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This Little Church Went to Market – The Church in the Age of Entertainment, by Gary Gilley


I have decided to start reading this book again. I have mentioned ‘This Little Church Went to Market’ in an earlier post in At the BookShelf and this is linked to below:

https://atthebookshelf.wordpress.com/2010/10/30/this-little-church-went-to-market-by-gary-gilley/

Back in October 2010 when I started to read this book I put it aside for some reason – I may have gone on holiday and forgot about it on my return. Anyhow, I decided to take it up again and then to read the two other books that come after it as per my original post. So that is my plan over the next few weeks and months.

This Little Church Went to Market, by Gary Gilley, was first published in 2002 by Xulon Press (ISBN: 1 5916 0049 9). The edition I have is that published as a paperback by Evangelical Press in 2010 (ISBN: 0-85234-596-8 & ISBN-13 978-085234-596-2). The book was revised and updated in 2006. My edition has 142 pages, so it isn’t a large book by any means.

So about to start reading the book – feel free to read it also and join in the discussion on it.

 

Book Group

I have added this book to read at the book group at BookClubIt. Please join in the discussion at the book group or add your thoughts here on the Blog.

At the BookShelf (book reading group at BookClubIt):
http://www.bookclubit.com/bookclub.php?id=404

 

The Book – Get a Copy

At Goodreads:
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2275230.This_Little_Church_Went_to_Market

At Shelfari:
http://www.shelfari.com/books/6229162/This-Little-Church-Went-to-Market-The-Church-in-the-Age-of-Enter

Purchase a copy of the book at Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/This-Little-Church-Went-Market/dp/1591600499
http://www.amazon.com/This-Little-Church-Went-Market/dp/0852345968/

Or Visit:
http://www.monergismbooks.com/This-Little-Church-Went-to-Market-p-16471.html

 

Note: This is a completely independent review – I have received nothing for it.

 

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At the BookShelf (Reading Club/Group)


I have started a book reading club/group in association with the Blog here – ‘At the BookShelf.’ The reading club/group will feature some of the books I post about here and will give opportunity for members to obviously discuss the books being read. This is something I’m quite excited about and look forward to seeing grow. I hope you will get involved with the club/group.

The reading club/group will also be networked with my websites, including the http://particularbaptist.com site, providing a social network feature that has been missing at the site for some time. In  doing so, I will also try to network the website, the Blog and the Facebook page into the particularbaptist.com community that is slowly being built. Please get involved – over time as the network grows, the interaction increases and the fellowship expands, I’m sure it will be a blessing to us all.

The book reading club/group is simply called At the BookShelf (the same as the Blog).

Visit at:
http://www.bookclubit.com/bookclub.php?id=404

 

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Currently Reading: Progress Update – 03 June 2011


I have decided post a weekly update of my reading progress. I did post an update of what I was reading back in April, so this won’t be the first post of this kind. This will however be the first of regular weekly updates on my reading progress.

Some of the books below have been on the list since April, with very little progress due to a holiday break and a general break in reading activity over the last month or so. This is all set to change as I again get my head into a book or two.

My Current Reading List:

  • History of the United States, from the Discovery of the American Continent – Volume 1, by George Bancroft

  • Life of George Washington – Volume 3, by Washington Irving

  • The Sermons of the Right Reverend Father in God, and Constant Martyr of Jesus Christ, Hugh Latimer, Some Time Bishop of Worcester – Volume 2

  • History of the English Baptists, from the Reformation to the Beginning of the Reign of King George I – Volume 1, by Thomas Crosby

  • Memoirs of the Life, Times, and Writings of Thomas Boston, of Ettrick

  • Bible and Bible Study

  • The Joy of Reading, by Charles Van Doren

  • Terrorism and the Illuminati – A Thousand Year History, by David Livingstone

  • Post War – A History of Europe Since 1945, by Tony Judt

 

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The World’s Funniest Proverbs, By James Alexander


‘The World’s Funniest Proverbs,’ by James Alexander is 154 pages long (my copy). It brings together some of the funniest sayings in the world – well they are generally clever and slightly amusing if nothing else. The book provides some light relief from reading those somewhat more heavy and taxing works that some of us tend to read. There are only about 5 or 6 proverbs/sayings per page, so the book doesn’t take long to flick through and/or read.

Why read it? Well, it provides some amusement and perhaps helps to take the mind of more serious matters for a short time if nothing else. There is always a wealth of information and content here for clever and witty status updates on Facebook and/or Twitter too.

I haven’t spent a great deal of time reading it – but I have flicked through it when time permitted and when I just needed something a little lighter for a while. It’s good for that.

