountains. You too may feel that you are leading in a cultural context you were not expecting. You may even feel that your training holds you back more often than it carries you along. Drawing from his extensive experience as a pastor and consultant, Tod Bolsinger brings decades of expertise in guiding churches and organizations through uncharted territory.

If the Bible isn’t a science book or an instruction manual, then what is it? What do people mean when they say the Bible is inspired? When Rachel Held Evans found herself asking these questions, she began a quest to better understand what the Bible is and how it is meant to be read. What she discovered changed her—and it will change you too.

Drawing on the best in recent scholarship and using her well-honed literary expertise, Evans examines some of our favorite Bible stories and possible interpretations, retelling them through memoir, original poetry, short stories, soliloquies, and even a short screenplay. Undaunted by the Bible’s most difficult passages, Evans wrestles through the process of doubting, imagining, and debating Scripture’s mysteries. The Bible, she discovers, is not a static work but is a living, breathing, captivating, and confounding book that is able to equip us to join God’s loving and redemptive work in the world.

In the first half of life, we are naturally preoccupied with establishing ourselves; climbing, achieving, and performing. But as we grow older and encounter challenges and mistakes, we need to see ourselves in a different and more life-giving way. This message of falling down - that is in fact moving upward - is the most resisted and counterintuitive of messages in the world's religions. Falling Upward offers a new paradigm for understanding one of the most profound of life's mysteries: how those who have fallen down are the only ones who understand "up".

Fred Rogers fiercely believed that all people deserve love. This conviction wasn’t simply sentimental: it came directly from his Christian faith. God, he insisted, loves us just the way we are. In Exactly as You Are, Shea Tuttle looks at Fred Rogers’s life, the people and places that made him who he was, and his work through Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. She pays particular attention to his faith - because Fred Rogers was a deeply spiritual person, ordained by his church with a one-of-a-kind charge: to minister to children and families through television.

The United States, the richest country on earth, has more poverty than any other advanced democracy. Why? Why does this land of plenty allow one in every eight of its children to go without basic necessities, permit scores of its citizens to live and die on the streets, and authorize its corporations to pay poverty wages?

Every day, we find ourselves in gatherings, Priya Parker says in The Art of Gathering. If we can understand what makes these gatherings effective and memorable, then we can reframe and redirect them to benefit everyone, host and guest alike. Parker defines a gathering as three or more people who come together for a specific purpose. When we understand why we gather, she says - to acknowledge, to learn, to challenge, to change - we learn how to organize gatherings that are relevant and memorable.

Like millions of her millennial peers, Rachel Held Evans didn't want to go to church anymore. The hypocrisy, the politics, the gargantuan building budgets, the scandals - church culture seemed so far removed from Jesus. Yet despite her cynicism and misgivings, something kept drawing her back. And so she set out on a journey to understand the Church and to find her place in it.

In this book, award-winning author James K. A. Smith shows that who and what we worship fundamentally shape our hearts. And while we desire to shape culture, we are not often aware of how culture shapes us. We might not realize the ways our hearts are being taught to love rival gods instead of the One for whom we were made. Smith helps listeners recognize the formative power of culture and the transformative possibilities of Christian practices.

Richard Rohr Rohr goes through the teachings of the Sermon on the Mount, explaining the historical and cultural context of each verse and offering guidance for what it means for Christians today.

American evangelical Christianity has lost its way. While the witness of the church before a watching world is diminished beyond recognition, congregations are torn apart over Donald Trump, Christian nationalism, racial injustice, sexual predation, disgraced leaders, and covered-up scandals. Left behind are millions of believers who counted on the church to be a place of belonging and hope. As greater and greater numbers of younger Americans bleed out from the church, even the most rooted evangelicals are wondering, “Can American Christianity survive?”

What is it like to discover that something you’ve believed all your life might be wrong? Sally Gary knew since her early adulthood that she was attracted to women. But as a devoted Christian, she felt there was no way to fully embrace this aspect of her identity while remaining faithful. Now, as she prepares to marry the love of her life, she’s ready to speak out about why - and how - her perspective changed.

Affluence, autonomy, safety, and power. These are the central values of the American dream. But are they actually compatible with Jesus' command to love our neighbor as ourselves? In essays grouped around these four values, D. L. Mayfield asks us to pay attention to the ways they shape our own choices, and the ways those choices affect our neighbors. Where did these values come from? How have they failed those on the edges of our society? And how can we disentangle ourselves from our culture's headlong pursuit of these values and live faithful lives of service to God and our neighbors?

Many people today talk about justice, but are they living justly? They want to change the world, but are they being changed themselves? Eugene Cho has a confession: "I like to talk about changing the world but I don't really like to do what it takes." If this is true of the man who founded the One Day's Wages global antipoverty movement, then what must it take to act on one's ideals? Cho does not doubt the sincerity of those who want to change the world.

