Caring For The Souls Of Children

Coming alongside struggling children can feel like an uphill battle. Counselors and parents mistakenly believe children somehow need different answers to life’s problems than adults need—but Christ is always the way. Children struggle with the same desires adults struggle with, are lured by the same lies adults fall prey to, and can find hope in the same source adults can find hope—in our Lord and Savior. In this manual for biblical counselors, men and women will learn how to help struggling children with the hope found in our Redeemer as presented in the Word of God. Caring for the Souls of Children equips counselors, parents, pastors, and anyone else who wants to love children with the hope of Jesus to boldly trust in the sufficiency of Scripture. Rather than relying on different methods to reach children, this manual helps counselors share the truth of Christ—the way, the truth, and the life—all while tailoring interactions and teachings to the understanding of children. Edited by counseling professional and author Amy Baker, this in-depth resource offers the biblical wisdom and practical insights of contributing authors who are experienced in biblical counseling for children.

Parenting is a school for spiritual formation, says author Gary Thomas, and our children are our teachers. The journey of caring for, rearing, training, and loving our children profoundly alters us forever…even when the journey is sometimes a rough one. Sacred Parenting is unlike any other parenting book on the market. This is not a “how-to” book that teaches readers the ways to discipline their kids or help them achieve their full potential. Instead of a discussion about how parents change their children, Sacred Parenting turns the tables and demonstrates how God uses children to change their parents. Stepping beyond the overly-tilled soil of method books, parents can learn a whole new side of parenting. They’ll be encouraged by stories that tell how other parents handled the challenges and difficulties of being a parent—and how their children transformed their relationship with God. The lessons the author writes about are timeless. But in this edition, Thomas adds in some additional insights and stories that he’s learned and lived over the past fifteen years of his own parenting. Gary has found that the lessons have remained much the same but there are new applications for the readers in this generation who are just now coming to his book.

Children possess a special quality-all children. A quality that is so unique that Jesus Christ warned adults that unless we become as little children, we will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven. That special quality is humility. But adults must teach and set examples of humility for their children throughout their continuous growth by giving, caring and sharing toward others; only then will the special quality within children never cease to exist; for it takes humility to love God and others. For Jesus said, "We shall love the Lord with all our heart, soul and mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it, "We shall love our neighbor as our self. Read more about this simple in-home international missions program for ALL ages. Shalom "

In the fields of pastoral care and pastoral theology, there are times when a book signals a paradigm shift. This is one such book. LaMothe develops a political pastoral theology that is used to examine critically political, economic, and societal structures and practices. In the first part of the book, LaMothe argues that care and pastoral care are political concepts, which, along with the notion of justice, can be used as a hermeneutical framework to assess macropolitical and macroeconomic realities. Included in this section is the notion of civil and redemptive discourse, necessary for the survival and flourishing of persons and polis. The last section of the book examines U.S. Empire, capitalism, class, classism, and other pressing political issues using the hermeneutical lens of care.

Injustice and the Care of Souls, Second Edition, explores injustices in church and society and their impact on pastoral caregiving. The book offers pastoral and spiritual caregivers broader contexts, knowledge, and skills to respond effectively to marginalized people and to reflect on how their own social locations affect their work.

It is said that children learn what they live. But children also teach the adults in their lives lessons on subjects such as unconditional love, self-sacrifice, self-forgetfulness, patience, and more. The ordinary way an adult learns these things from his or her children is by caring for them. Every parent knows that. But some extraordinary children seem sent by God to teach us about the "big questions," such as life, death, suffering, and the existence of God. The children in this book, all of whom suffered terribly during their short lives, bore witness to God's love and an understanding of the meaning of suffering and "what to do with it" that belied their years. And their teaching was not limited to their immediate family: Everyone with whom they came into contact, from family friends and other children, to doctors and nurses, to major political figures and popes, was profoundly affected by the encounter. This book will make you cry, yes, but the tears will be mixed with something akin to joy at the beauty of the short lives of Brendan, Margaret, and Audrey, and awe at the grace and dignity with which they bore their crosses, lived and enjoyed this life, and ultimately left it to be with the God they all loved. In this time in which there is so much despair and sadness, and in this world in which we are so frequently reminded that it can truly be a "vale of tears," let Littlest Suffering Souls remind you that this present life is not all there is; let these littlest suffering souls point you to heaven and to Christ.

A practicing psychologist explores the church's role in "soul care," advocating a counseling method that anchors modern therapy in timeless biblical principles.