Offers a new perspective on the relationship between religion and the creation of the first Chinese empires. Heaven Is Empty offers a new comparative perspective on the role of the sacred in the formation of China’s early empires (221 BCE–9 CE) and shows how the unification of the Central States was possible without a unitary and universalistic conception of religion. The cohesive function of the ancient Mediterranean cult of the divinized ruler was crucial for the legitimization of Rome’s empire across geographical and social boundaries. Eventually reelaborated in Christian terms, it came to embody the timelessness and universality of Western conceptions of legitimate authority, while representing an analytical template for studying other ancient empires. Filippo Marsili challenges such approaches in his examination of the reign of Emperor Wu of the Han (141–87 BCE). Wu purposely drew from regional traditions and tried to gain the support of local communities through his patronage of local cults. He was interested in rituals that envisioned the monarch as a military leader, who directly controlled the land and its resources, as a means for legitimizing radical administrative and economic centralization. In reconstructing this imperial model, Marsili reinterprets fragmentary official accounts in light of material evidence and noncanonical and recently excavated texts. In bringing to life the courts, battlefields, markets, shrines, and pleasure quarters of early imperial China, Heaven Is Empty provides a postmodern and postcolonial reassessment of “religion” before the arrival of Buddhism and challenges the application of Greco-Roman and Abrahamic systemic, identitary, and exclusionary notions of the “sacred” to the analysis of pre-Christian and non-Western realities. Filippo Marsili is Associate Professor of History at Saint Louis University.

Author and minister Asfaw Berhane shares his supernatural experiences, including visitations from Jesus and angelic beings, that gave him a revelation into heaven and hell. He not only shares his personal testimony but discusses the supernatural topics of dreams, visions, and the Tribulation. Throughout the book, Scripture references are given to support the visions and visitations. This is not a scare tactic but rather solid teaching on heaven and hell that will inspire readers toward righteousness and the pursuit of a tangible relationship with Christ. The purpose of the message is to show heaven is a reality and that living purely is not an option but a must.

Every day, millions of people who don't know Jesus Christ as their Savior move farther down the dark road to destruction. But as international evangelist Reinhard Bonnke says, hell was never designed for people, and heaven is expecting them! Tens of millions of people have come to know Christ through Reinhard's ministry. In this book, he shares his contagious passion for bringing the gospel to the lost. Each chapter in Hell Empty, Heaven Full discusses biblical stories that highlight how God's priority is saving people and how He wants us to join Him in that process. As Reinhard says, "Our calling is to put a kind hand on the shoulder of the world and turn it round to see God. It will adore Him. The Lord is the Savior.... He loves because to love gives Him joy. He loves beyond all the parameters of human affection and makes even the assault of the cross an expression of His love. His pain asserts it. He finds satisfaction in giving, pouring Himself out to us, surrounding us with wonders, making His redeemed the garden of delight in which He walks. To proclaim the gospel is to move for Him, act with Him, love in Him, and delight in His joy as the privilege, meaning and purpose of all life." Filled with vivid illustrations, this book is designed to show you how to reach the lost as Jesus did: with the passion and compassion of the heavenly Father.

From the author of the acclaimed Dinner with Persephone comes a radically original novel about four women who invite us to imagine the divine anew: what if “a woman’s point of view” were also God’s? Patricia Storace’s Eve begins by telling us her version of what happened in Eden, and by revealing that our familiar constellations conceal other heavens we have never allowed ourselves to see. Each of the four subsequent chapters is the story of one of these new zodiacs, featuring images central to women: a knife, a cauldron, a garden, a pair of embracing lovers. The four women whose stories they tell are Job’s daughter, the Queen of Sheba, a polytheistic cook, and a transformed Sarah, wife of Abraham. Storace brilliantly reimagines the worlds of these women, freeing them from the old tales in which they were trapped and putting them in the foreground of their stories and of the Old Testament itself.

Intended as a companion book to The Created Cosmos: What the Bible Reveals About Astronomy, the new book, The Expanse of Heaven: Where Creation and Astronomy Intersect, is a comprehensive treatment of astronomy, interpreted within the biblical model of creation. It begins with a chapter on ancient cosmologies, and concludes with a chapter on modern cosmology. In between are chapters on the appearance of astronomical bodies in the sky, discussions of the moon, the earth and other planets in the solar system, the sun, the stars, our Milky Way Galaxy and other galaxies. Evolutionary theories are described and critiqued, while creationary theories are explained. Evidence for design and recent origin is presented. This unique book is intended for general reading by lay audiences, but it can be adapted as a textbook on astronomy. You will learn how unique the earth is in the universe You will see incredible design in the moon, the sun, and other astronomical bodies You will better understand the role of evolutionary and creationary theories in astronomy today

So this is Heaven! These true stories are your unique, personal opportunities to enjoy a taste of Heaven from here on earth. Heaven Is Beyond Your Wildest Expectations shares the testimonies of ten ordinary people who have been to Heaven—having died and returned, or in a vision or dream. These real-life, modern-day stories inspire faith that, no matter what happens here on earth, all troubles are momentary, light afflictions compared to the glory that awaits you in Heaven. For momentary, light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison (2 Corinthians 4:17). When you see God’s love permeating all of Heaven and realize that He reaches down to you right where you are, your heart will come to rest in Him—knowing He is watching over you and that His angels will minister to you in every moment of need. When you know that Heaven’s splendor and glory is your eternal destiny, you can endure whatever you must while patiently waiting for the day when you will enter Heaven and your eternal joy in the presence of the Lord.