Drawing on thirty years’ experience among Hindus, Timothy Shultz writes this book as a testimony of the kingdom of God growing in a non-Christian environment. Disciple Making among Hindus: Making Authentic Relationships Grow describes how Hindu people experience and respond to Jesus Christ. What are the core values and rhythms of their cultural world? What are the patterns of community and discipleship that help them draw closer to Jesus? Through moving personal stories, biblical reflection, and practical wisdom, Shultz introduces us to the centrality of family, the covenantal relationships that make up Hindu social life, and the yearning for authentic spiritual experience. While this book will benefit anyone wanting to make disciples among Hindus, it is far more than a strategy of contextualization or a blueprint for successful evangelism. Read it to discover the beauty of Hindus as Jesus sees them—and the beauty of Jesus through Hindu eyes.

Building Authentic Relationships with Hindus Indians make up the world’s largest diaspora community, and most of them are Hindus of diverse backgrounds, languages, and cultures. Millions of Hindus have migrated abroad in recent decades and are well-settled in different countries while many more are expected to be dispersed far and wide in the coming years. Many of them are highly educated and skilled, professionally successful, culturally adaptive, and very religious in their outlook. Sharing Jesus with Hindus is the collective wisdom of many seasoned ministry leaders and practitioners about how to minister effectively to contemporary global Hindus. The contributors are situated in different parts of the world, and some come from Hindu backgrounds themselves. Emerging from an international conference on mission to and among Hindus worldwide, this book provides practical ministry strategies and scholarly reflections drawn from decades of insight. The authors have experience in diasporic living and ministering to Hindus in diverse contexts. Learn how to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with your new neighbors from the Indian subcontinent. Avoid common mistakes and be an effective Christian witness to Hindus globally. Here is an essential resource in the toolkit of every church and Christian ministry worldwide.

A Call to Follow Jesus When He Challenges Our Traditions There are many challenges to adequately representing Jesus to the majority world, and often Western Christian traditions create unnecessary hindrances to people accepting His truth. This book grew out of many interviews with Indian Jesus-followers—both Christians and Yesu bhaktas—who identified painful stumbling blocks to receiving and sharing the gospel. While Hindus often have a high view of Jesus, they struggle with the conventions, practices, and labels around "church." Christian Barriers to Jesus uniquely challenges readers to examine nine barrier-producing Christian traditions, exploring: • The assumptions Christians may hold about the value, origin, or necessity of their customs • The concerns Hindus commonly raise about traditions that confuse, offend, or alienate them • Teachings from Jesus in Scripture that often question the same ideas or practices Pennington suggests that by not asking deep enough questions about what is essential for following Jesus and what is a non-essential human invention, the church is unnecessarily alienating millions of people from Him. As a body, it is time to honestly address these concerns, developing new patterns of discipleship that reveal Jesus’s heart for breaking down barriers instead of creating them. The analysis presented in this book will empower readers to critically examine their personally cherished traditions and the purity of the gospel they present, with insights that are relevant in all contexts.

Focus on unreached people groups and the emergence of a global church have not yet eliminated massive gaps in the spread of the gospel. Differences between Hindu and Christian traditions account for the uneven reception of the gospel of Christ among Hindu peoples. Contextualization, best practices, and movements to Christ are central discussion points in response. In Cultural Gaps, H. L. Richard brings Benjamin Robinson, a forgotten nineteenth-century pioneer missionary, back into this conversation by reviving his memoir, In the Brahmans’ Holy Land, with a new foreword, extensive footnotes, and a new introduction. Robinson’s experiences in south India in the 1880s remain relevant, particularly his attempts at authentic interreligious encounter and his struggle to adequately integrate into the Hindu context. Robinson did not stop at language acquisition, cultural study, or personal relationships, but felt called to adapt his lifestyle further, trusting in God’s help. Although his engagement with Hindus was cut short by health problems, he had a deep humility, an unflagging commitment to learn, and an exemplary sense of inadequacy for a high calling. Robinson’s honesty regarding personal struggles with the perplexity of understanding Hindus relates immediately with current realities. His memoir raises important questions about faithful service and trusting God for an outcome that may still be yet to come. The path forward for better cross-cultural engagement is clearly present in the life and thought of this significant pioneer.

