Praying God's Word

The last (but certainly not least) book that I will be talking about this month is Praying God's Word by Beth Moore. Before I started reading this book, I had never really thought about the principle before, but Beth Moore discusses the importance of our prayers lining up with what God's Word says.

The Bible tells us that God desires for us to pray. He wants us to pray to Him. But so often, our prayers focus only on ourselves and our desires. If we are praying what God's Word says, though, we cannot really go wrong in what we are asking.

Praying God's Word is divided into several different chapters. Each chapter deals with a different stronghold that Christians may face. Beth Moore has found verses that deal with each stronghold, and shows us how to pray for each one.

I love this book for my prayer life, and it is also a good resource to use as a kind of "topical index" to find verses about different things.

A lot of times, as Christians, we fall behind in our prayer lives, so if you are looking for a boost, I recommend this book.

Hope you enjoy!

The Gospel Primer

The Gospel Primer by Milton Vincent is a very helpful tool to use while studying through the Bible. Before I say anything else about this book, I want to give you this piece of advice: read through it slowly. It is a very short book, and you could probably finish it in a couple hours if you wanted to. But this book has so much wisdom that it needs time to be absorbed.

This book really helps tie together some of the main points of the Gospel. I guarantee that you will say, "Oh, I never thought about it like that before," more than once while reading this book. I definitely did.

I think every person should own a copy of this book. It will never get old; you will find yourself going back to it again and again.

Enjoy!

Do Hard Things

Any of y'all who read this blog regularly know that I love Alex and Brett Harris' book Do Hard Things. In today's culture, so little is expected of teenagers. This book, along with Start Here, lets teens know what God expects of us.

Perhaps my favorite thing about this book is that it's applicable to every person in every situation. Most other books are not like that. People may get to a point in their faith where a book on a certain topic can't help them grow. But everyone has room to grow in this area. We are not necessarily called to do big things or great things, but we are called to do hard things. Once you have gotten good at hard things, there is a whole new level of hard:)

If you are ready for a challenge to grow in your faith and overcome this world's low expectations, then you should definitely check out this book!

Karen Kingsbury

Most of the books I will be talking about this month are more for studying, but I just had to write about Karen Kingsbury:)

I discovered some of Karen Kingsbury's at the beginning of this summer, and I have quickly gotten hooked. It can be so hard sometimes to find wholesome reading in the midst of this world filled with vampires, etc. But I have enjoyed her reading so much. I wont' tell you too much, because I don't want to ruin the books for you, but if you are looking for something to read this summer, I would definitely recommend anything by Karen Kingsbury.

Lies Young Women Believe

This month is my book month. Each post I do will have something to do with my thoughts on and experience with a particular book. One book I have really enjoyed is Lies Young Women Believe (and the Truth That Sets Them Free) by Nancy Leigh Demoss and Dannah Gresh.
My first important thought about this book is that you have to read it with humility. In other words, don’t read it and think that you don’t struggle with any of the things that it talks about. If you do, you may end up like this:

"I think many of the lies I have been believing about God are subconscious; they are slowly coming to light. I used to think that believing them at least somewhat subconsciously was better. I thought that, that way, I wouldn’t be outright believing that God was someone different then He really is. In some ways, maybe that’s true.
But on the other hand, if the lies are believed consciously, they can be recognized and corrected. I will not be lying to myself by thinking that I don’t believe lies.
Some lies that have started to come to light are 'God is not enough and 'God is not really involved in my life.'"

That is an exact, word -for -word, excerpt from a journal entry I wrote. Lies Young Women Believe encourages you to have a journal. There are some discussion questions at the end of each chapter; that was my answer to the question, “What lies have I been most likely to believe about God?”.

Ok, so the main point there is, read this book with humility!

Anyway, here is a basic overview of the book. The book has an introduction that introduces the Deceiver (Satan) and then lists 25 commonly believed lies and in-depth information on each one. My honest attitude when I first read the book was that I didn’t need to hear half of the lies. I thought, “These lies are for unbelievers who have a really hard time with sin.” But, as you think about it more, you realize that we all struggle with most of the lies on some level.
After the 25 lies are listed, there is a great section at the end that helps you identify lies in your life. It helps you see for yourself the things that you struggle with (even if they aren’t in the book) and figure out how to correct them.

I really recommend getting the Companion Guide for this book. If definitely takes a lot of time to work through (I’m still not finished) but it is a great help.

Hope you enjoy!