Articles for tag: Standard Publishing

September 22, 2011

Christian Standard

Doing Nothing Is Doing Something

By Mandy Smith The first 35 years of my life I honored God by doing. My plan for the next 35 years is also to honor him by not doing. Exodus 34:21 helped bring me to this turning point. It says: “Six days you shall labor, but on the seventh day you shall rest; even during the plowing season and harvest you must rest.” Around my 35th year I found I had worked myself out and had nothing more to give. My plan to single-handedly save the world was failing miserably since I could barely manage the grocery shopping. So

September 15, 2011

Christian Standard

Taking the First Bite Out of Biblical Illiteracy

By Jim Eichenberger An old joke asks, “How do you eat an elephant?” The response, of course, is “One bite at a time.” The church of the early 21st century seems to agree that biblical illiteracy is the elephant on our plate. Anecdotes abound of believers who confuse Abraham of Ur with Abraham Lincoln and who can name all four Beatles but not all four Gospels. How can we call others to the message given to us by God if many of our own brothers and sisters in the faith do not have a good working knowledge of our treasured

August 17, 2011

Christian Standard

How Churches Can Help Children Pray

By Katie Barbee There are so many things we, as adults, must teach children about prayer””persistence being one of them. I believe that teaching children how to pray certainly starts at home. After praying for a baby brother or sister for nearly one and one-half years, our 5-year-old son Drew prayed aloud one night: “Dear God, thank you for my family. Thank you for my friends . . . could you please give us a baby, whenever you think it”s time? Oh, never mind””could you just give me a puppy?” My husband and I tried not to laugh until we

August 15, 2011

Christian Standard

The Message Is Relentless

By Dale Reeves When Beth Guckenberger told me that we had an opportunity to advertise the cover of her book, Relentless Hope, on a car that would be racing in the Quaker State 400 Sprint Cup on July 9, 2011, I was absolutely thrilled! I immediately shared with my marketing manager the opportunity to have Standard Publishing represented at the Kentucky Speedway. We started wondering, Has anyone ever advertised a book in a NASCAR race before? Before long we were providing art files to NASCAR driver and Back2Back supporter Michael McDowell, and we quickly realized that he is a great

August 12, 2011

Christian Standard

An Embarrassment of Riches (Part 3: The Most Popular Translations)

By Mark S. Krause   Last week we looked at numbers eight through five on the list of top-selling English Bibles. The article included a survey of the presuppositions behind the translations, and their audiences. This week we will look at the top four. As before, we will compare the treatment of Psalm 8:4 and Matthew 16:18 in each version reviewed (see bottom for fuller explanation of our test verses).   4. New Living Translation The New Living Translation (NLT) first appeared in 1996 with a substantial update in 2007. Its roots can be traced to Kenneth Taylor”s The Living

August 11, 2011

Christian Standard

Get Ready for the Adventure!

By Mark A. Taylor Believe it or not, many church leaders have already started thinking about NEXT summer”s Vacation Bible School! That”s why Standard Publishing announced the 2012 VBS theme this July. Next year we”ll partner with you to bring “Adventures on Promise Island” to your church, and we can hardly wait. I”m excited about this course because . . . “¢ It”s biblical. Each lesson features a Bible story with powerful reminders of God”s life-saving love: I Am With You (Isaiah 41:10). Look how he protected Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego (Daniel 3:1, 4-28). I Care About You (1 Peter

August 1, 2011

Christian Standard

An Embarrassment of Riches (Part 1: Why Different Translations?)

By Mark S. Krause This year marks the 400th anniversary of the publication of the King James Version, the most famous English Bible translation of all time. The KJV continues to be used in many pulpits and Bible classes. Standard Publishing uses the KJV as the base translation for its enormously popular adult-level Standard Lesson Commentary. In the 19th century, after many years when the KJV was virtually the only version available, changes in English began to build pressure for new translations. KJV words such as thee, thou, hath, hast, wert, and wot were considered archaic. Many desired a Bible

July 27, 2011

Christian Standard

Standard Publishing Donates Books, Resources

Standard Publishing has partnered with Matthew 25: Ministries to reach out through church communities ministering in disaster areas around the world. To date, Standard Publishing has donated more than 19 tractor-trailer loads of Christian books and other resources to Matthew 25: Ministries for redistribution worldwide. These messages of hope and Bible truth have gone, for example, to sufferers in the wake of natural disasters in Joplin, Missouri; Alabama; Japan; and Haiti. Each year Matthew 25: Ministries serves more than 12 million individuals in the U.S. and around the world, largely through redistribution of donated goods. “We are pleased to work

July 26, 2011

Christian Standard

Read It for the Stories

By Mark A. Taylor   I”m reading Unleashed, Dudley Rutherford”s brainchild and Standard Publishing”s new release based on the sermons at this summer”s North American Christian Convention. And I”m a fan. I expected the book to be full of solid scriptural teaching. But I didn”t expect the book to draw me in so that I didn”t want to put it down. I didn”t expect it to make me laugh out loud or fight back tears. Unleashed will be purchased for many reasons, but my advice is, get the book for its stories. You”ll share them with your spouse. You”ll use

June 30, 2011

Christian Standard

NASCAR Driver Gives Orphan Care a Boost

Standard Publishing author Beth Guckenberger has teamed up with NASCAR driver Michael McDowell to promote orphan care. Guckenberger, director of Back2Back Ministries, is a veteran of efforts to help impoverished children across the globe, with a focus in Mexico, Nigeria, and India. But this is the first time NASCAR has been a part of the solution. McDowell, an up-and-coming NASCAR rookie, wants to do his part to support Guckenberger”s ministry. That includes putting the cover of Guckenberger”s newest book Relentless Hope on his car as he competes in the Quaker State 400 at the Kentucky Speedway July 9. He”ll also

