what I've been reading.

Book Review 2011 :)

Choosing to See

I started this book in Rwanda one night & couldn’t put it down. I was so surprised at how much I related to Mary Beth. High expectations for self & others, perfectionist personality, always trying to be “good enough”, desire to be well liked by everyone, planner, avoided conflict, felt unworthy of Gods love, guilt & shame carried around from teenage years – these are all things I have in common with Mary Beth. I know if we ever met (yes, Brynn we should take a trip to Nash!) we could talk for hours over coffee about what Jesus has done in us despite our pasts.

Something that really hit me was she said “back then my relationship with God was fear and performace driven. But now I was longing for an authentic closeness with Jesus. I would find out much later that what I was hungry for was grace.”

WOW!

I feel the same way. I don’t think I realized how starved I was for Gods grace until this fall. It’s the same message: desperate for grace, being motivated by the gospel and grace and not fear/guilt/law. I am desperate for His grace in my life! And I want to give it out more too.

Besides the revelations I gained from MB, I laughed with her in her stories of adoption, being all too familiar. Having just have been with the Honeggers as they picked up Jack, having the transformation that occurs through adoption on my mind. Looking forward to the day that I can SEE, really see that I was an orphan. That God adopted me when I had no name, no hope, no future, when I didn’t deserve his love and now I am a daughter of the king! I love hearing that from adoptive parents.

I can’t imagine the shear fear & terror that occurred the day they lost Maria. Listing and reading along with their story, I could almost see everything play out in my mind. The way their family clung to Jesus, and to each other is a true picture of how we are supposed to live as a family on earth. Being desperate for God and his word. I will continue to pray for the Chapman family, knowing and believing that God can work through their tragedy. They will “do hard” they will have faith & chose to see!

I really encourage you to read this book – a journey of struggle & hope!

Interrupted

I’ve been reading this book for a while. It’s not the kind of book I can just read straight through. In fact, I’ll probably flip back to my highlights again & again. It’s not just a book about “how to live missionally” it’s the story of how one Austin family did just that. It’s full of their own personal stories and expierences. It’s also full of biblical truths. I walked away knowing a lot more about church planting than I’ve ever known. They define living on mission as intentionally living the gospel wherever you are. But reading this book & starting to pray about living missionally has already started to transform my thinking. I haven’t even begun to process it all. I convinced my friend Jenna to read it with me, and she texted me one day & said “I just read part of Inturuppoed and I feel like I literally can’t breathe”. It’s that kind of story. Powerful. Read it. Live it. Let’s talk about it.  I long to live move & breathe for Jesus the way this family & the church strives to do. Seriously, read it & let’s chat.

Start something that Matters

I’m surprised the pages of this book aren’t smeared. I started this book on the way to Africa, thanks to my mentor, Becca and cried through the first few chapters. The full story of how TOMs came to be is beautiful & if you don’t know it – read this book! Blake really got me to think about what it is I would do if I didn’t have to worry about the $. For me that is telling stories, and telling them well. I want to live a powerful story and know that if I am willing, God can use me. There are a lot of very practical tips about how you can actually start something. I think so many times we don’t do anything because we are so paralyzed with fear of where to start. Not knowing what to do, we do nothing. This is a book I’ll go back to over & over as I start to uncover what God might be prompting us to “start”.

Heaven is For Real

I read this book in 1 day at the lake right after I got home from Africa. It was a great book. Really uplifting, inspirational, and “feel good”. It made me think of heaven in a new light. It reminded me that Jesus tells us so many times to be “like little children”. I’m reading another book right now called “The Praying Life” and the first few chapters have been about how we should pray like little children.Beliving big, asking big, knowing God will hear us. That’s how the sweet boy was – believing big. Praying and talking to people so they know Jesus. His faith is very child-like, just like ours should be. I pray I can have the same sort of enthusiasm for telling people about Jesus as Colby does. Highly recommend this book!

What about you, what have you been reading?! 

next for me: one thousand gifts & there is no me without you!