Resources
Recommended Apps and Podcasts
Lectio 365 App
Lectio 365 is a free daily devotional resource that helps you pray the Bible every day. Written by leaders from the 24-7 Prayer movement, this resource helps you engage with Scripture to inspire prayer and shape your life.
Available on:
App Store | Google Play
Things Above Podcast
The Things Above Podcast is a podcast for “mind discipleship.” It is for those who want to set their minds on “things above” (Col. 3:2). Each week James Bryan Smith will offer a glorious thought—something good and beautiful and true, something excellent and praiseworthy—to fill your mind with heavenly truths.
James Bryan Smith is the author of the Good and Beautiful Series which includes The Good and Beautiful God, The Good and Beautiful You, The Good and Beautiful Life, and The Good and Beautiful Community.
Recommended Books
The global church is facing a discipleship crisis. Here’s how we move forward into transformative discipleship…
Traditional discipleship strategies fail because they only address surface issues and do not go deep enough into the emotional health of individuals. But transformative, emotionally healthy discipleship is a methods-based biblical theology that, when fully implemented, informs every area of a church, ministry, or organization.
In Emotionally Healthy Discipleship, bestselling author Pete Scazzero combines three decades of wisdom with hard lessons from his own ministry journey. He lays out what is required for church leaders to multiply deeply-changed people who are growing in relationship with God, themselves and others.
Geri Scazzero knew there was something desperately wrong with her life. She felt like a single parent raising her four young daughters alone. She finally told her husband, ‘I quit,’ and left the thriving church he pastored, beginning a journey that transformed her and her marriage for the better. In The Emotionally Healthy Woman, Geri provides you a way out of an inauthentic, superficial spirituality to genuine freedom in Christ.
This book is for every woman who thinks, “I can’t keep pretending everything is fine!” Geri speaks like a friend as she uses personal stories and biblical principles to help you find your way out of superficial spirituality and move to a deep, meaningful, life-changing relationship with God.
And the journey begins by quitting. Geri quit being afraid of what others think. She quit lying. She quit denying her anger and sadness. She quit living someone else’s life. When you quit those things that are damaging to your soul or the souls of others, you are freed up to choose other ways of being and relating that are rooted in love and lead to life.
When we are baffled by the insanity of the “other side”—in our politics, at work, or at home—it’s because we aren’t seeing how the conflict itself has taken over.
That’s what “high conflict” does. It’s the invisible hand of our time. And it’s different from the useful friction of healthy conflict. That’s good conflict, and it’s a necessary force that pushes us to be better people.
High conflict is what happens when discord distills into a good-versus-evil kind of feud, the kind with an us and a them. In this state, the brain behaves differently. We feel increasingly certain of our own superiority, and everything we do to try to end the conflict, usually makes it worse. Eventually, we can start to mimic the behavior of our adversaries, harming what we hold most dear.
New York Times bestselling author and award-winning journalist Amanda Ripley investigates how good people get captured by high conflict—and how they break free.
A practical and winsome book, Discovering Our Spiritual Identity covers topics such as: hearing and speaking with God, growing in spiritual friendship, practicing stewardship of our work and play, learning discernment, approaching our death and the world beyond, and living now in the kingdom of God. Chapters are peppered with “holy experiments,” simple practices that bring us into God’s presence and help us experience life as his beloved. At the end of each chapter is a set of questions which are ideal for discussion with one or two spiritual friends or a small group.
A small book packed with truths on whys and ways to pray for the lost, Praying Effectively for the Lost is an excellent tool for intercessory prayer.
This book will teach you how to pray more effectively for your lost loved ones. You will learn to pray according to the Word. The lost are “blinded” to the Gospel; you will learn how to pull down those mindsets so they will be open the Gospel.
You know you love your child. But how can you make sure your child knows it?
The #1 New York Times bestselling The 5 Love Languages has helped millions of couples learn the secret to building a love that lasts. Now discover how to speak your child’s love language in a way that he or she understands. Dr. Gary Chapman and Dr. Ross Campbell help you: discover your child’s love language, assist your child in learning, use the love languages to correct and discipline more effectively, and build a foundation of unconditional love for your child.
Discover your child’s primary language—then speak it—and you will be well on your way to a stronger relationship with your flourishing child.
Socially, mentally, and spiritually, teenagers face a variety of pressures and stresses each day. Despite these pressures, it is still parents who can influence teens the most, and The 5 Love Languages of Teenagers equips parents to make the most of that opportunity.
In this adaptation of the #1 New York Times bestseller The 5 Love Languages, Dr. Gary Chapman explores the world in which teenagers live, explains their developmental changes, and gives tools to help you identify and appropriately communicate in your teen’s love language.
Children of every age long for the gift of The Blessing—the unconditional love and approval that comes from a healthy relationship with their parents. This life-changing gift for Christian parents and their children, essential for instilling a deep sense of worthiness and unshakable emotional well-being, contains five essential elements: meaningful touch, a spoken message, attaching high value, picturing a special feature, and an active commitment.
Offering solid, practical advice and a fresh perspective on making this gift a bigger part of our families, The Blessing powerfully communicates these biblically based elements as necessary to prepare children for positive future relationships, including their relationship with a loving God.
God Is Closer Than You Think shows how you can enjoy a vibrant, moment-by-moment relationship with your heavenly Father. Bestselling author John Ortberg reveals the face of God waiting to be discovered in the complex mosaic of your life. He shows you God’s hand stretching toward you. And, with his gift for storytelling, Ortberg illustrates the ways you can reach toward God and complete the connection—to your joy and his.
Add family faith moments to your daily routine with little or no prep, and share meaningful spiritual experiences with your children! Traci Smith, a pastor and mother of three, offers ways to discover and develop new spiritual practices as a family, whether you’re a new seeker or a lifelong follower. Faithful Families is brimming with easy, do-it-yourself ideas for transforming your family’s everyday moments into sacred moments!
Faithful Families helps you: connect faith to your family’s everyday life; add family faith moments into your daily routine; learn new spiritual practices alongside your children; teach your children to appreciate religious diversity with time-tested non-Christian and Christian spiritual practices; respond to life’s everyday challenges and opportunities with meaningful practices.
In 1741, John Wesley preached his famous sermon titled “The Almost Christian” in which he encouraged people to follow Christ wholeheartedly. We should not be satisfied with being almost Christian but rather strive towards being altogether a Christian.
In Almost Christmas: A Wesleyan Advent Experience, author and pastor Magrey deVega leads a group of authors to explore how we can make the same commitment to Christ during Advent, connecting our Wesleyan heritage with the traditional Advent themes of Love, Hope, Joy, and Peace.