Available at Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Worlds-Funniest-Proverbs-James-Alexander/dp/1906051070

There is a copy here:
http://ebook-freelibrary.blogspot.com/2009/12/worlds-funniest-proverbs-by-james.html

 

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BookYap: Book Recomendations


I am about to start using a new web application called BookYap. Put simply, BookYap is an application that recommends books based on criteria you enter. There are over 650 000 books in its database, so chances are it will find a book for you.

You can search for a book by using keywords or the filters it has available (based on personality types). By becoming a registered user, the application learns more and more about you and your reading habits, improving the recommendations it makes for you.

Books appear with thumbnails of their covers and book ratings. A brief description appears by hovering over the thumbnail. You are able to interact with the application and associated community by sharing books you have read and your reviews of them. There is connectivity with both Facebook and Twitter also.

You are also able to add books to a reading wishlist if you like. Books can be purchased from Amazon when you choose a book to read.

Visit BookYap at:
http://bookyap.com/

 

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Currently Reading: Progress Update – 22nd April 2011


What am I currently reading? Generally I have quite a few books and things under way, including the following:

    History of the United States, from the Discovery of the American Continent – Volume 1, by George Bancroft. It’s very early days with this one and I am still in chapter 1. However, it is also a book I’m seeking to add to my Scribd collection and my History website, so it will be a slow read.

    Life of George Washington – Volume 2, by Washington Irving. I’m getting very close to the end of this volume and will soon begin volume 3. It’s a great read and a good tratement of this periof of US history.

    The Sermons of the Right Reverend Father in God, and Constant Martyr of Jesus Christ, Hugh Latimer, Some Time Bishop of Worcester – Volume 2. I haven’t read any new material from this book for a while, but that will change soon. I have been getting the book ready for Scribd and the particularbaptist.com site. I am now up to where I have read, so will be moving along again soon.

    History of the English Baptists, from the Reformation to the Beginning of the Reign of king George I – Volume 1, by Thomas Crosby. I am getting close to the end of the this first volume and will be placing it in my Scribd collection and on the particularbaptist.com site.

    Memoirs of the Life, Times, and Writings of Thomas Boston, of Ettrick. I am currently in chapter 7 of this work, reading it and putting it in my Scribd collection and on the particularbaptist.com site.

    Bible and Bible Study. I am following the Robert Murray McCheyne Bible reading Calendar, as well as studying the Book of Genesis in more detail, with various works on Genesis as well.

    The Joy of Reading, by Charles Van Doren. This book is a treatment of various important works over the centuries and I guess it’s an introduction to reading important books. I’m slowly working my way through this from time to time – a good introduction to the books and works treated.

So that’s about it for the time being. Another update in a week or so.

 

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History of the United States, from the Discovery of the American Continent – Volume 1, by George Bancroft


I have been working on getting this volume onto the Tracing our History – History website for some time. I did have about three chapters on the site in HTML format, but have now begun getting the volume up in PDF format. This is taking some time, especially with the large number of footnotes in the text, which I am seeking to have available quickly via links to the footnotes and links that return to the text from the footnotes. The time being spent on this will allow a very good and useful ebook when completed I think. I do have plans to make the entire set of volumes on the History of the United States available over time.

I would recommend the volume I am currently reading (volume 1) as a very good treatment on the European discovery and colonization of the United States. For those outside of the United States (like me) – and quite possibly many within the United States – this work provides a very easy to read and informative history of this period. For those interested in further research, the footnotes provide plenty of material for further reading and investigation, drawing on a wealth of historical material and treatments.

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Site Libraries and At the BookShelf


I have been working on the two book libraries (of sorts) that I have on two of my websites. These libraries are being redeveloped and there is quite a bit of work to be done on both of these sites. Let’s look at the two libraries in a little more detail.

 

Tracing our History – History

The first library is hosted at Tracing our History and this library is part of the History section of the site. This library is the smallest of the two libraries, though it will continue to grow in size over time.

History is the main page of the History section of the Tracing our History site and doubles as the main directory to the History library. At the moment the library is a library of links to works on Australian history in particular and other areas of history that I am interested in. Works that were previously hosted at Tracing our History are currently unavailable until they have been reviewed and made available in pdf format. There are however a number of books available via links that are of a high quality and in my opinion, very important and/or valuable works.

Visit the History page at:
http://tracingourhistory.com/history.html

 

The Book Room

The second library is hosted at particularbaptist.com and is called simply ‘The Book Room,’ where old books are not forgotten. It is also known as The Particular Baptist Library, with an emphasis on Particular Baptist and good, solid, Reformed works. The Book Room features a directory to the various sections of the library in the right column of each page. This makes navigation of the site a relatively simply exercise.

As with the previous library at Tracing our History, there are a large number of books available via links to other sites. Most of these links should now be in working order, having recently been checked. As with the previous library, works hosted at particularbaptist.com are being reviewed and being replaced by PDF versions. This will take time to complete and currently those works are still available in HTML format.

