The Church, Culture and Spirits

The Church, Culture and Spirits PDF Author: Biblical Research Institute
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780925675200
Category : Africa
Languages : en
Pages : 242

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Book Description
Africa is a key nerve center of growth for the Seventh-day Adventist church in the world today. Growth here occurs in the context of ingrained traditions and ideologies, and the church always faces the challenge of steering away from syncretism while seeking to be relevant to the African culture. This book is meant to provide a critical resource to pastors, missionaries, and evangelists as they minister in an increasingly spiritualistic African religious environment.

The Church, Culture and Spirits

The Church, Culture and Spirits PDF Author: Biblical Research Institute
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780925675200
Category : Africa
Languages : en
Pages : 242

Get Book

Book Description
Africa is a key nerve center of growth for the Seventh-day Adventist church in the world today. Growth here occurs in the context of ingrained traditions and ideologies, and the church always faces the challenge of steering away from syncretism while seeking to be relevant to the African culture. This book is meant to provide a critical resource to pastors, missionaries, and evangelists as they minister in an increasingly spiritualistic African religious environment.

Discerning the Spirits

Discerning the Spirits PDF Author: Cornelius Plantinga
Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing
ISBN: 9780802839992
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 190

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Book Description
Christian worship in North America has undergone great change in recent years. But change always brings uncertainty -- at times even division -- about what constitutes "authentic worship." This important book reviews a wide variety of current perspectives and offers a fresh outlook on the contemporary practice of Christian worship. In order to provide the widest, most insightful discussion on present-day worship practices yet assembled, the authors gathered a team of church musicians, ministers, worship leaders, and educators from eight church traditions. Discerning the Spirits is the fruit of their work. Shaped by the wisdom of men and women like Marva Dawn, Justo Gonzalez, C. Michael Hawn, and John Witvliet, this book broadens today's "worship wars" into a bigger, richer discussion that moves from arguments over musical tastes to good thinking about the overall purpose of worship in relation to church life and God himself. Sidebar articles and quotes are meant to draw readers and study groups into dialogue on these issues. Whether one plays a leadership role in church worship or is simply grappling with questions about it, Discerning the Spirits is a must-read.

Discerning Spirits

Discerning Spirits PDF Author: Nancy Mandeville Caciola
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 1501702173
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 514

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Book Description
Trance states, prophesying, convulsions, fasting, and other physical manifestations were often regarded as signs that a person was seized by spirits. In a book that sets out the prehistory of the early modern European witch craze, Nancy Caciola shows how medieval people decided whom to venerate as a saint infused with the spirit of God and whom to avoid as a demoniac possessed of an unclean spirit. This process of discrimination, known as the discernment of spirits, was central to the religious culture of Western Europe between 1200 and 1500.Since the outward manifestations of benign and malign possession were indistinguishable, a highly ambiguous set of bodily features and behaviors were carefully scrutinized by observers. Attempts to make decisions about individuals who exhibited supernatural powers were complicated by the fact that the most intense exemplars of lay spirituality were women, and the "fragile sex" was deemed especially vulnerable to the snares of the devil. Assessments of women's spirit possessions often oscillated between divine and demonic interpretations. Ultimately, although a few late medieval women visionaries achieved the prestige of canonization, many more were accused of possession by demons.Caciola analyzes a broad array of sources from saints' lives to medical treatises, exorcists' manuals to miracle accounts, to find that observers came to rely on the discernment of bodies rather than seeking to distinguish between divine and demonic possession in purely spiritual terms.

Seven Deadly Spirits

Seven Deadly Spirits PDF Author: T. Scott Daniels
Publisher: Baker Academic
ISBN: 0801031710
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 160

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Book Description
Examines the nature of the seven angels of the churches addressed in Revelation to show how congregations can escape the powers that hold them captive.

The Spirit and the Secular

The Spirit and the Secular PDF Author: Phil William Zarns
Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers
ISBN: 1725269163
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 115

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Book Description
How does one make disciples and plant the church in a secular environment? Does it take technical production? Is a great venue or "mother" church necessary? Does it take a well-networked team? Tangible factors such as these are easily remedied by consulting seasoned, church planting experts. Yet, what if some obstacles to plant the church aren't tangible at all? The Spirit and the Secular examines the ways that Spirit-led Christians trust the Holy Spirit while church planting amidst a secular cultural backdrop. A review of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles traces a Spirit-led Christ and Spirit-led church as they make disciples. To better discern the challenge of what it means to be a contemporary church planter in Sweden, a historical review of Swedish culture reveals the rise of secularism alongside of the flourish of the Pentecostal church of the 1900s. What follows is a groundbreaking fieldwork study using a current, investigative interview method, Q-Methodology, measuring the perceptions of thirty church planters in Sweden who reveal their collective ideal and differing practices. The study wraps with a comprehensive analysis grounding the research in a theory of Spirit-led church planting.

Territorial Spirits and World Evangelisation?

Territorial Spirits and World Evangelisation? PDF Author: Chuck Lowe
Publisher: Mentor
ISBN: 9781857923995
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Over the last two decades, a new theory and practice of spiritual warfare has taken hold around the world. This teaching proposes the existence of "territorial spirits." Along with the theory has come a new practice of spiritual warfare, ruling demons are named, their territories identified, and they are then bound or cursed.

The Essence of the Church

The Essence of the Church PDF Author: Craig Van Gelder
Publisher: Baker Books
ISBN: 1585585017
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 213

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Book Description
This fresh perspective on the church explores its essential nature as a community of people governed by the Word and led and taught by the Spirit.

The Wisdom of the Spirit

The Wisdom of the Spirit PDF Author: Canon Martyn Percy
Publisher: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.
ISBN: 1472435656
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 229

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Book Description
In this groundbreaking book exploring Christianity and contemporary culture, internationally-renowned scholars interface with the legacy of Andrew Walker’s work and look forward in their own predictions of trends. Following Walker’s special interests in house churches, charismatic renewal, culture and faith, this book picks up on these themes and also looks more broadly at topics such as Pentecostalism, Alpha and post-Evangelicalism.

The Holy Spirit and the Church

The Holy Spirit and the Church PDF Author: David Mansfield
Publisher: Lulu.com
ISBN: 132655493X
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 118

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Book Description
An exploration of the data in 1st Corinthians regarding the Holy Spirit and the Church. Looking at the baptism in the Spirit, the gifts and ministry of power. In this book we explore prophecy, speaking in tongues and interpretation, messages of wisdom and knowledge, healing and miracles, distinguishing of spirits, and how they should work in the contemporary church.

Spirit-Filled World

Spirit-Filled World PDF Author: Allan Heaton Anderson
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319737309
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 274

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Book Description
This book is about African Pentecostalism and its relationship to religious beliefs about a pervading spirit world. It argues that Pentecostalism keeps both a continuous and a discontinuous relationship in tension. Based on field research in a South African township, including qualitative interviews and focus group discussions, the study explores the context of African Pentecostalism as a whole and how it interacts with the concepts of ancestors, divination, and various types of spirit. Themes discussed include the reasons for the popularity of healing, exorcism, the “prosperity gospel,” the experience of the Holy Spirit, Spirit manifestations and practices resembling both traditional and biblical precedents, as well as scholarly discussions on African Pentecostalism from theological and social scientific disciplines. The book suggests that the focus on a spirit-filled world affects all kinds of events and explains the rapid growth of Pentecostalism outside the western world.