The smallest act of kindness is worth more than the grandest intention. Oscar Wilde
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The Power of Half
The Power of Half by Kevin and Hannah Salwen First of all, I want to put a plug in for having a furry reading buddy. Whether you are a dog person or a cat person, a reading buddy is a friendly thing! When 14 year old Hannah Salwen saw a homeless man she was bothered by the inequity she saw right around her. The man in the next lane was driving a Mercedes while the homeless man was begging for a meal. That started the Salwen's journey into giving. They decided to sell their home in the suburbs of Atlanta and move to a home half the size so that they could donate half of what they made/saved to help others. I love this concept. Many of us have extra time, talents, or treasures that we can give to those in need. What was hard to relate to was the scale of the Salwen's donation. When they sold their large house and moved to the smaller house, they were looking at an $800,000 gift to give. If my family did this...
Waking Up in Heaven
Waking Up in Heaven by Crystal McVea In 2009 Crystal McVea went into the hospital for a routine procedure and died. For nine minutes she was in Heaven with God. This is the story of God's leading in her life all along the way and the most important lesson she learned: God is real, and we are all worthy of His love ans salvation because He finds us worthy. page 233 Here is what was convicting to me, Mrs. McVea shared a story about going to a pizza place with her daughter, when she was paying the bill she felt a "nudge" from God to tip the waitress $100. She talked to God about it and she felt that He was telling her it would be OK to tip her $50 instead. Finally after speaking with her husband by phone, she was obedient. Later she found out that the waitress was praying that she'd make $100 in tips that night, she already had $50 and with the tip Mrs. McVea gave her she made her $100. Here's what she said: God even used me to answer...
Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover Before I share my thoughts on the book itself, I want to speak to two groups of people who may be reading this post. First if you are a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, Ms. Westover's family is Mormon, she begins her book saying that her story is not about the church or about any faith in particular. Her story is simply what it is. I have friends who are part of the LDS church and I know that the Westover family is not representative of who Mormons are. Second, if you are a homeschooler, this story is not descriptive of your efforts to educate your children. A fellow librarian read the book before I was able to and I reminded her of this truth; there are only two kinds of homeschool stories you will hear, either the child will be a genius who is admitted into an Ivy League school at the age of 14 or the child is terribly neglected and cannot read. I homeschooled my children, I kn...
Small but Powerful
The Knowledge of the Holy by A. W. Tozer This is one of those books we own that I'm no longer sure how it came to belong to us. It's one of those books that I kept telling myself that I need to read because it's a classic in Christian literature. Finally, I read this book and I'm glad that I did. The Knowledge of the Holy isn't a long book, it's only 117 pages. Mr. Tozer packed a lot of truth into such a small book though. Each chapter (which is only two to four pages long) discusses one attribute of God and gives a concise explanation of how the attribute makes a difference to us in our day to day lives. As I've stated before, this is brief but powerful and full of truth. I took away two things from this book: first, if I hold a low, erroneous view of God then I am guilty of idolatry, second, God always retains all of His attributes all of the time (God doesn't let go of His justice to exercise His mercy for example). The...
And Sometimes It's Perfectly OK to Abandon a Book
Faith: A Journey for All by Jimmy Carter I chose this book to read for several reasons: I need to read a book by or about a world leader for my reading challenge, I wanted to understand the faith of our 39th president a little better, and I was hoping to be encouraged by his faith in God and by how he lives out his faith. I got about a third of the way through the book and had to abandon it. He's a very nice man, but he rambles. I wasn't always clear on the point he was trying to make. Chapter titles and the content of the chapters didn't mesh. He wasn't clear about where his faith is placed - is it in God or in the experiences of others or in his faith? He didn't do a great job explaining what authority defines his beliefs - is it the Bible or one of the theologians he quotes or his experiences? Bottom line, this was a frustrating read. I know some of us (myself included until the last couple of years) feel guilt for starting a book and n...