Two New Great Adventures in Odyssey Imagination Station series

The latest books in the Adventures in Odyssey Imagination Station series that I read with my now 5 year old son were Battle for Cannibal Island and Escape to the Hiding Place by Paul McCusker and Marianne Hering.  The books continue to follow the cousins Patrick and Beth and their adventures in Mr. Whittaker’s imagination station.  These books are more independent of the other books as individual adventures.

My son really enjoys these books.  He was very excited to get some more and since reading them he was disappointed there weren’t any more available.  We have encouraged him to write a letter to the author for more.  He really likes their adventures and gets into the places they go and things the cousins do.   I enjoy the adventures and the topics they bring up.  We have had some great times talking about how we could make wise choices in similar situations.  My son has a vivid imagination and these help give him some focus.  I look forward to reading more as they come out and would highly recommend them to others.

I received a complimentary copy of the book for review purposes from Tyndale House.

Has God Spoken by Hank Hanegraaff

Has God Spoken by Hank Hanegraaff is his final book in a series meant to address questions that Christians face regarding the Bible.  It is laid out with the acronym MAPS to assist the reader in assimilating the massive amount of information that Hank offers the reader.

This book is thick and meaty and will take some time to get through versus other apologetic type books that I have read.   Hank has done his research and does his best to put it out in a manner that it easy to consume, but it does take a while to get through.  I appreciated the material in the book and found myself learning a good deal.  I felt like the book went beyond simply providing evidence to specifically address the prevailing lines of thought against the Bible currently and even pointed towards specific people who lead those arguments.

I appreciate books like this as I like to know why I believe what I believe.  I find them most useful in strengthening a believer’s faith in Christ by showing the complexity of our Lord, but less to convince a skeptic.  And I found this book good to equip believers so they aren’t ignorant of the prevalent criticisms in our culture today.

I received this book free from the publisher through the BookSneeze®.com book review bloggers program.

Life Application Study Bible Devotional

I recently received the Life Application Study Bible Devotional from Tyndale Publishers.  This devotional is setup slightly differently from others that I have.  Instead of dates it uses weeks and days.  This may seem like a minor change, but it really does promote a daily reading schedule  as it can be difficult to find your day if you only pick it up occasionally other than just reading randomly.  Each week has a theme centric to Jesus in some manner bases on scripture and accompanied with devotion and questions.

Overall I found this to be a decent devotional.  I love reading scripture, so having that on each page was good.  Personally I felt the devotional portion to be a bit lacking.  The inferences read into the scripture with these were overreaching.  That being said I did enjoy the questions portion.  I found them to be thought provoking in a manner that would really make one think of how to apply the scripture to one’s life.  I would simply put in more scripture from the New and Old Testament and less story telling.  All in all I found it to be a good book and one that would encourage the daily reading and application of God’s Word.

Tyndale House Publishers has provided me with a complimentary copy of this book in exchange for a review.

My First Hands on Bible

I recently received a copy of My first Hands-On Bible from Tyndale. We have a variety of children’s Bibles and as they each have only selected stories from the Bible it doesn’t take long to go through them several times. That being the case I am always on the lookout for some good new options that will bring some new stories or have some fun ideas of things to do with the kids.

After reading through some of the stories there are several things I enjoyed about this Bible. One is that the stories aren’t just summations of what the Bible says, but actual sections of scripture. I enjoy how they make the focus of every story to be on Jesus. I truly enjoy finding Jesus in every passage of my Bible as I read and I like to emphasize this with my kids. So to have a children’s Bible that helps in this is something that I appreciate. I like the effort put into the activities they include with each story, but I do find some of them to be a bit on the cheesy side.

Overall I have enjoyed this Bible and I look forward to reading through more of it with my kids.

I received a complimentary copy of the book for review purposes from Tyndale House.

Billy's Quotes

Billy Graham in Quotes is a collection of personal and published quotes edited by his son Franklin Graham and Donna Lee Toney. I have enjoyed reading some of Billy Graham’s books over the years and so I was looking forward to reading a compilation of quotes from him. I thought it would be a great get to read quotes that spanned his lifetime. It is kind of like getting a “best of” compilation.

The book is broken up into chapters that consist of quotes focused around a variety of topics. It is really interesting to read his thoughts around different topics that we all have to deal with in life. I appreciate that Billy focuses himself on Jesus Christ and his quotes reflect that he knows Jesus is the answer for the world today. He has years of experience and many lessons learned. I appreciate learning from men who have walked with the Lord for years.

I enjoyed reading through the quotes and I would recommend this book to others as well.

I received this book free from Thomas Nelson Publishers as part of their book review bloggers program

The Imagination Station: Peril in the Palace

Peril at the Palace is the third book in the Adventures in Odyssey Imagination Station series written by Paul McCusker and Marianne Hering. The story follows the cousins Patrick and Beth and their adventures in Mr. Whittaker’s imagination station. This continues their adventures as they try to help save Mr. Whittaker’s friend Albert who has been captured by the mysterious Lord Darkthorn.

I read this book to my 4 year old son. At first he wasn’t really interested as there weren’t many pictures, but as I started to read the story he really liked it. We read it over several days and each day he would come and ask me to read him some more. I liked how the cousins proclaimed the gospel in a dangerous situation, that they delivered a Bible and I liked how the cousins worked together. I would recommend this book to young kids and to parents who want to start moving beyond picture books with their kids.

I received a complimentary copy of the book for review purposes from Tyndale House.

The Reason Why

The Reason Why was originally written by Robert A. Laidlaw and published in 1913. Today Mark Mittelberg has taken The Reason Why and expanded on it. Mark looks as such questions as; Is there a God? Can the Bible be trusted? and Are we accountable to God? The book is a mere 127 pages and is an easy read.

Mark’s writing style is easy to read and laid out in a thoughtful manner that keeps the heart of what Laidlaw set out to do. Mark has taken the historical and archeological evidence from the past century to further expound on why Christians can firmly account for why they believe in the Bible in addition to their personal testimonies.

I like Marks approach and found this book to be simple and useful in encouraging Christians to stand firm in their faith, in the perfection Word of God and in Jesus Christ.

I received a complimentary copy of the book for review purposes from Tyndale House.