June 22, 2011

Christian Standard

The Verse that Saved My Life

By Mark Atteberry It happened on my last day of Bible college. It was a ceremony dreamed up by several members of our senior class, something inspirational to do as a part of our final chapel service. Each senior would walk to the podium and call the name of a member of the junior class. The junior whose name had been called would then stand and listen as the senior read a specially chosen verse of Scripture. Several of my classmates thought it would be a good way for us to say goodbye. When the idea was sprung on me,

June 17, 2011

Christian Standard

Dead Guys and a Living Church

By LeRoy Lawson Southern Seen: Meditations on Past and Present Larry T. McGehee, Edited by B. J. Hutto Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 2005 The First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt T. J. Stiles New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2009 The Church Awakening: An Urgent Call for Renewal Charles R. Swindoll New York: Faith Words, 2010 What so disappoints me about Larry T. McGehee is that he is dead. You read someone”s book, you become enamored of his wit and charm, you look forward to reading more and maybe even meeting him. Then you discover you can”t. As

June 12, 2011

Christian Standard

Sustained by the Word

By Kay Moll I was 22 years old. My husband of eight months had left our home in Illinois to travel to Homecoming at Johnson Bible College in Tennessee early on a snowy February morning with five teenagers from the small congregation we were serving in Illinois. A small group of us from the church had prayed with them for safety on the trip and watched them drive away. A little while later I went to the junior high school where I was teaching English and history and began my workday. Around 10:00 a.m., a fellow teacher stuck her head

June 1, 2011

Christian Standard

Same-Sex Marriage””What Should We Do?

By Ben Cachiaras Editor”s note: As the Maryland state legislature considered a bill to legalize same-sex marriage, earlier this year, Ben Cachiaras encouraged his congregation, Mountain Christian Church, Joppa, Maryland, to respond in a way that honors Christ. (The bill ultimately died without being passed.) Below is an excerpt from what Ben wrote in March. Christians need to think carefully about this issue. Here are a few incomplete thoughts and observations, offered humbly into the discussion: “¢ The landscape in America has changed. Recent polls confirm what we already know””that a growing number of Americans are prepared to recognize gay

May 23, 2011

Christian Standard

How Could a Loving God Send Anyone to Hell?

By Jeff Vines Editor”s note: Five years ago we published a series of articles by Jeff Vines that dealt with three difficult questions that are often stumbling blocks for Christians as well as nonbelievers. The articles described a long conversation Jeff had with a circle of skeptics he met in an Australian restaurant. With the current discussion about the reality of Hell, we felt it helpful to reprint the third article in this series. To get all three articles (the first are “How Can We Believe in God with So Much Evil in the World?” and “How Can You Say

May 22, 2011

Christian Standard

Rob Bell Isn”t Your Biggest Concern

By Brian Jones With the release this spring of Rob Bell”s new book, Love Wins, we finally have confirmation of what many of us have suspected for years””he”s a flipping genius. Only a brilliant thinker and writer could make heresy sound like refreshing orthodoxy. But this is in fact what he”s done, with flair. Taking something so clear and unambiguous as the reality of Hell after death for nonbelievers and replacing it with false hope, and making even the most grounded among us scratch our heads, is no easy feat. The fact is we shouldn”t be surprised””this has been going

April 16, 2011

Christian Standard

I Bought It with Tip Money

By Chris Travis I bought the Bible that changed my life while working as a delivery driver for Papa John”s pizza””literally, while working. I stopped at a local bookstore during a shift. I bought it with tip money. I can”t remember whose generosity financed that pivotal purchase, but it”s fun to imagine how my customers might have felt about it. Would they have been thrilled? Appalled? I doubt they had any idea what God would do with the couple bucks they gave me. As the door to the bookstore swung shut behind me, a bell jingled against the glass, sounding

March 12, 2011

Christian Standard

A Dangerous Book

By Pat Magness “Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world” (James 1:27, King James Version). I don”t recall ever hearing a sermon on this verse. It doesn”t get read at weddings, funerals, ordinations, or baptisms. It probably isn”t on anyone”s top-10 list of best-loved Scripture passages; yet this little verse once turned my life upside down and has affected me ever since. Isn”t it strange how a verse that has always been there, quietly unobtrusive in its place, suddenly

March 3, 2011

Christian Standard

Magazine Recommends “˜Eats with Sinners”

Eats with Sinners: Reaching Hungry People Like Jesus Did by CHRISTIAN STANDARD blogger and contributing editor Arron Chambers was named one of Outreach magazine”s recommended resources of the year in its new issue out this week. “Chambers offers a pragmatic and concrete approach to evangelism hospitality,” the magazine writes. “Excellent for use in local churches and groups.” Eats with Sinners is published by Standard Publishing. To learn more about the book and to order it, click here.

February 28, 2011

Christian Standard

Learning to Trust

By Clark Tanner Do you have a life verse? Almost 30 years ago I was challenged to find one. I can remember the location perfectly. My wife and I had been invited by several people from our church to attend a weeklong gathering at the Navigator”s Conference Center in Colorado Springs, Colorado. During one of the morning sessions, a speaker challenged us about having a life verse from the Bible. Then, in our small group discussion, people kept talking about their life verses and how meaningful they were. I remember thinking, I just need to know the Bible””why a life

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