Acts of Faith is a remarkable account of growing up Muslim in America and coming to believe in religious pluralism, from one of the most prominent faith leaders in the United States. Eboo Patel's story is a hopeful and moving testament to the power and passion of young people - and of the world-changing potential of an interfaith youth movement.

We have hundreds of "friends" through online social networking, but we often don't even know the full name of the person who lives right next door. This unique and inspiring book asks the question: What is the most loving thing I can do for the people who live on my street or in my apartment building? Through compelling true stories of lives impacted, the authors explain how to create genuine friendships with the people who live in closest proximity to us.

In Betty Reid Soskin’s 96 years of living, she has been a witness to a grand sweep of American history. When she was born in 1921, the lynching of African-Americans was a national epidemic, blackface minstrel shows were the most popular American form of entertainment, white women had only just won the right to vote, and most African-Americans in the Deep South could not vote at all. From her great-grandmother, who had been enslaved until her mid-20s, Betty heard stories of slavery and the times of terror and struggle for Black folk that followed.

At a time when we are all more rudderless than ever, we look for the very best teachers and mentors to guide us. In Fully Alive, an unusual and gripping memoir, Timothy Shriver shows how his teachers have been the world's most forgotten minority: people with intellectual disabilities. In these pages we meet the individuals who helped him come of age and find a deeper and more meaningful way to see the world.

In a shallow light-speed world, how can we really know and be known by another person? How do we make true friends? The Digital Age is all about change, but the need for true friendship never changes. We are designed for real engagement with others - for affirmation that goes beyond a simple "like" on social media, for connection over meals, for hope and excitement about the future. Above all, we need to be known and accepted for who we are.

This guide is not a formula about what stuff you need to give up. It's about slowing down long enough for God to remind you of his truth and what it means to be his child. Through heartwarming, relatable, and hilarious stories, Courtney Ellis shares her journey from a life of stress, stuff, and exhaustion to one of peace, space, and fulfillment. You'll learn practical tips for paring down your possessions, simplifying your schedule, and practicing the ancient art of Sabbath - even if you're a parent! Uncluttered ushers you towards a lifestyle of holiness and joy in the Lord.

Almost any parent you asked would tell you that they want their children to be happy, successful adults. But many of us forget (or never knew to begin with) that lasting personal joy is not necessarily found the way the world says it is - through reaching a certain socioeconomic status, having a certain job, buying a certain house, or having a certain amount in one's bank account. In fact, says Kristen Welch, author of Raising Grateful Kids in an Entitled World, personal satisfaction comes not from grabbing onto things but from holding them with an open hand and, very often, giving them away.

Pastor and bestselling author Greg Laurie was one of those fortunate few blessed with an insider’s view of Billy Graham’s world for more than two decades. With the same painstaking research and eye for detail that distinguishes his previous biographies, Steve McQueen: Salvation of an American Icon and Johnny Cash: The Redemption of an American Icon, Laurie now turns to the life of his beloved mentor, offering the intimate perspective of a disciple and friend.

Drawing on the wisdom gleaned from thriving mega-churches and innovative business leaders while anchoring their vision in the Eucharistic center of Catholic faith, Fr. Michael White and lay associate Tom Corcoran present the compelling and inspiring story to how they brought their parish back to life. Rebuilt is a story of stopping everything and changing focus. When their parish reached a breaking point, Fr. Michael White and lay associate Tom Corcoran asked themselves how they could make the Church matter to Catholics.

When Dorothy Day died in 1980, the New York Times eulogized her as “a nonviolent social radical of luminous personality...founder of the Catholic Worker Movement and leader for more than 50 years in numerous battles of social justice.” Here, in her own words, this remarkable woman tells of her early life as a young journalist in the crucible of Greenwich Village political and literary thought in the 1920s, and of her momentous conversion to Catholicism that meant the end of a Bohemian lifestyle and common-law marriage.

The life story of Coretta Scott King - wife of Martin Luther King Jr., founder of the King Center for Nonviolent Social Change, and singular 20th-century American civil rights activist - as told fully for the first time, toward the end of her life, to one of her closest friends. Born in 1927 to daringly enterprising Black parents in the Deep South, Coretta Scott had always felt called to a special purpose.

A trailblazer in the civil rights movement, John M. Perkins led voter registration efforts in 1964, worked for school desegregation in 1967, and was jailed and tortured in 1970. He is no less zealous today as he sees a new generation of freedom fighters battling the same issues and the same systems he has spent his life working to correct.

Matthew Barnett, son of a well-known megachurch pastor, discovered his great cause when he relinquished his dream of building a big, successful church like his father’s and began listening for God’s dream for his life. Sensing that God was calling him to serve the poor and powerless of Los Angeles, Matthew founded the Dream Center, a beacon of hope for homeless families, drug addicts, abused women and children, victims of human trafficking, teen runaways, gang members, and many others whose lives were filled with brokenness.