Series in Ministry
Books in Ministry
Max Lucado Essential Bible Study Library
Dive head-first into the Bible study works of best-selling author Max Lucado with the most powerful software available. Theease-of-use of eBible is marriedwith the wealth of Bible study material available from Max Lucado in the Max Lucado Essential Bible Study Library . One Click technology with Lucado's own Bible study guides and Bibles allowyou to create word studies, reports, lists, and much more. The Max Lucado Essential Bible Study Library contains fully-searchable versions of Max's Bibles and New Testament Bible studies, including: Grace For the Moment gift book Grace For the Moment Daily Bible The Lucado Life Lessons Study Bible 19 of Lucado's Life Lessons Bible Study Guides Fully-searchable text ofNKJV, KJV, and NCV Bibles A perfect companion to The Essential Bible Study Library (ISBN 9781418543198).
The Greatest Controversies of Early Christian History
Without the presence of Christianity, our world would be considerably different. Whether we view it in religious, social, or political terms, Christianity has deeply and integrally influenced the Western worldview and way of life. Yet, throughout Christian history, compelling controversies have existed surrounding the faith's first three centuries, when it grew from a persecuted sect into a powerful religion. These controversies bring into question many commonly accepted beliefs about Christianity. In this course, an award-winning professor and New York Times best-selling author offers a penetrating investigation of the 24 most pivotal controversies, shedding light on fallacies that obscure an accurate view of the religion and how it evolved into what it is today. In each lecture, you'll delve into a key issue in Christianity's early development: Did the Jews Kill Jesus? Was Jesus Raised from the Dead? Did the Disciples Write the Gospels? Did Early Christians Accept the Trinity? Is the Book of Revelation about Our Future? Who Chose the Books of the New Testament? You'll delve into the conception of the meshiach (messiah) in Jewish tradition, and the basis for the core Christian claim that a suffering messiah was predicted in the Jewish scriptures. In grasping Paul's role in the early faith, you contemplate the key differences between the teachings of Jesus himself and the Christian view of his death and resurrection. And you trace the ambiguous role in early Christianity of the Jewish scriptures, and how these books came to be accepted as the Christian Old Testament. Explore these and other intriguing questions in this unique inquiry into the core of Christian tradition.
The Historical Jesus
From the late Roman Empire all the way to our own time, no continuously existing institution or belief system has wielded as much influence as Christianity, no figure as much as Jesus. Worshipped around the globe by more than a billion people, he is undoubtedly the single most important figure in the story of Western civilization and one of the most significant in world history altogether. Yet who was Jesus of Nazareth? What was he like? It's a question that's been pondered by people and groups of varying convictions for more than 2,000 years. And everyone with even the faintest knowledge, says Professor Ehrman, has an opinion - with those opinions differing not only among laypeople but even among professional scholars who have devoted their lives to the task of reconstructing what the historical Jesus was probably like and what he most likely said and did. This series of 24 lectures from an award-winning teacher and scholar approaches the subject from a purely historical perspective, with no intention of affirming or denying any particular theological beliefs. He explains why it has proven so difficult to know about the "Jesus of history" and reveals the kinds of conclusions modern scholars have drawn about him. He begins with a discussion of the four New Testament Gospels - our principle source of knowledge about Jesus - and other sources, explaining what they are, how they came to be written, and how biblical scholars plumb them for historical understanding, before integrating them into the historical context of Jesus' life and a scholarly reconstruction of Jesus' words and deeds in light of the best available historical methods and evidence.
The History of the Bible: The Making of the New Testament Canon
What different kinds of books are in the New Testament? When, how, and why were they written? And why did some books, and not others, come to be collected into what Christians came to consider the canon of scripture that would define their belief for all time? With these 12 lectures, get a fast-moving yet thorough introduction to these and other key issues in the development of Christianity. Designed to deepen the understanding of both Christians and non-Christians alike, this lecture series takes as its perspective the historical, rather than the theological, issues behind the development of the Bible. And it's an illuminating perspective, indeed, ranging across issues of language, oral history, the physical limitations of spreading the written word at a time when the printing press lay far in the future, and, of course, the theological forces that were shaping Christianity, molding a commonly accepted canon from the various expressions of the faith spreading across the ancient world. Professor Ehrman recreates the context of the times in which the canon was being assembled so that you can understand what the message of each written work would have meant to ancient Christians. You'll come to see how the diverse books of the New Testament were gathered together into the form we now know, whether it's the four canonical Gospels (whose authorship was only attributed by later Christians), the book of Acts, the 21 Epistles, or the book of Revelation (sometimes called the Apocalypse of John). These lectures are a compelling introduction not only to the development of the Christian canon, but to all of the forces that would play a role in early Christian history.