The Blessing

The Blessing by John Trent and Gary Smalley is about "Giving the gift of unconditional love and acceptance." It is a simple read packed with great insight and advice. This book is divided into 4 parts with several chapters, each having multiple chapters. Part 1: Why is the blessing so importance? Part 2: Understanding the Blessing. Part 2 is the instructional meat, if you will, of the book. The chapters in this part explain how to bless others and your children-Meaningful touch, a spoken message, attaching high value, picturing a special future, and an active commitment. Part 3: When the blessing doesnt happen, and Part 4: Living the Blessing challenge.
This book is a great manual for helping raise children and also to help understand reasons adults may behave the way they do simply due to a withheld or missed blessing. "The Blessing" has biblical based evidence to help form the best relationships, meaningful and positive.
I was given this book as part of a blogger review program and the opinions expressed are soley my own. Thanks

The Waiting Place

The Waiting Place-Learning to Appreciate Life's Little Delays, is a fantastic read by Eileen Button. This book is a collection of 22 stories that cover many years of the authors life, from childhood to parenting. It ranges in topics from fishing to death and all of those in between times. There are times in reading that I connected to the auther and times I felt sorry for her as well as empathy. It is just a great read!
I love being able to pick up a book and read for 15 minutes and feel like I have accomplished something and this is a book for that. These short stories evoke emotions of laughter, love, sadness, loniless, and a range of other emotions that make for good stories.
So, go ahead and give this book as a gift for anyone in a "waiting place" which happens to be most of us, most of the time!

Love at Last Sight

Authors Kerry and Chris Shook of the New York Times Bestseller "One Month to Live," write another insightful relationship book. "Love at Last Sight-30 days to grow and deepen your closest relationships" is a great book for daily challenges and quality advice. This book is divided into 4 weekly sections which are divided into daily readings, so one chapter a week with the daily challenges and the book is complete and relationships are strengthened. Week 1-The are of being all there, is exactly what it says. Its a week of practicing "being all there on a deeper level, during conflict, in tough times, and in the moment. Week 2 -the art of acting intentionally. This week is about intentional thinking, intentionally creating space, and intentionally giving encouragement. Week 3-the art of risking awkwardness. Among others, it discusses awkwardness or revealing your heart, expressing anger, unity, and asking. Week 4-the art of letting go. This week works of letting go of insecurity, pride, hurt, and unrealistic expectations, along with a few other topics.
Overall, the book was an easy to read, easy to navigate, and easy to understand book with functional advice and practical challenges. It includes biblical insight and scripture verses for reference as well. Read it, follow it, and deepen relationships!
This book was given to me through a blogger review program and the opinions expressed are soley my own.

Hannah's Hope

Hannah's Hope by Jennifer Saake (Seekig God's heart in the midst of infertility, miscarriage, and adoption loss), is a must read for anyone who is dealing or has dealt with infertility issues. This book discusses envy, lenght of hurt, bitterness, prayer, the churches response to infertility, grief,failed adpotions, ministering to others, and worshiping while waiting-among other touchy topics.
Having struggled with first time and secondary infertility, I caught myself going, "yes, I felt just like that", or "exactly what someone said to me." It is a great book that includeS biblical stories and scripture for infertility stuggles as well as a section at the end of each chapter for "burden bears." This section is for the people struggling along side the mate or friend dealing with infertility issues.
I highly recommend this book to anyone wanting a glimpse into the heart of someone dealing and struggling internally or outward with infertility or failed adoption issues.
This book was given to me through a blogger review program. The opinions expressed are soley my own. Thank you!

Learning to Hear God

Learning to Hear God by Jan Johnson is a personal retreat guide. This book is divided into multiple sections for finding quietness, God's tone of voice, His unusual speech,and Hearing God in the word. The introduction gives a basic guideline of a personal or small group retreat, what to expect, what to do and not to do, and a timeline.
This book has valuable insight into biblical study for the "everyday person wanting to get more out of scripture" as well as ideas and thoughts on "how to hear God." It asks pointed questions such as, "are we a listener or someone who acts on what he hears?" to better help us gain insight in our christian walk. I enjoyed the book after muddling through the first chapter-would recommend to those wanting to hear what God's is saying for their life. This book was given through a blog review program by Navpress.

The Take Action Bible

The New King James Version, The Take Action Bible, published by Thomas Nelson, is refreshing. This Bible has a nice preface that explains subject headings, the new and old testament text, and some of the footnotes. It has a special introduction section for 1. The Pentateuch, 2. The Historical books, 3. Poetical and Wisdom books, 4. The Prophets, 5. The Gospels, 6. The Acts of the Apostles, 7. The Letters of Paul, and 8. The General Epistles and Revelation. It includes a reaing plan for the Bible in 1 year as well as the words of Jesus in red. Throughout the Bible are interspersed short stories or devotions with scripture reading and a thought provoking question to take the devotion a step into action. At the conclusion of scripture the "Take Action Bible" includes a section entitled "52 Action Ideas." This section puts feet to the scriptures with ideas to help jumpstart action in faith. Each idea is atttached to a scripture verse. For example, idea #13. Find out how to start a Bible study at the local jail or prison. (Mathhew 25:36) Overall, this is a great addition to one's Bible collection. It adds a bit of new insight and would make a great gift for the action minded. I recieved this Bible for the purpose of blogger review, however, these opinions are my own.

Easy Read-nothing spiritual!

The Final Summit, by Andy Andrews was an easy read. Saying that, however, it was nothing profound, wonderful, or anything to recommend to an avid reader. This book, focused on a summit meeting of historical and biblical figures that included a troubled millionaire of modern day times. This summit was a quest to find the one principle that would save humanity. The Final Summit does entertain readers with historical stories and tidbits of biblical ones, but is certainly not anything to be considered "christian" except for the mention of the arch angels and the exclusion of bad language. Overall, this book was worth the read-if you read many, many books, and get enjoyment out of a large selection of book types.