This book is a printed edition of the Special Issue Religious Experience in the Hindu Tradition that was published in Religions

"Don't be fooled by the title of this book. If you are expecting another dry heap of irrelevant missiological research you are going to be sadly disappointed. With flair and wit Cody C. Lorance slices through the chaff of ethnographic examination to produce Ethnographic Chicago, a lively and energetic missiological rumination that has major ramifications for the Southern Baptist churches, as well as further afield. The local denominational venture is presented complete with all its warts and sparkling insights to encourage other North American missioners to employ similar missional reflection as well as to serve as a methodological case study to bring about growth for the Kingdom's sake." Dr. Robert L. Gallagher Associate Professor of Intercultural Studies Wheaton College Graduate School

Your hands-on guide to one of the world's major religions The dominant religion of India, "Hinduism" refers to a wide variety of religious traditions and philosophies that have developed over thousands of years. Today, the United States is home to approximately one million Hindus. If you've heard of this ancient religion and are looking for a reference that explains the intricacies of the customs, practices, and teachings of this ancient spiritual system, Hinduism For Dummies is for you! Provides a thorough introduction to this earliest and popular world belief system Information on the rites, rituals, deities, and teachings associated with the practice of Hinduism Explores the history and teachings of the Vedas, Brahmans, and Upanishads Offers insight into the modern daily practice of Hinduism around the world Continuing the Dummies tradition of making the world's religions engaging and accessible to everyone, Hinduism For Dummies is your hands-on, friendly guide to this fascinating religion.

50 Years of Mobilizing for Frontier Missions “Do not despise the day of small beginnings.” These words from the book of Zachariah were prophetically spoken by famed missiologist Arthur Glasser to the inaugural Perspectives class in 1974. The mystery of transformation from a tiny classroom discussion into a sweeping frontier mission seems lost to time. The fascinating connection between the Perspectives movement, the frontier mission movement, and church planting movements is a story rarely told yet vital to understanding the spread of the gospel to resistant populations. Yvonne Huneycutt’s Propelled by Hope unfolds the hidden tapestry of these interconnected movements through sixty personal interviews and inspiring anecdotes. Huneycutt explains how the Jesus Movement transformed disillusioned youth into fervent volunteers for mission. Discover not just history but a spiritual journey that offers lessons, inspiration, and encouragement for today's believers. Whether you are a mission leader, a student of missiology, or someone seeking to understand God's movement in the world, this book will deepen your insight into the strategies, goals, and personal stories that have shaped modern missions.

Taking the analysis of worldwide Christianity to a deeper level of detail, this volume focuses on Christianity in East and Southeast Asia, covering every country and offering both reliable demographic information and original interpretative essays by indigenous scholars and practitioners. It maps patterns of growth and decline, assesses major traditions and movements, analyses key themes, and examines current trends. As a comprehensive account of the presence of Christianity in every country in East and Southeast Asia, this volume is set to become a standard work of reference in its field.

For the first time in history, large numbers of people from the world’s major non-Christian religions are following Jesus as Lord. Surprisingly for many Western Christians, they are choosing to do so within the religious communities of their birth and outside of institutional Christianity. How does this work, and how should we respond to these movements? This long-awaited anthology brings together some of the best writings on the topic of insider movements. Diverse voices explore this phenomenon from the perspectives of Scripture, history, theology, missiology, and the experience and identity of insider believers. Those who are unfamiliar with the subject will find this book a crucial guide to a complex conversation. Students and instructors of mission will find it useful as a reader and reference volume. Field workers and agencies will discover in these chapters welcome starting points for dialogue and clearer communication. The first book to provide a comprehensive survey of the topic of insider movements, Understanding Insider Movements is an indispensable companion for those who want to glimpse the creative, unexpected, boundary-crossing ways God is at work among the peoples of the world in their diverse religious communities.