Can I Really Trust the Bible? (Series: Questions Christians Ask)

We live in a culture that more and more questions authority, truth claims, and traditional beliefs. So what are we to believe about the authority and trustworthiness of a book that is thousands of years old? Is God's word truly inerrant? How is it different from other religious texts? Why should we trust its claims?

The church has an image problem. It is widely viewed in the world at large as being outdated, boring, irrelevant and filled with backbiting hypocrites. How different that picture is to how the Bible talks about the new family that Jesus has gathered. In this brief accessible but thorough guide to church, Sam outlines what church is and why we need it. And how, when we have got it wrong, we can move closer to what a true church should be.

Can't anyone teach me how to pray?"" Millions of people today are asking the same question. There is a sense of the necessity of prayer - we have to pray. But how?' Prayer is central to Christian faith; indeed, as Timothy Keller notes in his introduction, it is the main way we experience deep change. Yet so many people struggle with prayer - a struggle that the author himself has shared. This wise and inspiring book is the fruit of those struggles, offering a real and glorious vision of what it can mean to seek God in prayer.

Scott Sauls is husband to Patti, dad to Abby and Ellie, and serves as senior pastor of Christ Presbyterian Church in Nashville, Tennessee. Scott was previously a lead and preaching pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian in New York City after planting two churches in Kansas City and St. Louis. Scott has authored two books and blogs regularly at scottsauls.com. His work has also been featured in Christianity Today, Relevant magazine, Catalyst Leadership magazine, and other publications. Connect with Scott on Facebook or Twitter and Instagram at @scottsauls.

Many people find it easy to understand about God and Jesus,but struggle to understand quite how and where the Holy Spirit fits in to the picture. Who exactly is he? And how does he work in our lives? These short, simple books are designed to help Christians understand what God has said about these questions and many more in the Bible. Suitable for all Christians - especially those who are struggling with questions about who the Holy Spirit is.

Many Christians experience times of doubt and uncertainty. At various times we can ask: Does God love me? Am I really a Christian? And even, is there a God at all? This short, understandable book unpacks the difference between good and bad doubt and shows us where it comes from and how to deal with it in ourselves and others. It explains clearly and simply the liberating reality of what the Bible tells us about doubt, assurance, and the Christian life.

In the post-Christian context, public life has become markedly more secular and private life infinitely more diverse. Yet many Christians still rely on cookie-cutter approaches to evangelism and apologetics. Most of these methods assume that people are open to, interested in, and needy for spiritual insight when increasingly most people are not. The urgent need, then, is the capacity to persuade - to make a convincing case for the Gospel to people who are not interested in it.

Throughout the Bible, followers of Jesus are commanded to submit to Him as their King. They are told to obey and follow, faithfully and without hesitation. Every time Christians utter the word Lord, they make a subtle yet profound declaration - that God is their Master and that they belong to Him. In fact, the Bible describes believers as His slaves. They have been bought with a price and now live for Christ as a people for His own possession. But go into most churches today, even flip through most Bible translations, and you won’t see or hear the word slave anywhere.

A battle rages within every one of us every day. It's the clash between our sense of stubborn self-sufficiency and God's call to recognize that we're really nothing without Him. It's pride versus humility. And it's a fight we can't win without looking repeatedly to Christ and the cross. C. J. Mahaney raises a battle cry to daily, diligently, and deliberately weaken our greatest enemy (pride) and cultivate our greatest friend (humility).

For the Spirit, being somewhat forgotten is an occupational hazard. The Holy Spirit is so actively involved in our lives that we can take his presence for granted. As they say, familiarity breeds contempt. Just as we take breathing for granted, we can take the Holy Spirit for granted simply because we constantly depend on him. Like the cane that soon feels like an extension of the blind man's own body, we too easily begin to think of the Holy Spirit as an extension of ourselves.

The English Bible was born in defiance, in exile, in flight, and in a form of exodus, the very elements that empowered William Tyndale to bring the English scripture to the common citizen. Being “a stranger in a strange land,” the very homesickness he struggled with gave life to the words of Jesus, Paul, and to the wandering Moses. Tyndale’s efforts ultimately cost him his life, but his contribution to English spirituality is measureless. Even five centuries after his death at the stake, Tyndale’s presence looms wherever English is spoken.

Christianity has a rich, evidential history, yet most of us are ill prepared to make the case for what we believe. In Forensic Faith, veteran detective J. Warner Wallace teaches us the principles investigators use, so we can develop a clear, evidence-based faith.

Moral Choices: Audio Lectures is designed to help listeners develop a sound and current basis for making ethical decisions in today's complex postmodern culture. The lectures outline the distinctive elements of Christian ethics while avoiding undue dogmatism. They also introduce other ethical systems and their key historical proponents, including Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, and Immanuel Kant. 

Too many discipleship books are written for clean, perfect people who know all the right Sunday school answers. The Imperfect Disciple is for the rest of us - people who screw up, people who are weary, people who are wondering if it's safe to say what they're really thinking. For the believer who is tired of quasi-spiritual lifehacks being passed off as true, down-and-dirty discipleship, here is a discipleship book that isn't afraid to be honest about the mess we call real life.

Christians believe that history is moving toward a dramatic conclusion - that one day Jesus Christ will return in glory to judge the living and the dead. But there seem to be so many different views about how this will happen and when it will take place. How can we make sense of it all? This short, listenable book explains clearly and simply the liberating reality of what the Bible is actually saying about the return of Christ and the end of the world.