Chaos and Grace
Discovering the Liberating Work of the Holy Spirit
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- 9,49 €
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- 9,49 €
Publisher Description
It's no secret that we are addicted to control. We work to control our time, our TVs, our weight, and even our faith lives. We strive for efficiency and quantifiable results. But all that control, we soon find out, is exhausting. And it is contrary to God's plan for us. In Chaos and Grace, Mark Galli offers readers freedom from the need for control and order by reintroducing them to the mysterious work of the Holy Spirit.
In this insightful book, Galli exposes our individual mistakes and the church's foibles and points the way to grace--which, as it happens, usually lies through chaos and crisis. Through Scripture he shows us that this problem is not unique to modern believers and helps us learn from the stories of God's people through the ages as they gave up and gave in to the transforming work of the Holy Spirit.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Lamenting the ways the contemporary church turns "the gospel of liberation into a religion of control," Galli (Beyond Smells and Bells), senior managing editor of Christianity Today, explores the work of the Holy Spirit (whom he labels "the Mischief Maker") in the biblical books of Genesis and Acts, and also in the church today. Contrasting God's unruliness with humanity's addiction to order, Galli offers intriguing, often humorous interpretations of stories involving Adam, Eve, Abraham, and Sarah, in which humans respond to God's generous promises with distrust and a desire to take charge. The chapter "A Variety of Religious Oppression" examines the slippery path by which religious leaders become upholders of "order and peace" rather than missionaries of liberation. Skewering the "church growth movement" with its current emphasis on "marketing" rather than witnessing, Galli insists Christians are most faithful when allowing the Spirit to do transformative work, and unfaithful when structuring their lives to avoid intimacy with God. Thoughtful and provocative, this book offers cultural, psychological, and scriptural insights worth pondering for Christian leaders and laity.
