Abundant Life And Loving God

Abundant Life & Loving God tells how one mans journey of discovery led him to find abundant life in Jesus Christ and a central place in his life for following the most important commandment to love God. Greg Wander tells how he came to love God as passionately as he loves the members of his family. Energized by this change in his lifes priorities, he looks back over his personal history in the church and reveals how loving God was rarely discussed. By telling this story he hopes to help others find renewed love for God. In adopting an approachable tone, Abundant Life and Loving God turns its attention to topics like enjoying real relationships with God, loving God, spending time seeking God, finding transformation in God, and reviewing recommendations for spiritual leaders to encourage others in their searches for a loving God. A concluding list of recommended readings, grouped by topic, provides guidance for ones spiritual search. If you have come to the point in your life where you recognize gaps and holes in your spiritual life, then this text offers support. With its embraceable narrative, it will provide you with scripturally grounded guidance for discovering the blessings that come with showing your love for God and receiving His grace for enjoying an abundant life.

Mental illness loves to tell lies. One of those lies is that you should be able to manage what you're struggling with all by yourself, but in Depression, Anxiety, and Other Things We Don't Want to Talk About, pastor and psychotherapist Ryan Casey Waller reminds us that we don't have to suffer alone. Mental health issues aren't a symptom of a spiritual failing or insufficient faith. In fact, suffering is the very thing our Savior seeks to heal as he leads us toward restoration. And yet, as Waller has experienced firsthand, the battle can be lonely and discouraging--but it doesn't have to be. Combining practical theology, clinical insights, and deep empathy, Waller offers a rare mix of companionship and truth, inviting us to: Have shame-free conversations about mental health Discover why self-knowledge is so important to a deep relationship with God Understand the intersection of biology, psychology, and spirituality Explore varying avenues of healing in community, therapy, and medication Be equipped to support loved ones while practicing self-care Waller bridges the gap between the spiritual and the psychological in this empathetic, imminently helpful guidebook, reminding us all that we are not alone. Hope starts now. Praise for Depression, Anxiety, and Other Things We Don't Want to Talk About: "I work with Christian leaders from all over the country and have seen firsthand how desperately we need to be talking about depression and anxiety. What prior generations considered taboo, the leaders of today and tomorrow consider essential. Whether you're new to the conversation of mental health or intimately familiar with its complexities, Waller's book has something for you. I can't wait for you to read this." --Grant Skeldon, author of The Passion Generation and Next Gen Director at Q

Is your life going in the direction you want? Have you had trouble relating Jesus' life to your own? This book will break down some of the qualities that made the life of Jesus successful. You will learn steps to take to create habits that will put your life on a pathway to the kingdom of God. -- Learn the first thing you must do to get your life on track. -- See a new perspective on submission. -- Find out why giving is important. -- Discover a unique reason for work. -- Find out how dreams drive purpose. -- It only takes a few minutes a day for a month to begin the journey to true success. These ten character traits of Jesus should show in the life of every Christian. Kathleen Jimenez is married with two children, and is owned by six cats. She was born and raised in the Midwest, but currently resides in New Mexico. Her family heritage of faith includes two ministers and a missionary. Becoming a star on Broadway was her first goal, but God had other plans. After receiving a B.A. degree in Communications and Theatre from Taylor University, she spent four years touring the United States and Canada with a Christian theater company. Kathleen recorded an album, "One More Song for You," and has written 20 songs. She has sung for churches, civic groups and Christian television and radio. Years of studying the Bible and leading small groups gave her the inspiration to share what God has revealed to her about the authority that Christians have in Jesus.

How do we find contentment in God when we feel so hidden? Sara Hagerty unfolds the truths found in the biblical story of Mary of Bethany to discover the scandalous love of God and explore the spiritual richness of being hidden in him. Every heart longs to be seen and understood. Yet most of our lives is unwitnessed. We spend our days working, driving, parenting. We sometimes spend whole seasons feeling unnoticed and unappreciated. In Unseen, Sara Hagerty suggests that this is exactly what God intended. He is the only One who truly knows us. He is the only One who understands the value of the unseen in our lives. When this truth seeps into our souls, we realize that only when we hide ourselves in God can we give ourselves to others in true freedom--and know the joy of a deeper relationship with the God who sees us. Our culture applauds what we can produce, what we can show, what we can upload to social media. Only when we give all of ourselves to God--unedited, abandoned, apparently wasteful in its lack of productivity--can we live out who God created us to be. As Hagerty writes, "Maybe my seemingly unproductive, looking-up-at-Him life produces awe among the angels." Through an eloquent exploration of both personal and biblical story, Hagerty calls us to offer every unseen minute of our lives to God. God is in the secret places of our lives that no one else witnesses. But we've not been relegated to these places. We've been invited. We may be "wasting" ourselves in a hidden corner today: The cubicle on the fourth floor. The hospital bedside of an elderly parent. The laundry room. But these are the places God uses to meet us with a radical love. These are the places that produce the kind of unhinged love in us that gives everything at His feet, whether or not anyone else ever proclaims our name, whether or not anyone else ever sees. God's invitation is not just for a season or a day. It is the question of our lives: "When no one else applauds you, when it makes no sense, when you see no results--will you waste your love on Me?"

