"The First Resurrection"-Who Will Be in It? Or, the Main Purpose for Human Life!

by Richard Kenney

This book started out as a thirty-two-page 8.5" x 11" Bible study/article about ten years ago (approximately 2006), which I wrote and printed up myself at home for the various groups I was teaching at the time. I inserted each of the pages into clear plastic page protectors and then mounted them into standard loose-leaf binders. Then, as time passed, I started telling myself, "There's so much more to this study that's not in this writing." So I went about to write another study/article of fifteen 8.5" x 11" pages concerning the time right close to the time Jesus Christ would actually return, then subsequently this full-length book. This book is about the main subject Christ told his followers to teach to the whole world--the Gospel of the kingdom of God and the many aspects pertaining to it. There are many questions. When will Christ return? Will we go to heaven or stay here on earth? Will the dead really be resurrected? We're living in the very last days now! Events will happen that'll affect everyone! There will be such calamities that will affect the sun, moon, and stars! Where will the battle of Armageddon be staged? This book has the answers to these questions and more. We need to stay close to God now more than ever! The best way to be prepared is to educate yourself by reading this book.

288 pages, Hardcover

Published August 16, 2017

About the author

Richard L. Kenney (born 1948) is a poet and professor of English. Kenney and his family live in Port Townsend, Washington.

He is the author of four books of poetry: The Evolution of the Flightless Bird, Orrery, The Invention Of The Zero, and The One-Strand River: Poems, 1994-2007.

After graduating from Dartmouth College in 1970, Kenney won a Reynolds Fellowship and studied Celtic lore in Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. He teaches in the English department at the University of Washington and has published in many magazines and journals, including The New Yorker, The Atlantic Monthly, and The American Scholar.

Drawing from many great writers and thinkers throughout time, Kenney often includes references to them in his works. James Merrill influenced him the most, and, fittingly so, his third book, The Invention of the Zero, is dedicated to him. Other notable influences include W.B. Yeats, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Robert Lowell, and Philip Larkin.

Known for having an avalanching and original style, James Merrill best sums it up in his foreword to The Evolution of the Flightless Bird:

"The poetic wheels just spin and spin, getting nowhere fast. But Kenney--it's what one likes best about him--nearly always has an end in view, a story to tell."