Reading, Writing & Pondering

      Something: One Small Thing Can Make A Difference by Natalee Creech is one of my favorite new children's books. Something is both beautifully written and beautifully illustrated. Something is 32 pages long and measures about 9 1/2 inches by 9 inches with a dust jacket. The first page does have a verse from the Bible--Mathew 25:35-36 on it, "For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat. I was thirsty and  you gave me something to drink. I was a stranger and you invited me in. I needed clothes and you clothed me. I was sick and you looked after me. I was in prison and you came to visit me." This is the verse the book is based on. Something has bright, gorgeous illustrations that are inclusive of people of all colors and abilities. I love that. I also love the ideas in this book that will surely spark more ideas with children's imaginations to give young children ideas on how they can show God's love by helping people. I especially like how the book gets...

    You Can Shine So Bright by Jinger and Jeremy Vuolo is a brightly illustrated 32-page children's book aimed at children ages four to seven. This book has a dust jacket and measures about 9.75 by 9.35 inches--a great size for a read-aloud with your family or smaller Sunday School class, as well as a good size for children to read and look at on their own. You Can Shine so Bright is most definitely a Christian children's book as it is based on Galations 5:22-23 which is about the Fruits of the Spirit. The book talks about each "fruit" and ways to apply it in our world today. I love that the illustrations are inclusive of children of various colors as well as abilities. It does lean a bit towards "Jesus is meek and mild" message, but it also offers a lot of good things that children could do in our world today. At the back of the book is a one-page message of salvation and a brief explanation of the fruits of the spirit. All in all, a good book for young C...

Beautiful words and beautiful photos make up this truly beautiful book, Be The Gift by Ann Voskamp. Be The Gift includes Voskamp's best selections from her best selling book, The Broken Way. These selections of heart touching prose reveal how our lives can become gifts to others when we let God take our brokenness and turn it into gifts of grace. Voskamp says in the introduction, "Maybe the only abundant way forward--is always to give ourselves forward? To be broken and brave who know that when the stakes are the highest, kindness matters the most. To believe that the bad brokenness of the world is met by the good brokenness of Christ's humble sacrifice for us." Many of us do have hearts that are sad and broken, but Voskamp suggests we take that sadness and give our broken heart away so we can begin to heal. If I could put Be The Gift into everyone's hands in this country and have them read it, I would. If we could all just take ourselves and pour oursel...

Every day that I watch the news on television or read through my social media newsfeed, I think how much we need more kindness in our world. The One Year Daily Acts of Kindness Devotional is a 365 day devotional with ideas to make the world a kinder place. The Three authors of this devotional, Julie Fisk, Kendra Roehl, and Kristin Demery, came up with an idea to do an act of kindness during the Christmas season when they felt their children needed to be less self-centered and more other-centered. After their short December experiment, the ladies decided to expand their idea to a whole year. After a year, "we found that our own lives and our thoughts toward others had changed" as a result of their daily acts of kindness. Each of the readings in The One Year Acts of Kindness Devotional starts with a Bible verse, then a short reading about  an act of kindness from one of the three authors, and then ends with an idea of how you or your family could apply the devotion to d...