Reading Challenge Recap… Stretching the Brain!

Written on March 7, 2012 by Renee in Books, Musings

I am SO happy that I have checked TWO BOOKS off my 2012 Reading Challenge!

Woot!

Somewhere along the middle of February I realized I was going to have to really buckle down and make time for this reading thing, if I really wanted to reach this goal. With three kids there isn’t a whole lot of extra time for leisurely reading, but just like anything else… you MAKE time for what you’ve deemed important.

I found that it really doesn’t take THAT long to just read a chapter every weekday.

And as a bonus, I like to tell myself that I somehow am prolonging my inevitable dementia by exercising my brain. :)

So, I made it a priority and finished my first book… Give Them Grace by Elyse Fitzpatrick and Jessica Thompson.

This was a very good book with some revolutionary thinking about how we as Christians should parent our children.

It was so revolutionary that I often found it hard to grasp practically. It’s just SO different from what I’ve been taught, what I’ve read, and what I’ve seen modeled.

Her favorite phrase she mentioned repeatedly was that we should strive to continually DAZZLE our kids with the love of Jesus. We must constantly, at every opportunity, show them and tell them of Christ’s love and sacrifice for them.

It is all about presenting your children with the gospel in every circumstance possible. In times of discipline, focus on their sin and God’s gift of grace instead of ‘This was the rule and you broke it’ or the opposite but wrong philosophy ‘You followed the rule, so you are a good girl.’

This was very different thinking about taking every opportunity to present grace and the life changing Gospel INSTEAD OF a focus on rules and rewards for our kids. It is the sense that we need less charts and stickers and “Suzy, you are such a GOOD girl.” Because, really. None of us are good.

Instead we need more focus on the grace and gifts from God that empowered them… or, that can provide the encouragement when they’ve sinned.

The authors included lots of day to day examples of dialogue to strive for in those life training moments as most situations will require a rethinking on our part if we’re to handle every moment as a chance to present Christ and his love and work to our children.

I think this is a great book… an asset to parents that are desperately seeking to bring up children who love God and know that He loves them.

Especially so, when all around us we have repeatedly seen “good” Christian kids who are growing up without being dazzled by Christ’s love.

I highly recommend it, so go grab yours!

When I was approaching the end of February, I realized I was NOT going to be able to finish the other book I had started, 7 Habits of Highly Effective Families, since Chris and I are reading it together. It has been hard for both of us to logistically get it done! We were trying to take turns with the book, but our current plan is to read it aloud together. It may take us until December that way, but hey, at least we are trying, right?

Since that book wasn’t happening, I decided to grab another book off my list and see if I could get it done with the little time I had left.

I picked The Cross Centered Life by CJ Mahaney. If you remember, I chose this one for my list based on the amazingly HIGH recommendation by Kristi.

It was going to be tough for any book to live up to that rave of a review. :)

This is a little book packed FULL of deep theology yet is VERY easy to read. You could almost read it in one setting. That is if you don’t have wild maniacal children running around like at my house.

I have to say that {surprisingly} I WHOLEHEARTEDLY agree with Kristi. This book is phenomenal. I love that it is so short and to the point but says so many things that ring true in how I am wrongly thinking and acting.

The core of this book is the thought that Christ should be the very Center of our lives! If we dwell on this thought continually that Christ died for our sins, it will change how we live our lives and how we treat others.

It is easy to relax into a legalistic mentality about your Christian life. You subconsciously check things off your Christian to do list… Bible reading, prayer, church attendance, service and ministry, etc. And in doing so we can confuse our sanctification with our justification.

We are justified before God because Christ paid the penalty for our sins. Completing a list of good Christian things does NOTHING to make me more pleasing in God’s sight.

All of those things are good and are beneficial to me as a Christian, but they have nothing to do with Christ’s measure of love and my justification. His love is boundless and amazing… regardless of how well I’ve been living.

Please read this book! It will do good things to change your thinking about your daily Christian walk!

Because I thought these books were so great, I contacted the authors and asked if they would be willing to offer a GIVEAWAY!!

It is true what they say that it never hurts to ask, because they both awesomely said yes!!!

Woot!

I’ll be giving away one copy of each of these great books, so that means TWO lucky winners!

Click through to view the post and enter!! Giveaway ends next Wednesday, the 14th, at midnight!

This is my first time trying out Rafflecopter, but I have used it on other blogs. It is very easy. :) Just follow the instructions! You have three ways to enter!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

*Disclosure… All opinions are my own. I received no compensation for this post, and I even paid for my own books!

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Reading Challenge Recap… Stretching the Brain!