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Take Our Moments and Our Days: An Anabaptist Prayer Book is a four-week cycle of morning and evening prayer services for Ordinary Time. The services are designed for use by families or small groups and are also suitable for individuals. Virtually all the prayers are directly from the Bible, and traditional Anabaptist themes are strikingly prominent. Also check out Volume 2 in this series: Take Our Moments and Our Days: An Anabaptist Prayer Book: Advent through Pentecost

Many people long for more fulfillment through worship, but are not quite sure what it is they are missing or want to happen. The worship service may be poorly designed or structured, use of the Bible may be inadequate or antiquated, and meaningful connections with real life missing.Eleanor Kreider helps pastors and worship leaders identify key elements of worship and suggests ways to fit the pieces together to create an experience satisfying to both worshipers and God.

Is your church boring, solemn, tradition-bound? Do you long to see vital communion at the heart of worship? With liveliness and depth, Eleanor Kreider considers the influence of seating, movement, symbols, leadership style, language, music, prayers, and more. Renewed communion brings unity to a congregation.

This second volume is for the seasons of the Christian year (Advent through Pentecost). Its distinctive Anabaptist flavor is evident in the predominance of Jesus’ voice, space for communal reflection on Scripture, and the choices of Bible readings—it offers a way of prayer that lets the voice of Jesus pervade the whole day. “Praying together like this really bonds our prayer group, and connects us with the life of the congregation. We sense that we are supporting the pastoral care and the teaching ministry of the church.”—Noon prayers group, Prairie Street Mennonite Church, Elkhart, Indiana

How much of myself (and my possessions) must I give up to follow Jesus? How does belonging to a religious community shape being a Christian? How do I walk in faith with friends whose beliefs are unclear or uncertain? What gives Christians hope in the face of power politics? Can I be pro-life and decry war, too? How do I make peace amidst the wrongs of the world? If you wonder about such questions, this book is for you. The Road That I Must Walk represents the author's own wrestling with the call and cost of discipleship across a decade. Rather than an academic attempt to define or describe discipleship, these are simply the words of a disciple, one who has sought to walk in the way of Jesus. Arising from various circumstances and responding to various concerns, the several pieces collected here comprise a sketchbook of ethical reflections, biblical meditations and spiritual ponderings drawn from one person's journey of faith.

Why is peace such a divisive issue, even among Christians? Why is it so hard to practice right here right now? Why is peace often considered an extra, rather than an essential, to faithful Christian living? The three authors decided to write this book when the Indonesian member of the team remarked to the other two: "If the Christian church is to make any impact on Indonesia, it must address itself to the biggest peace issue -- reconciliation with Muslims." But before the writers could honestly consider that explosive possibility, they first had to ask why Christians find it so difficult to live peaceably with other Christians. They've discovered that conflict is often a prerequisite of peace. They grant that peace is a continuum -- easier to live in some areas of life than in others. They've learned that peace has two parents -- hard work and grace. Living in peace is muscular activity. The authors suggest how to develop "peacemaking reflexes"; how churches "can learn to handle conflict well"; and how to cultivate vulnerability and humility, two essential "attitudes of peacemakers." True stories from communities around the world support this hopeful but strenuous call to faithful living.

Jesus gave us communion to be a central part of our Christian lives. Yet we often struggle to understand it and to give it a meaninful place. It can easily become mere ritual. In Given for you Eleanor Kreider shows that this need not be the case. Much can be learned from the riches (and mistakes) of Christian history, and much can be done in the ways we celebrate communion today. She calls for a renewed unity of Word and Eucharist in Christian worship that recaptures its meal character and truly forms the church in the image of Christ. This book provides fresh and engaging material for pastors, teachers, worship-planners and leaders. Its graceful vision of the Lord's Supper as the central communal act of Christian worship will help the church flourish in an individualist and selfish age.

This collection of the never-before-seen correspondence of Harry S. Truman and Eleanor Roosevelt sheds important light on the relationship between two giants of 20th century American history. 20 photos.