Book Reviews

Parent's Guide to Spiritual Growth of Children: Helping Your Child Develop a Personal Faith by John Trent, Rick Osborne, and Kurt Bruner is yet another great book from Focus on the Family.  This is my "wagon book"-the book I wish I could load up in a wagon and just walk around and hand out to everyone I see.  I originally picked this book up on the recommendation of Pam West because I was looking for some guidance in how to raise kids who have a faith they can claim as their own.

This book walks you through how to build your child's faith beginning at age zero and going up to age 12.  At each age, the authors tell you what your child is capable of learning and how you can steer those abilities in spiritual directions.  Even as infants, babies can begin to learn that church is safe and fun and that God exists.  As tweens, kids are learning to make decisions independently.  There's a lot of ground to cover between those two, so you'll find lots of how-to's in the book.  I also like that the book encourages you to honor your family's unique personality, and gives you lots of tools so you can choose what fits your family best (family night, devotionals, seasonal activities, memory verses, etc).

If you do add this to your parenting library, I hope you'll do a better job of going back and re-reading than I do!  To get the most out of it, you should review it every few years as your kiddos grow and change.

Rating: 5 Nachos (out of 5)

Jennifer Bussey

I read Hank Hanegraaff's The Covering after Pastor Meador's incredible sermons series, The Battle.  If you remember, it was about spiritual warfare and the armor of God.  I have been reading a lot on this topic in preparation for a drama series I am working on, and I found Hanegraaff's book to be an excellent companion to The Battle.  Where Pastor Meador dove deeply into the Scripture and the historical context of the Roman armor, Hanegraaff is more focused on the practical applications of putting on your armor and the realities of spiritual warfare in the life of the believer.  Like Pastor Meador, Hanegraaff emphasizes the importance of prayer ("Prayer is indelibly woven into each piece of the covering").

I recommend this book because it engages the intellect, always bringing the reader back to the Scriptures to make or prove a point.  But it is also an important book spiritually, regardless of your particular struggle.  Hanegraaff sets out to equip you to understand the armor that is yours for the asking; he writes, "The whole of Scripture informs us that spiritual warfare is the battle for the mind."

I know that a lot of people find Hanegraaff exhausting, but this book is small and only 114 pages of short, meaty chapters.  I can just about promise that you will find something in it that speaks to your personal spiritual needs at any given time.

Rating: 5 Nachos (out of 5)

Jennifer Bussey

Considering that my mother was a 2^nd grade school teacher for over twenty years, I normally take her reading recommendations with a grain of salt. This time she went so far as to actually put her copy of the book in my hands, so I had little choice.

Same Kind of Different as Me is a personal, narrative account of an unlikely friendship that runs deeper than the surface relationships we often see in today's world.  It's a compelling story that goes from the run-down shacks of a Louisiana plantation to the affluent art galleries in Paris.  However, it's mostly centered upon a homeless shelter on the south edge of downtown Fort Worth.

Ron Hall (white guy) and Denver Moore (black guy) couldn't have been any more different when they were literally forced to meet for the first time by Ron's wife.  But because she simply responded to God's direction in her life, these men built a bond that transformed both their lives for the better and showed the power of God's redemption to hundreds (and now hundreds of thousands) of people.

Ron and Denver take turns narrating this personal account, and they clearly come from very different worlds.  But by God's divine providence, their paths cross and they both come to a powerful encounter with Jesus at the Cross.

I would make two recommendations from my experience...first, have some Kleenex on hand as you read the book, and second, be prepared to share your copy with someone else.  You'll be moved that much!

Rating: 4 ½ Nachos (out of 5)

Chuck Anderson