Awarded the 2007 National Research Prize SAES/AEFA. This study is a reappraisal of John Bunyan in the light of the dissenting religious culture of the late-seventeenth century. Charges of schism and fanaticism were repeatedly levelled against Bunyan, both from within the dissenting community and without, but far from being chastened by these accusations, Bunyan responded with a religious discourse marked by a rhetoric of excess. The focus of this book is therefore upon Bunyan's overwhelming spiritual experiences, especially the representation of torment, in his literary and polemical works. The believers' suffering was an obsessive concern of dissenting ministers, even to the point where their writings are often remembered today for little else. Hitherto, most scholars have termed all the mental states that they invoke 'despair', but this simplifies the experiences at issue. A wealth of contemporary material helps to restore the nuances of seventeenth-century physical and spiritual conditions, from enthusiasm to melancholy and madness; from fear to desertion and sloth. These chapters explore fresh ways in which this subtle typology of torment and its extreme manifestations form the core of the literary expression of Restoration dissent, challenging Bunyan to represent spiritual equilibrium as the ultimate quest of the earthly pilgrimage.

Detectives Lucas Baldwin and Mark Rawlings are surprised to find themselves on their way to the Grande National Hotel, the site of the annual Modern Language Association Conferenceto an academic conference, of all places!where the book-and-urine enshrouded body of Blake scholar D. Q. Manchester has been discovered and from which guest speaker H. M. Grace has vanished. As they investigate the suspicious death of one and the disappearance of another of the group of six faculty members who had come to consider themselves an island in a sea of educational malfeasance, their respect for these dedicated professors and scholarsand for education itself grows. They also come to realize that the supposedly hallowed halls of academia may be even more frightening than the decidedly mean streets of the city.

Every Christian has been saved by Gods grace, but many believers have never grasped the glory of that grace. Can Gods grace be resisted? Will it cause the believer to endure in faith? How is it related to divine election? Did Christ in His death have a particular group of people in mind? Brian Anderson in Overwhelmed By Grace meets a widespread need for the doctrines of grace to be clearly, simply, and Biblically explained for all believers. By the time you are done reading this book, you may also be overwhelmed by grace! Here is a well-reasoned, readable, Biblical explanation of the doctrines of grace. Many Christians find these truths difficult to wrestle with, and unfortunately there is a dearth of material that explains them well. Too many who attempt the task get bogged down in philosophical and historical arguments before they ever deal clearly with the Biblical data. Brian Anderson avoids that pitfall and focuses his energies instead on simply giving a clear and understandable presentation of what Scripture teaches. I am very grateful for his wonderful, straightforward, and above all Biblical treatment of these crucial doctrines. John F. MacArthur, Jr. Pastor, Grace Community Church, Sun Valley, California President, Masters College and Masters Seminary Brian Anderson has written a solid, readable, engaging and very clear book for those who want to understand the nature of Gods grace in the salvation of the lost. I warmly recommend it. Dr. John H. Armstrong Founder and President, Act 3 Brian Anderson served from 1990 to 2000 as the teaching pastor of a Bible church in Milpitas, California. Since that time he has been planting and overseeing house churches in Sonora, California.

After suffering a life-changing trauma at the tender age of four when he found his infant brother dead in his crib, Dr. Rifkin went on a lifelong quest to know and understand the workings of God. His journey took him to northern California to study with the Beatles' guru and to Machu Picchu to study with Incan shamans. He lived in an Indian ashram for eleven years and studied Zen, yoga, and the occult But it wasn't until Jesus revealed himself that his pain was overtaken by the love and peace that only Jesus provides. Despite being raised Jewish, Dr. Rifkin fully embraced his Messiah and led many of his family to salvation. He has spent nearly forty years as a licensed therapist, helping others to repair their marriages and work their way through their own emotional pain. In 2011, his practice was interrupted when he learned that despite knowing Jesus and living a very healthy lifestyle, he inherited his family's genetic and devastating disease which destroys and eventually shuts down the functioning of both kidneys. Polycystic kidney disease had him on daily dialysis at home which exhausted him. His thirteen-year-old son would keep him company, all the while fearful that his father would die before finding a new kidney. To make matters worse, his wife of eighteen years no longer wanted to remain married. Feeling very alone, he turned to Jesus and was told by the Holy Spirit that he was about to be the recipient of a miracle. Then, eleven months later, after being prompted by the Holy Spirit, he put his request for a living donor on social media, and he received a perfect kidney from a complete stranger. Today, Dr. Rifkin is remarried to the love of his life and has recently learned that polycystic kidney disease has affected his liver to the point where he will need a transplant. After hours of prayer, he was reassured that he will be successful in this transplantation and looks forward to living out his life with his beautiful wife serving the Lord.

