For 45 years, Michel Dent served as a pastor in The United Methodist Church. In congregations in Texas and Colorado, large and small, rural, urban, and suburban, new and old, he preached over 2,000 messages in the Unites States and overseas, sharing the timeless and timely words of God in wisdom tales to serve the current era.
In his latest book, Understanding Jesus in the 21st Century, Dr. Dent calls readers to study, pray, seek, and claim the Holy One of God as Lord of life. He doesn’t shy away from “controversial” issues as he discusses topics on the minds of many Christians who approach a “post-pandemic” world with both hope and uncertainty.
His topics include:
• Jesus and Racism
Jesus and Politics: I have a candidate
Jesus and Politics: How Faithful People Can Change Politics
Jesus and Politics: Looking for Transformational Leaders
Jesus and Jews
Jesus and Other Religions
Jesus and Sexuality
Jesus the Refugee
Jesus and the Most Interesting Man in the World
Jesus and Sports
Jesus and Christopher Columbus
Jesus and Willie Nelson
Jesus and Osama bin Laden
Jesus and Contentment
Jesus and Faith in a Pandemic World
Jesus and Thanksgiving
Jesus and Pets
Written with both individual readers and small groups in mind, Understanding Jesus in the 21st Century is sure to create conversation and soul-searching.
What Readers are Saying
“We’re going to save lives,” Mike Dent bluntly told an airport worker who asked why our small group was traveling to Angola. “We’re going to distribute bed nets to protect people from malaria.” Mike Dent is alert to a suffering world and to the hunger of people for good news. In this spiritual legacy he offers the harvest of an abundant and generous pastor’s life, with gripping stories of the human condition, told with honesty and whimsy to provide his readers the courage to live their lives in the light of God’s justice and compassion. Whether confronting racism, homophobia, and the immigration crisis, lamenting the Sand Creek Massacre or explaining about how it happened, he notices and honors each person in every encounter and awakens the reader to how good it can be to live in peace with Creation and our Creator.
United Methodist Bishop Elaine JW Stanovsky
Pastor Michael Dent has enlightened, delighted, and inspired United Methodist congregations for 45 years. A strong pastor in every way, he is most at home behind a pulpit. His wisdom tales are filled with Biblical insight, common sense, and humor. He invites us to remember God’s grace in ordinary times and points us toward God’s abundant grace in every time. This collections in a gift to pastors and laity alike.
Janice Riggle Huie
Former President, United Methodist of the Council of Bishops
Mike Dent brings energy and joy to readers by sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ and his love for them. Shunning canned answers, religious buzzwords, and trite advice, Mike is like a funnel through which God’s voice is echoed. This seasoned pastor travels from the tops of the readers’ heads to the bottoms of their hearts, providing encouragement and wisdom in his timely tales.
The Rev. Dr. Jack R. Van Ens
Executive Director of Creative Growth, Inc.
