Suburban life—including tract homes, strip malls, commuter culture—shapes our desires. More than half of Americans live in the suburbs. Ashley Hales writes that for many Christians, however: "The suburbs are ignored ('Your place doesn't matter, we're all going to heaven anyway'), denigrated and demeaned ('You're selfish if you live in a suburb; you only care about your own safety and advancement'), or seen as a cop-out from a faithful Christian life ('If you really loved God, you'd move to Africa or work in an impoverished area'). In everything from books to Hollywood jokes, the suburbs aren't supposed to be good for our souls." What does it look like to live a full Christian life in the suburbs? Suburbs reflect our good, God-given desire for a place to call home. And suburbs also reflect our own brokenness. This book is an invitation to look deeply into your soul as a suburbanite and discover what it means to live holy there.

"Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy." Yeah, right. Sabbath-keeping seems quaint in our 24/7, twenty-first century world. Life often feels impossibly full, what with work, to-do lists, kid activities, chores, and errands. And laundry... always and forever laundry. But the Sabbath isn't just one of the ten commandments; it is a delight that can transform the other six days of the week. Join one family's quest to take Sabbath to heart and change their frenetic way of living by keeping a Sabbath day each week for one year. With lively and compelling prose, MaryAnn McKibben Dana documents their experiment with holy time as a guide for families of all shapes and sizes. Tips are included in each chapter to help make your own Sabbath experiment successful.

We're told that freedom and opportunity are our ticket to the good life. Get out there and follow your dreams! Be the hero of your own story! Find your happiness! Live your best life! It seems that limitless possibilities await anyone with vision and willingness to hustle their way through life. The thing is, instead of resulting in a sense of accomplishment, this limitlessness merely has us doing more and trying harder—leaving us depleted and dissatisfied. With life and faith. Ashley Hales invites us to a better way: a more spacious life. Contrary to what we've believed, the spacious life is not found in unfettered options or accomplished by our hustle and hurry. The life we crave is found within the confines of God's loving limits. Ashley helps us recognize that when we live within these boundaries, we discover a life filled with purpose, joy, and rest. This is the spacious life—finding true freedom within the good limits given to us by our good God.

Describing childhood in suburban California, a poignant portrait of growing up in the grid of tract houses and carefully measured streets illustrates the good, the bad, and the difficulties found in being ordinary.

With the honesty of a close friend, the hilarity of a late-night comic, and the humility of a mom up to her eyeballs in diapers and dishes, Courtney Ellis invites us on a journey to draw closer God amid the joyful, mundane, exhausting days of young parenthood. Probing ancient Christian practices for renewal, Almost Holy Mama chronicles one moms quest to discover an answer to her most pressing question: Can God use the challenges of parenthood to grow your character? You long to spend time with God and catch your spiritual breath, but you find yourself honestly wonderinghow and when? Ellis gets its. Its hard to carve out space for a quiet moment with God, let alone a quiet time! Instead of adding more tasks to your plate, Almost Holy Mama will help you integrate your spiritual practices into your daily life. From studying Scripture in the shower to listening in prayer at the foot of Laundry Mountain, Ellis finds that meeting God in sacred disciplines can breathe new life into one of lifes most joy-filled and trying seasons.

Like an ecosystem, cities develop, change, thrive, adapt, expand, and contract through the interaction of myriad components. Religion is one of those living parts, shaping and being shaped by urban contexts. The Routledge Handbook of Religion and Cities is an outstanding interdisciplinary reference source to the key topics, problems, and methodologies of this cutting-edge subject. Representing a diverse array of cities and religions, the common analytical approach is ecological and spatial. It is the first collection of its kind and reflects state-of-the-art research focusing on the interaction of religions and their urban contexts. Comprising 29 chapters, by a team of international contributors, the Handbook is divided into three parts: Research methodologies Religious frameworks and ideologies in urban contexts Contemporary issues in religion and cities Within these sections, emerging research and analysis of current dynamics of urban religions are examined, including: housing, economics, and gentrification; sacred ritual and public space; immigration and the refugee crisis; political conflicts and social change; ethnic and religious diversity; urban policy and religion; racial justice; architecture and the built environment; religious art and symbology; religion and urban violence; technology and smart cities; the challenge of climate change for global cities; and religious meaning-making of the city. The Routledge Handbook of Religion and Cities is essential reading for students and researchers in religious studies and urban studies. The Handbook will also be very useful for those in related fields, such as sociology, history, architecture, urban planning, theology, social work, and cultural studies.

In Search of A Holy Land is a perfectly timed memoir told with brisk honesty and sharp humour. Sweeping from the suburbs of North London to the olive groves of Palestine, it explores a life of excess-to-spirituality impacted by the struggle of a distant people. Paddling the celebrity shallows of the 1990's as *Tony Blair's sister-in-law*, Lauren Booth explored everything city life had on offer; appearing on reality TV shows and at the opening of a paper bag (if it meant freebies). Yet, as a cautious Christian, she was drawn to the Holy Land too. Given the chance to visit Palestine, instead of finding the faith of her Catholic heritage, she became embroiled in the people's struggle, accidentally breaking a deadly siege by land and sea, playing handball with Hamas and witnessing daily acts of patience and courage which would change her forever. Above all In Search of A Holy Land is a witty personal odyssey calling the reader to consider the universal question; `what's this life thing all about?'