Living Faith
by Jimmy Carter, 1996

FOR THREE DECADES, Jimmy Carter has regularly spent part of Sunday morning reading from Scripture and sharing his personal faith with neighbors, friends, and visitors at his Baptist church in Plains, Georgia. In Living Faith, he draws on this experience to offer lessons for life from the Bible, personal experience, and the examples of friends and family who have guided, challenged, and inspired him.

For President Carter, faith finds its deepest expression in a life of compassion, reconciliation, and service to others. Living Faith is filled with stories of people whose lives have touched his – some from the world stage, more from modest walks of life. We see how President Carter was inspired by the simple theology of preacher Eloy Cruz, "Love God, and the person in front of you"; how the cheerful strength of family friend Annie Mae Rhodes taught him the meaning of "patient faith"; and how the remarkable missionary efforts of Jerome and Joann Ethredge in Togo revealed to him the healing power of God's love at work in the lives of the poor.

Living Faith is also a deeply personal account of the joys, heartbreaks, defeats, and achievements of President Carter's life as seen through the eyes of faith. Here is his boyhood in Depression-era Plains, Georgia, where he learned his Sunday school lessons in his own father's classroom; his years as an ambitious naval officer, striving to master the secrets of leadership among men; the bittersweet days of misunderstanding and young love as he and his wife, Rosalynn, learned the deeper meanings of marriage; and their painful clashes with friends and neighbors over the bitter legacy of racial prejudice.

Through all these struggles, and through his later years of political triumph and acclaim as one of the world's most respected peacemakers, Christian beliefs has been President Carter's anchor and touchstone. In Living Faith, he shares more fully than ever before the personal meaning of his creed. Rooted in Scripture and infused with a vision of how a dynamic faith can enrich our public and private lives, this is a warmly inspirational volume to give.

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