God loves you far too much to let you linger in a life that's old, stale, and filled with worldly pleasures that bring nothing but short-term satisfaction. This book of daily devotions promises to help you shed that old life and be remade into a completely new creation. With each day's reading, you'll be blessed with a fresh perspective and a youthful vigor for pursuing the abundant life God intends for you to live. This "newness" does not require a self-help program or a to-do list of projects. God promises the gift of an abundant life--a gift from his heart to yours. Experience Abundant Life in Jesus every day of the year. You'll be inspired to live in God's presence and enjoy the pleasures he so abundantly provides. Previously published in hardcover as Abundant Life Day Book.

"A powerfully informative book and inspirational interpretation of the practical side of the Word of God. Too many Christians live defeated lives. You don't have to be one of them. Your Pathway to Abundant Living merges our practical, everyday actions with the spiritual teachings of the Word of God and delivers a powerful self-help guide to success. It will help you realize and obtain the natural and spiritual blessings God has for you. No longer will you suffer living beneath your privilege after reading and applying the principles in this book. God wants you to live life more abundantly. Enjoy God's best for your life through application of biblical principles. It provides instructions to live abundantly in every area of your life to include family, wealth, marriage, and spirituality. Filled with self-evaluations and recommendations for improvement, Your Pathway to Abundant Living can be used as a self-help for group studies or for individual self-improvement."

Our world is hungry for salvation, but we don't always know how to talk about it. Christians agree that God cares about people's lives both in this world and into eternity. But the ways we describe salvation often separate the spiritual from the material. Many groups emphasize one at the expense of the other, limiting the picture of what God has to offer. Mark Teasdale works to bridge the gaps by taking up Jesus' language of abundant life. This life is something Jesus invites us to participate in—to seek both for ourselves and for others. It's rich and multidimensional, not splitting spirits and minds from bodies and material needs. By connecting biblical perspectives of holistic salvation to contemporary concepts of well-being, Teasdale also shows how Christians can both better communicate in secular settings as well as partner with all people regardless of their faith to seek the common good. Incorporating concepts of material standard of living and subjective quality of life, Teasdale argues, gives Christians common language to share the promise of abundant life with those who hold to secular commitments. Yet we must also boldly present Jesus' invitation to eternal life and discipleship. For churches, ministry leaders, and laypeople Teasdale offers ideas to improve and measure methods of promoting all dimensions of salvation for the good of others.

Our opening verse for this book is from John 10:10b, I came that they may have and enjoy life, and have it in abundance (to the full, till it overflows). The Greek word used here for life is zo. So we can conclude that Jesus came to show us how to have and enjoy the god kind of life. As a born-again believer you have been recreated and given a new life code (or DNA) to live by, and Jesus came to show us how to live that new creation reality here on earth. The Bible tells us in John 3:16, For God so greatly loved and dearly prized the world that He (even) gave up His only begotten (unique) Son, so that whoever believes in (trusts in, clings to, relies on) Him shall not perish (come to destruction, be lost) but have eternal (everlasting) life. Then in Romans 6:23 it tells us, For the wages which sin pays is death, but the bountiful free gift of God is eternal (the god kind of) life through and in union with Jesus Christ our Lord. This eternal life he came to give us is the very nature of God. In John 1:4 we can get a better understanding of what this life will do for us: In Him was Life, and the Life was the Light of men. One of the meanings for light in the dictionary is a state of understanding or awareness. So we could read this verse like this: in him was the god kind of life, and the god kind of life was the state of understanding and awareness for men. Let us live out of the zo kind of life and determine to be led by the spirit of God in all that we do so we can live in the actual abundance of God. Amen.