Can a butt-ugly alley cat named Cupid bring together two people driven apart by secrets and lies? After writing a doctoral thesis that exposed fraud in the pop-psychology genre, thirty-two year old professor Althea Chandler sacrifices her professional integrity to save her family from financial disaster. She secretly becomes best-selling romance guru Dr. Trulee Lovejoy, self-proclaimed expert on how to catch a man, even though Thea's a miserable failure when it comes to relationships -- especially those with the opposite sex. Burned by a failed marriage, Luke Bennett finds himself pursued by Dr. Lovejoy toting women after a gossip columnist dubs him New York's most eligible bachelor. When he at first mistakes Thea for one of the women out to snare him, sparks fly, but the two soon find themselves battling sparks of a less hostile nature, thanks in part to that alley cat. Luke believes he's finally found an honest woman. Unfortunately, Thea is anything but honest. She's got more secrets than the CIA and a desperate gossip columnist out to expose her. Cupid definitely has his work cut out for him. • Finalist Romance Writers of America Golden Heart Award • Winner of the PASIC Book of Your Heart Award • Winner of the Great Expectations Award • Winner of the Jasmine Award • Winner of the Heart of the Rockies Award Keywords: humor, recipes, chick lit, billionaire, pets & animal care, cats, culinary

It’s easy to feel overwhelmed when life brings financial, relational or spiritual trouble. But what if, instead of focusing on the trials and challenges, Christians would allow themselves to be overwhelmed by God? Pastor Steve Mays invites readers to accept God’s promise of abundant life—not a life free of trouble, but filled with peace, forgiveness and love . . . a life filled with God! With gentleness and infectious joy, the author guides readers to shift their perspective away from the very real troubles they face and fill their gaze with the overwhelming presence of a loving Lord.

Grace in Practice is a challenging call to live life under grace -- a concept most Christians secretly have trouble with. Paul Zahl pulls no punches, contending that no matter how often we talk about salvation by grace, in our "can-do" society we often cling instead to a righteousness of works. Asserting throughout that grace always trumps both law and church, Zahl illuminates an expansive view of grace in everything, extending the good news of grace to all creation. Conversationally written and filled with fascinating insights, Grace in Practice will reward any Christian who seeks to understand the full measure of God's grace and the total freedom it offers.

Although literary-historical studies have often focused on the range of dissenting religious groups and writers that flourished during the English Revolution, they have rarely had much to say about seventeenth-century Baptists, or, indeed, Baptist women. Baptist Women’s Writings in Revolutionary Culture, 1640-1680 fills that gap, exploring how female Baptists played a crucial role in the group’s formation and growth during the 1640s and 50s, by their active participation in religious and political debate, and their desire to evangelise their followers. The study significantly challenges the idea that women, as members of these congregations, were unable to write with any kind of textual authority because they were often prevented from speaking aloud in church meetings. On the contrary, Adcock shows that Baptist women found their way into print to debate points of church organisation and doctrine, to defend themselves and their congregations, to evangelise others by example and by teaching, and to prophesy, and discusses the rhetorical tactics they utilised in order to demonstrate the value of women’s contributions. In the course of the study, Adcock considers and analyses the writings of little-studied Baptist women, Deborah Huish, Katherine Sutton, and Jane Turner, as well as separatist writers Sara Jones, Susanna Parr, and Anne Venn. She also makes due connection to the more familiar work of Agnes Beaumont, Anna Trapnel, and Anne Wentworth, enabling a reassessment of the significance of those writings by placing them in this wider context. Writings by these female Baptists attracted serious attention, and, as Adcock discusses, some even found a trans-national audience.

Explores how Vanity Fair transformed from its Puritan origins as an emblem of sin into a modern celebration of hedonism.