Flourishing Relationships
Recommended Resources
By Nate Collins
For many years the intersection of gay identity and Christian identity in the United States was a virtual no-man’s land. In All But Invisible, author Nate Collins explores the cultural background of this claim and outlines a vision for Christian community in which straight and nonstraight people might be reconciled so they can flourish together in full awareness of their shared humanity.
Along the way, Collins addresses several questions clustered around the topic of LGBT and Christian experience, such as:
What is the relationship between biblical concepts like desire, lust, and temptation and modern constructs like sexual attraction and orientation?
How do you reconcile aspects of identity that are important to gender and sexual minorities with Christian faith identity?
How might new forms of kinship, such as intentional community or celibate partnership, make the blessings of family life more accessible to gay people in traditional faith communities?
Speaking from his own experience as a gay man in a mixed orientation marriage, Collins is committed to helping faith communities include LGBT people in the family life of the church. He writes for believers who have a traditional sexual ethic and provides a renewed vision of gospel flourishing for gay, lesbian, and other same-sex-attracted individuals.
By Wesley Hill
*Is there a place for celibate, gay Christians in the church? * How do the gospel, holiness, and indwelling sin play out in the life of a Christian experiencing same-sex attraction? And how do brothers and sisters in Christ show love to them? Wesley Hill offers wise counsel that is biblically faithful, theologically serious, and oriented to the life and practice of the church. As a celibate gay Christian, Hill gives us a glimpse of what it looks like to wrestle firsthand with God's "No" to same-sex sexual intimacy. What does it mean for gay Christians to be faithful to God while struggling with the challenge of their homosexuality? What is God's will for believers who experience same-sex desires? Those who choose celibacy are often left to deal with loneliness and the hunger for relationships. How can gay Christians experience God's favor and blessing in the midst of a struggle that for many brings a crippling sense of shame and guilt? Weaving together reflections from his own life and the lives of other Christians, such as Henri Nouwen and Gerard Manley Hopkins, Hill offers a fresh perspective on these questions. He advocates neither unqualified "healing" for those who struggle nor accommodation to temptation, but rather faithfulness in the midst of brokenness.
By Greg Coles
In an age where neither society nor the church knows what to do with gay Christians, Greg Coles tells his own story.
Let's make a deal, you and me. Let's make promises to each other.
I promise to tell you my story. The whole story. I'll tell you about a boy in love with Jesus who, at the fateful onset of puberty, realized his sexual attractions were persistently and exclusively for other guys. I'll tell you how I lay on my bed in the middle of the night and whispered to myself the words I've whispered a thousand times since:
"I'm gay."
I'll show you the world through my eyes. I'll tell you what it's like to belong nowhere. To know that much of my Christian family will forever consider me unnatural, dangerous, because of something that feels as involuntary as my eye color. And to know that much of the LGBTQ community that shares my experience as a sexual minority will disagree with the way I've chosen to interpret the call of Jesus, believing I've bought into a tragic, archaic ritual of self-hatred.
But I promise my story won't all be sadness and loneliness and struggle. I'll tell you good things too, hopeful things, funny things, like the time I accidentally came out to my best friend during his bachelor party. I'll tell you what it felt like the first time someone looked me in the eyes and said, "You are not a mistake." I'll tell you that joy and sorrow are not opposites, that my life has never been more beautiful than when it was most brokenhearted.
If you'll listen, I promise I'll tell you everything, and you can decide for yourself what you want to believe about me.
By Wesley Hill
Friendship is a relationship like no other. Unlike the relationships we are born into, we choose our friends. It is also tenuous--we can end a friendship at any time. But should friendship be so free and unconstrained? Although our culture tends to pay more attention to romantic love, marriage, family, and other forms of community, friendship is a genuine love in its own right. This eloquent book reminds us that Scripture and tradition have a high view of friendship. Single Christians, particularly those who are gay and celibate, may find it is a form of love to which they are especially called.
Writing with deep empathy and with fidelity to historic Christian teaching, Wesley Hill retrieves a rich understanding of friendship as a spiritual vocation and explains how the church can foster friendship as a basic component of Christian discipleship. He helps us reimagine friendship as a robust form of love that is worthy of honor and attention in communities of faith. This book sets forth a positive calling for celibate gay Christians and suggests practical ways for all Christians to cultivate stronger friendships.
By Mark Yarhouse and Julia Sadusky
This book offers a measured Christian response to the diverse gender identities that are being embraced by an increasing number of adolescents. Mark Yarhouse and Julia Sadusky offer an honest, scientifically informed, compassionate, and nuanced treatment for all readers who care about or work with gender-diverse youth: pastors, church leaders, parents, family members, youth workers, and counselors.
