Trying Man Trying God

Revised version of the author's thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Chicago, 2009.

Meira Z. Kensky examines scenes of the divine courtroom in Jewish and Christian literature from antiquity. Her central argument is that these courtroom scenes, though fanciful in nature and often remarkably entertaining, are part of a serious inquiry taking place throughout the Mediterranean as to the nature of divine justice. These scenes can contain explicit criticism about the adequacy and equity of God's justice, or can be used to attempt to vindicate God from charges of injustice and inequity. What is important is that this amounts to a rotation of the courtroom scene: the courtroom, rather than simply functioning on the narrative level with the reader as an additional spectator, is rotated so that the reader is in the judicial position, and it is the judge and the process itself which are being adjudicated. When man is tried, it is truly God who is on trial.

Pastor and Grammy-winning musician Smokie Norful inspires readers to go to God and experience more fulfillment, delight, power, and success than they ever dreamed. According to Smokie Norful, sometimes our lives feel like a pot of rice in his grandmother’s kitchen: hissing, boiling over, about to explode and create panic. The only way to avoid an explosion is to take the lid off—that is, to stop being trapped inside ourselves and instead look to God and his grace to make us all he intends us to be. Taking the lid off, Norful argues, entails four actions: look inward, experiencing the cleansing of forgiveness and the power of the Holy Spirit; look outward, seeking for others to experience the joy of living for God and have the best God has to offer; look upward and marvel at God’s love and strength to accomplish his purposes; and move onward, devising a strategy to accomplish all God has put in our hearts to do. When we take these four steps, the pressure goes down, we gain peace and perception, and things work out much better in the end. When we finally take the lid off, we can become the people God has created us to be and do what we were intended to do. We get in touch with the unlimited power of his Spirit, we’re directed by the challenge of his purposes, and we experience the joy of seeing him use us to change lives. All of us need help in taking the lid off in order to trust God, take action, and reach our full potential.

After a health scare, an atheist travels the world searching for an experience of the divine, from meditating with Tibetan lamas in Nepal and unblocking his chi in China, to studying the Kabbalah in Israel.

As a Christian, do you ever wonder why you still struggle with sin? Are you tired of repeating the same old mistakes? Have you found yourself caught in a seemingly never-ending cycle of habitual sin and shame? Are you tired of the feelings of defeat and long for the freedom, peace, and victory promised in being a new creation? Then it's time to face him. He is called the old man, the old self, or our old nature. We all have one. Are you ready to look him in the eye? Are you ready to fight him? Are you ready to live free? Let it begin today. It's time to kill your old man and be the person God sees in you. "Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. For he that is dead is freed from sin. Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him" (Rom. 6:6-8).

Man was lost, when God found man, but God is never lost. I was just a country boy, one who did not know anything, but God took me to the highest place. I did not know that I would be able to make it, for my life was hard, but the Lord was with me. He took me all the way from my homeland, from my family and friends, and gave me the best things in the world: my wife, and our five lovely daughters and ten grandchildren. Remember this, God is my best thing, and my wife is my good thing. Thanks to God and to you.

Christians worldwide agree there is coming a moment when the true church, comprised of faithful followers of Christ, will be suddenly caught up, snatched away, raptured--to be forever with their Lord. But what will you do, how will you react, if this disappearance does not occur before Antichrists Great Tribulation begins? Are we prepared and equipped to take a stand in a culture, a new world order, that will be passionately opposed to our beliefs? The god-man: seed of Satan is the first in a two-part, pre-wrath rapture thriller that tells the riveting story of the rise of the treacherous Antichrist, the god-man who will come to prominence during the seventieth week of Daniel. As Romiti and his false prophet, Laroque, implement their ambitious plot to rule a global empire, their plans are obstructed by a series of worldwide disasters--war, famine and disease. Much to the surprise of some, the church finds itself a reluctant witness to apocalyptic events that were to be studied--not experienced! Sticks, an evangelical pastor in Mississippi, and Uri, the pastor of a messianic congregation in Jerusalem, have carefully prepared their congregations for a rapture that occurs within the seventieth week of Daniel. Led by these activist pastors and a host of others like them, their congregations boldly engage a hostile global community as the God-fearers courageously live out the gospel in ways that are reminiscent of the early church.