"Prayer is not so much about convincing God to do what we want God to do as it is about convincing ourselves to do what God wants us to do." —from the IntroductionActivists Shane Claiborne and Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove show how prayer and action must go together. Their exposition of key Bible passages provides concrete examples of how a life of prayer fuels social engagement and the work of justice. Phrases like "give us this day our daily bread" and "forgive us our debts as we forgive our...

2018 Foreword INDIES Book of the Year Award Finalist—Multicultural"I am a man torn in two. And the gospel I inherited is divided."Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove grew up in the Bible Belt in the American South as a faithful church-going Christian. But he gradually came to realize that the gospel his Christianity proclaimed was not good news for everybody. The same Christianity that sang, "Amazing grace, how sweet the sound" also perpetua...

Building Up the Church: Live Experiments in Faith, Hope, and Love, the companion volume to Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove's book, New Monasticism: What It Has to Say to Today's Church (2008), is a practical study guide to invite the church to imagine that "another ways is possible" as it lives into its identity as "God's peculiar people" (Titus 2:14). Its stories, reflection questions, and suggested exercises are designed to catalyze local churches and Christian communities into becoming "labor...

For four decades, the Rev. Dr. Jonathan R. Wilson has cultivated an imagination for "kingdom realism" as a pastor, teacher, theologian, and friend. To celebrate his seventieth birthday, Kingdom Come has gathered reflections from fellow theologians, popular authors, poets, and practitioners to mark both the range of Wilson's influence on the Christian church and the consistency of his prayer and work for God's kingdom to come here on earth as it is in heaven. With contributions from: Isaac ...

Readers' Choice Award WinnerBest Books About the Church from Byron Borger, Hearts and Minds BookstoreFast food. Fast cars. Fast and furious. Fast forward. Fast . . . church?The church is oftenidealized (or demonized) as the last bastion of a bygone era, dragging our feet as we're pulled into new moralities and new spiritualities. We guard our doctrine and our piety with great vigilance. But we often fail to notice how quickly we're ...

A pastor’s frank advice for Christians who want to bring the gospel to their neighbors.Gold Medal Winner, 2016 Illumination Book Award in ministry/mission, Independent PublishersHow can Christians represent the love of Christ to their neighbors (let alone people in foreign countries) in an age when Christianity has earned a bad name from centuries of intolerance and cultural imperialism? Is it enough to love and serve them? Can you win thei...

Surprising teachers. Tragic losses. Unexpected gifts. Every neighborhood has stories, and ways of singing the stories of their place. Start digging in, and you find all sorts of music. In a neighborhood skilled in improvisation, like Enderly Park, you also discover new ways to sing those songs, and a choir of new kinfolk to sing them with. Since 2005, author and saxophonist Greg Jarrell has been learning the songs of Enderly Park, his Charlotte neighborhood. A Riff of Love explores the rif...

Through Iraqis' eyes--through their stories--this book "tells the truth" about what war and the U.S. government's antiterrorism policies have really meant for them. Iraqis recount the abuses they experienced in the U.S. and new Iraqi detention systems, the excessive violence, and collective punishment of the U.S.-led occupying forces, as well as tensions between Kurds and Arab Iraqis--tensions rooted in Saddam Hussein's genocide against the Kurds. Stories coming out of Iraq between 2004 an...

If the church is more than just a building, what could it mean to live in it--to inhabit it as a way of life? From their location in new monastic communities, Otto, Stock, and Wilson-Hartgrove ask what the church can learn from St. Benedict's vows of conversion, obedience, and stability about how to live as the people of God in the world. In storytelling and serious engagement with Scripture, old wisdom breathes life into a new monasticism. But, like all monastic wisdom, these reflections ...

**A definitive new history of the world’s most watched sporting event—just in time for the 2026 tournament"Wilson is the game’s pre-eminent popular historian."—Observer (UK)An Irish Times Best Sports Book of the Year**Since 1930, the World Cup has become a truly global obsession. It is the most watched sporting event on the planet, and 211 teams competed to make it into the 2022 tournament. From its inception, it has also been a vehicle for far mor...

SHORTLISTED IN THE CHARLES TYRWHITT SPORTS BOOK AWARDS 2025LONGLISTED FOR THE 2025 WILLIAM HILL SPORTS BOOK OF THE YEARIs it football any more?'Fascinating and persuasive' The Herald'Everyone involved in the VAR controversy should read this short, beautifully-written book and think again' Sir Michael BarberIn 2019, the English Premier League introduced the V...

What modern church doesn't call itself a "community"? Yet for how many is it real? How many churches form disciples intimately connected enough to call themselves Christ's "body"? How many form disciples who know the relational arts that create a robust unity? How many form disciples practiced in the ways of sacrificial love? Pastor John Alexander, a thirty-year veteran of living in Christian communities, yearns for all the wonder and promise of the New Testament vision of church to come t...