Yarhouse and Sadusky help readers distinguish between current mental health concerns, such as gender dysphoria, and the emerging gender identities that some young people turn to for a sense of identity and community. Based on the authors' significant clinical and ministry experience, this book casts a vision for practically engaging and ministering to teens navigating diverse gender-identity concerns. It also equips readers to critically engage gender theory based on a Christian view of sex and gender.
Contents
Part 1: Making Important Distinctions
1. The Transgender Experience and Emerging Gender Identities
2. How Language and Categories Shape Gender Identities
3. Controversies in Care
Part 2: Seeing the Person
4. Foundations for Relationship
5. Locating Your Area of Engagement
6. Locating the Person: A Relational-Narrative Approach
7. Engaging Youth: Looking beneath the Surface
8. Ministry Structures for Youth
9. Recovering a Hermeneutic of Christian Hope
Binding: Paperback
Pub Date: August 18, 2020
Physical Info: 0.7" H x 8.9" L x 6.0" W (0.8 lbs) 256 pages
By Mark A. Yarhouse
In the fog of the culture war, complex issues like gender dysphoria are reduced to slogans and sound bites. And while the war rages over language, institutions and political allegiances, transgender individuals are the ones who end up being the casualties.
Mark Yarhouse, an expert in sexual identity and therapy, challenges the church to rise above the political hostilities and listen to people's stories. In Understanding Gender Dysphoria, Yarhouse offers a Christian perspective on transgender issues that eschews simplistic answers and appreciates the psychological and theological complexity. The result is a book that engages the latest research while remaining pastorally sensitive to the experiences of each person.
In the midst of a tense political climate, Yarhouse calls Christians to come alongside those on the margins and stand with them as they resolve their questions and concerns about gender identity. Understanding Gender Dysphoria is the book we need to navigate these stormy cultural waters.
Christian Association for Psychological Studies (CAPS) Books explore how Christianity relates to mental health and behavioral sciences including psychology, counseling, social work, and marriage and family therapy in order to equip Christian clinicians to support the well-being of their clients.
By Hillary Ferrer
Mama Bear Apologetics® is the book you’ve been looking for. This mom-to-mom guide will equip you to teach your kids how to form their own biblical beliefs about what is true and what is false. Through transparent life stories and clear, practical applications—including prayer strategies—this band of Mama Bears offers you tools to train yourself, so you can turn around and train your kids.
Are you ready to answer the rallying cry, “Mess with our kids and we will demolish your arguments”? Join the Mama Bears and raise your voice to protect your kids—by teaching them how to think through and address the issues head-on, yet with gentleness and respect.
A compelling true tale of love and devotion as a husband cares for his ill wife. He shares the story of their struggles and the remarkable lessons they have learned together about God's love.
Winner of the ECPA Book of the Year Award for Christian Living
Over 100,000 Copies in Print
What is your calling as a parent?
In the midst of folding laundry, coordinating carpool schedules, and breaking up fights, many parents get lost. Feeling pressure to do everything “right” and raise up “good” children, it’s easy to lose sight of our ultimate purpose as parents in the quest for practical tips and guaranteed formulas.
In this life-giving book, Paul Tripp offers parents much more than a to-do list. Instead, he presents us with a big-picture view of God’s plan for us as parents. Outlining fourteen foundational principles centered on the gospel, he shows that we need more than the latest parenting strategy or list of techniques. Rather, we need the rescuing grace of God—grace that has the power to shape how we view everything we do as parents.
Freed from the burden of trying to manufacture life-change in our children’s hearts, we can embrace a grand perspective of parenting overflowing with vision, purpose, and joy.
When doors slam and angry words fly, when things just aren't working out, and even when your spouse has destroyed your trust, there is still hope. If you feel like your marriage is near the breaking point, or even if you've already separated, Gary Chapman will show you how you can give your marriage one more try.
One More Try will help you . . .
Take the next step when blindsided in marriage;
Discover healthy ways to manage frustration and anger;
Effectively deal with loneliness;
Renew hope and trust in your spouse; and
Rebuild your marriage from the ground up.
Distress or even separation do not necessarily mean divorce is imminent. Matter of fact, it's possible that these may even lead to a restored, enriched, growing marriage. The outcome of this challenging time is determined solely by the individuals involved. If you're willing to make the most of that process, then begin the journey with confidence as Gary walks you step-by-step towards healing and hope.
