Jimmy Carter has been teaching Sunday school since he was a young midshipman at the U.S. Naval Academy, leading bible study for officers’ children. For more than 30 years, President Carter has taught at his home church in Plains, where his adult bible class is attended by several hundred visitors each week. Representing a wide range of faiths and denominations, they come from around the world to join President Carter in a common goal – to understand the wisdom of the bible and apply it to their lives.
Sunday Mornings in Plains: Bible Study with Jimmy Carter gives listeners everywhere the opportunity to share in this remarkable experience. Drawing on an extensive archive of class recordings, each volume in this original series presents a complete month-long sequence of classes on a general theme or topic of enduring mainstream interest. Listeners will hear all the unscripted interaction and unexpected insights that keep these classes so lively, as well as the warmth, humor and authority that make President Carter such a beloved and effective teacher.
President Carter has written that his classes share “a feeling of being part of a community of people trying together to make sense of our lives and our world,” and each week he infuses his lessons with anecdotes from his own life and observations about world events, inviting listeners to join him in exploring the role of faith in the modern world for the individual and for society at large.
All three of the series first three volumes are collected here in there entirety. The first volume, Leading a Worthy Life presents four classes which were recorded in January 1998 and focus on the basic tenets of Christian living as recounted in Paul’s New Testament letter to the Ephesians. Speaking to a theme of reconciliation—with God and with each other—President Carter guides listeners through a discussion of “the very essence of Christianity.” He offers his thoughts on such relevant issues as fundamentalism and the current disunity in the church, the importance of harmony among all religions and reconciliation among warring nations and peoples, and the practical application of faith in daily life.
The second volume, Measuring Our Success presents the five classes that President Carter taught in March 2003 on the Book of Mark. Recorded at the time of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, these classes offer a dramatic and moving demonstration of the struggle to reconcile spiritual ideals with the challenges and conflicts of daily life. The third volume, Bringing Peace to a Changing World includes four classes taught on the Book of Isaiah on December 2001. Recorded at a time of national grief and healing, when the world was torn by conflict and fear, these classes include President Carter’s reflections on his personal experience waging peace in the Middle East and elsewhere, and conclude with practical, inspiring examples of how each of us can answer the call to demonstrate peace on earth and put these prophesized ideals into practice in our lives and in our communities.
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