The Methodist Church in Britain is launching its first e-book as its renewed emphasis on practical Christian living in a changing world gathers momentum.The book, entitled Discipleship and the People Called Methodists, will be available to download for free from www.methodist.org.uk in both the epub format that can be used on many ebook readers and the mobi format for the Amazon Kindle.
At the same time, the printed version of the book has just been reprinted and now has over 19,000 copies in circulation.
The book’s author, the Rev Dr Martyn Atkins, General Secretary of the Methodist Church, and former Principal of Cliff College, says: “Discipleship - following Christ as a way of life - is about transforming the world as well as ourselves, and I’m delighted that the Methodist people are really taking this emphasis on discipleship to heart."
He continues:"The demand for this book in its print version shows that as a Church we are really keen to explore what discipleship means and how we can become better disciples together, and the ebook version will enable more people to join in".
The Methodist Church has already designated 2011 as Year of the Bible as part of the discipleship programme, and is enthusiastically backing the ecumenical BibleFresh (http://www.biblefresh.com/) campaign.
This will run throughout 2011 as churches across Britain celebrate 400 years of the King James Bible, and so far, over a dozen Methodist districts have signed up to put on BibleFresh festivals across the country, with more still at the planning stage.
Martyn Atkinson commented: “There are many different ways to ‘do discipleship’. This book is one way to get started, and we also have the Inspire network that is re-energising discipleship among local church leaders."
SIC: Ekklesia/UK