*The content of this book has been significantly revised and updated from its previous title Hope for the Separated.*
By Suzanne Stabile
Most of us have no idea how others see or process their experiences. And that can make relationships hard, whether with intimate partners, with friends, or in our professional lives. Understanding the motivations and dynamics of these different personality types can be the key that unlocks sometimes mystifying behavior in others—and in ourselves.
This book from Suzanne Stabile on the nine Enneagram types and how they behave and experience relationships will guide readers into deeper insights about themselves, their types, and others' personalities so that they can have healthier, more life-giving relationships. No one is better equipped than Suzanne Stabile, coauthor, with Ian Morgan Cron, of The Road Back to You, to share the Enneagram's wisdom on how relationships work—or don’t.
Why do Sixes seem so intimidated and put off by Eights, who only wish the Sixes would stop mulling things over and take action?
Why do Fives seem so unavailable, even to their closest family and friends, while Twos seem to feel everybody else’s feelings but their own and end up irritating people who don’t want their help?
How in the world can Fours be so open and loving to you one day and restrained and distant other times?
The Enneagram not only answers these questions but gives us a way out of our usual finger pointing and judging of other people—and finding them wanting, perplexing, or impossible. Suzanne's generous, sometimes humorous, and always insightful approach reveals why all the types behave as they do. This book offers help in fostering more loving, mature, and compassionate relationships with everyone in our lives.
"I said I was sorry! What more do you want?"
Even in the best of relationships, we mess up. We say and do things we deeply regret later on. So we need to make things right. But just saying you're sorry isn't enough. That's only the first step on the road to restoration.
In The 5 Apology Languages, Gary Chapman, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the 5 Love Languages®, partners with Jennifer Thomas to help you on the journey toward restored relationships. True healing comes when you learn to:
Express regret: "I'm sorry."
Accept responsibility: "I was wrong."
Make restitution: "How can I make it right?"
Plan for change: "I'll take steps to prevent a reoccurrence."
Request forgiveness: "Can you find it in your heart to . . . ?"
Don't let hurts linger or wounds fester. Start on the path to healing today and discover how meaningful apologies can make your friendships, family, and marriage stronger than ever before.
In Ten Lessons to Transform Your Marriage, marital psychologists John and Julie Gottman provide vital tools—scientifically based and empirically verified—that you can use to regain affection and romance lost through years of ineffective communication.
In the 20th Anniversary Edition of this Gold Medallion Award winner, Mike Mason goes on a poetic search to understand the wondrous dynamics of committed love. In highly readable, first-person style, Mason’s writing stimulates readers’ thoughts and prayers and propels couples to deeper intimacy. “A marriage is not a joining of two worlds,” says the author, “but an abandoning of two worlds in order that one new one might be formed.” Rich chapters on “Otherness,” “Vows,” “Intimacy,” “Sex,” “Submission,” and an all-new chapter on “Oneness” lift readers to view the eternal, spiritual nature of this faith-filled, “impossible,” wild—yet wonderful—frontier.
SEX. Splashed across magazine covers, billboards, and computer screens-sex is thrilling, necessary, unavoidable. And everybody's doing it, right?
In Real Sex: The Naked Truth about Chastity, Lauren Winner speaks candidly to single Christians about the difficulty--and the importance--of sexual chastity. With nuance and wit, she talks about her own sexual journey. Never dodging tough terms like "confession" and "sin," she grounds her discussion of chastity first and foremost in scripture. She confronts cultural lies about sex and challenges how we talk about sex in church (newsflash: however wrong it is, premarital sex can feel liberating and enjoyable!). Building on the thought of Wendell Berry, she argues that sex is communal rather than private, personal rather than public.
Refusing to slink away from thorny topics, Winner deftly addresses pornography, masturbation, and the perennial question of "how far is too far?" Winner also digs deeper: What does chastity have to do with loving my neighbor? How does my sexual behavior form habits and expectations? With compassion and grit, she calls Christians, both married and single, to pursue chastity as conversion and amendment of life.
Real Sex will be an essential read for single Christians grappling with chastity, for married Christians committed to monogamy, and for those who counsel them. Discussion questions have been added to the paperback edition.
You may be ignoring the fastest-growing demographic in your community
There are now more single adults than married adults in the United States. Yet the evangelical church often focuses primarily on serving couples and families. As a result, singles may feel undervalued and underserved, causing them to look elsewhere for spiritual nourishment and community engagement.
Through fascinating personal testimonies from a wide variety of single believers, Gina Dalfonzo shows that serving singles well is not difficult--and it benefits everyone. She gives church leaders and lay members alike a rare glimpse into the challenges many single adults face and offers practical ways to involve singles in the life of the church.
