Building Up the Church: Live Experiments in Faith, Hope, and Love

Synopsis: Building Up the Church: Live Experiments in Faith, Hope, and Love, the companion volume to Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove's book, New Monasticism: What It Has to Say to Today's Church (2008), is a practical study guide to invite the church to imagine that "another ways is possible" as it lives into its identity as "God's peculiar people" (Titus 2:14). Its stories, reflection questions, and suggested exercises are designed to catalyze local churches and Christian communities into becoming "laboratories for the gospel kingdom"--that is, communities that serve the living God and their neighbors by carrying out experiments in faith, hope, and love. Author Biography: A native of North Carolina, Sam Ewell lives in Londrina, Brazil, with his wife, Rosalee Velloso Ewell, and their three children: James, Isabella, and Katharine. Sam is a theological educator, networker, local pastor, (late convert to soccer . . . ), and missionary with Schools for Conversion-Latin America.

Samuel E. Ewell III is a co-director of EAT MAKE PLAY, a neighborhood-based community co-op focused on regenerating a circular economy that is citizen-led and place-based. He also works with Companions for Hope, a Christian community based in the Summerfield parish, where he combines prison and community engagement, urban permaculture, and theological facilitation as a way of cultivating abundant community at the edges of inner-city Birmingham (UK). He is also the author of Building Up the Church: Live Experiments in Faith, Hope, and Love (2008).


Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove lives with his wife, Leah, and other friends at the Rutba House, a new monastic community of hospitality, peacemaking, and discipleship in Durham, North Carolina. (www.newmonasticism.org)