Future plans for The Book Room include having dedicated pages for each work hosted at particularbaptist.com, including sections on each book page for book reviews, a Scribd widget for reading and downloading PDF versions of the book, additional resources on the book, links to other versions of the book and purchasing options for the book via online bookshops like Amazon. An example of this approach is ‘The Sermons of Hugh Latimer,’ which can be found at:

http://particularbaptist.com/library/latimer_sermons_contents.html

The Book Room can be found at:
http://particularbaptist.com/library/libraryindex.html

 

At the BookShelf

This Blog, ‘At the BookShelf,’ will be linked to both of these libraries, being the vehicle whereby news of added content, book reviews, and so on, will be broadcast. Of course At the BookShelf will remain a place for reviewing books and sharing my experience of them, but I do plan for At the BookShelf being a way of sharing what I read in a more valuable way also – by actually making available what I read to those who are entering into my reading experience, be that by way of an ebook hosted on one of my sites, an ebook hosted elsewhere or by links to places where the book may be purchased.

At the BookShelf and the two libraries already mentioned will also interact with my other book reading and sharing activities on the World Wide Web at such places as Goodreads, Shelfari and Book Crossing, as well as at other sites that I may become involved in over time. There will also be interaction with Quotista (a site for sharing quotes) and possibly another Blog I maintain for the purposes of quotes from books (which currently I use for private purposes).

With all of my involvement in book sharing social networks, web applications, web sites and the like, At the BookShelf will be a rich meeting place for all things to do with books and should be the better for it. I hope it will be a place of interest and usefulness for others. It will also be a place for sharing my personal experiences with books, which may or may not be of interest to visitors of this Blog. I guess time will tell.

 

Visitor Interaction

I welcome visitor interaction on all of my sites, including this Blog. On all of my sites I try to make available the means for interacting with visitors for sharing information, making comments, etc. Please make use of the means for doing so, though I do reserve the right for removing content that I don’t approve of (such as Spam, offensive comments, etc).

 

 

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Life of George Washington – Washington Irving


I have been reading the five volume work of Washington Irving on the ‘Life of George Washington’ over the last little while. Currently I am in the middle of the second volume. Though I am only reading two to ten pages a day and don’t view this reading exercise as particularly pressing, I am enjoying my reading experience very much. It is an easy to read book, with chapters divided into very manageable portions. As a whole, the five volumes make up about 2000 pages.

This work by Washington Irving on the life of George Washington covers the life of the first president of the United States, shedding much light on the life and times of Washington. Thus far I have covered the period of Washington’s early life, through the war against the French and Indians (in which Washington played an important role) and into the American War Of Independence (in which Washington led the fledgling nation’s army against the British). This biographical work seems to be an excellent life of George Washington, but also provides an insight into the players and the history of the times.

In short, this five volume work on Washington is excellent and I would highly recommend reading the entire work on an important person in, and period of, American history. The work is available at the Internet Archive and I have links to the five volumes on my website at:

http://tracingourhistory.com/history.html

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The Sermons of the Right Reverend Father in God, and Constant Martyr of Jesus Christ, Hugh Latimer, Some Time Bishop of Worcester – Volume 2


I have been working for some time at getting this work of Hugh Latimer up on the particularbaptist.com website. It was previously up on the site in conventional HTML, but that is no longer the case. With this work (and all current and future projects) I have posted the PDF file to Scribd and embedded the document from there into the website with a Scribd provided widget. The book is not yet complete, but as I add to the work revisions of it will be posted to Scribd and the widget automatically updated. The work is available for download via both the widget and at Scribd.

The page devoted to this work at particularbaptist.com within the site’s library simply known as ‘The Book Room,’ has also been updated and the format for it is the design I will now be using throughout The Book Room as books are added (or links to books at other sites). Obviously there is still a lot of work to be done throughout The Book Room, but work is progressing. The entire library site at particularbaptist.com is being overhauled and updated.

I am currently reading this second volume of sermons by Hugh Latimer as I work on the project. I have included a review on the page in The Book Room and this is what I have said there:

‘This book of sermons is like a trip into the past – a trip back to the English reformation. With this book it is possible to get a feel for the times in which the reformer Hugh Latimer walked. The sermons are of course locked into the period, with references to events well known then (and perhaps not so now) and framed in a manner unknown now.’

‘Though preached many years ago, I have found many of these sermons still profitable to my own walk with God now. They are well worth reading, though it must be said they can sometimes be a little difficult to stay with due to the cultural differences, language of the day, etc. Stick with it and these sermons will warm your heart.’

Visit this work online at:
http://particularbaptist.com/library/latimer_sermons_contents.html