“This book is bold and strong and unapologetic. Unflinching, even. Joy Beth doesn’t back down from those hard conversations that need to be happening, not just in our churches but in our small groups, our social circles, our relationships.” —Mandy Hale, creator of The Single Woman and New York Times bestselling author
Did you enter adulthood thinking marriage would naturally find you, only to end up at a second-cousin’s wedding, dodging yet another bouquet the night before you turned thirty? Maybe you’ve started wondering, is this the best the single life has to offer? Joy Beth Smith says it’s not. The single life doesn’t have to be the runner-up version of God’s best. It doesn’t have to leave you constantly waiting for “real life” to begin. Party of One offers a trade: let go of the tired lies weighing you down and turn toward truth. Understand that:
You don’t have to be married to be wise. You don’t have to be a mother to have supernatural love. You don’t have to own a home to be hospitable.
Singleness is not meant to be pitied, shamed, fixed, or even ignored. It is to be celebrated.
God doesn’t promise you a husband, but he does promise comfort, intimacy, and satisfaction.
With humor, self-awareness, and been-there perspective, Party of One delves into the insecurities and struggles of singleness and encourages you to find the good, the true, and the beautiful, to dive headfirst into community, and to stop pressing pause on a life you never expected.
Are you hoping to reignite the passion in your relationship? Join Clifford and Joyce Penner as they share the time-tested secrets to finding fulfillment in your marriage.
Clifford, a licensed clinical psychologist, and Joyce, a registered nurse and clinical nurse specialist, have been married for forty years--and they know firsthand that there are countless barriers that can get in the way of experiencing love and commitment, from anger or a lack of respect to external tension.
But these obstacles don't have to last forever. In The Gift of Sex, the Penners give you the tools you need to move past those barriers and embrace marriage as God intended it.
This revised and updated version of The Gift of Sex features a new introduction, new illustrations, a section on addictions and the Internet, and a timely discussion on sexually transmitted diseases and their consequences. It also asks and answers key questions about biblical marriage, including:
How does sex fit into God's design for marriage?
Why did God create men and women to think about sex differently?
How can I light the spark in my relationship again?
Whether you're newlyweds or you've been married for decades, The Gift of Sex is a timeless guide to discovering the sexual fulfillment that you and your spouse deserve.
What if the way Christians talk about sex actually makes it worse?
Based on a groundbreaking in-depth survey of over twenty thousand women, The Great Sex Rescue pulls back the curtain on what is happening in Christian bedrooms and exposes the problematic evangelical teachings that wreck sex for so many couples--while pointing couples to what they should have been told all along.
Experience the relief of knowing that you are not broken! Elusive pleasure, mismatched desires, perpetual sexual temptation--that doesn't need to be your story any longer.
The Great Sex Rescue is a long overdue corrective to church culture, helping couples awaken the kind of intimacy and passion God intended.
By David Instone-Brewer
Will God allow me to divorce my abusive husband?
Would it be a sin if I remarried?
Divorce and remarriage are major pastoral issues facing every church. Yet when we turn to Scripture for guidance, we often hear conflicting messages about its teachings.
David Instone-Brewer shows how, when properly understood, the New Testament provides faithful, realistic and wise guidance of crucial importance and practical help for the church today.
Discover the Keys to a Healthy StepfamilyLeading stepfamily expert Ron L. Deal reveals the seven fundamental steps to blended family success and provides practical, realistic solutions to the issues you face as a stepfamily. Whether married or soon-to-be-married, you'll discover how to
· Solve the everyday puzzles of stepparenting and stepchildren relationships
· Communicate effectively with an ex-spouse
· Handle stepfamily finances confidently
· "Cook" your stepfamily slowly rather than expect an instant blend
This revised and expanded edition has updated research and two new chapters with even more real-world advice on topics such as stepsibling relationships and later-life stepfamilies.
By Gary Chapman and Ron L Deal
Create a Loving and Safe Environment for Your Blended Family
Blended families face unique challenges, and sadly, good intentions aren't always enough. With so many complex relationships involved, all the normal rules for family life change, even how you apply something as simple as the five love languages.
That's why Gary Chapman, the bestselling author of The 5 Love Languages® and national expert on stepfamilies, Ron Deal, join together in this book to teach you how the five love languages can help your blended family. They'll teach you:
About the unique dynamics of stepfamilies
How to overcome fear and trust issues in marriage
How to develop healthy parenting and step-parenting practices
How the love languages should—and should not—be applied
You're going to face many challenges, but with the right strategies and smart work, your family can be stronger and healthier together.