Category Archives: Books

The Little White Horse ~ Elizabeth Goudge

  “She stood still and looked up at them, and she found herself rejoicing in their beauty. After all, though pink was not her favourite colour, it was a colour and, as Sir Benjamin had said, all colour is of the sun, and good. And pink is the colour of dawn and sunset, the link between day and night. Sun and moon alike ought both to love pink, because when one is rising and the other setting they so often greet each other across an expanse of rosy sky.”

I just finished The Little White Horse by Elizabeth Goudge. I first read about this book at Island Sparrow’s blog. I am a big fan of books written for children. I’m including the quote above from the book and this recommendation of the story on the inside cover of the book.

“For imaginative readers…this tale will have a strong appeal. There are richness of detail and a lovely use of color and light-sunshine, moonlight, and shadows, symbolically contrasted-to catch the fancy, and a spiritual quality in this parable of greed and pride vanquished by innocence and goodwill.” ~ The New York Times

ht: photo, Bridget at Sunset, from Bridget’s blog used with permission 🙂 

Some of the Cutest Harry Potter Fans I Know

 Bridget ~ Julie ~ Erin ~ Lucy

 Hands Down the Most Adorable Owlet ~ Finn

One of the most loyal Harry Potter Fans in the World and Finn’s Mother

Michelle, Katie and Kelly discussing Harry and all the possibilities.

Loved the Box Our Copy Came In with Attention Muggles Do Not Deliver or Open Before July 21st!

An Older less cute fan…

Katie almost done with the book at 8:00 PM Pacific Time

And now off to a corner to read till the end.

Ht: I stole photos from Erin’s blog and Bridget’s blog. Please let me know soon if you’d like me to give them back!

My photos are being held hostage at the Photobucket site as of July 2017.

Show & Tell Friday ~ Lincoln’s Devotional

 I found this book at Goodwill this week.

The newly-found book of daily Scriptural messages and inspirational verse in which Abraham Lincoln signed his name – a book he used and cherished, revealing a faith you can share. This copy was copyrighted in 1957.

The devotional portion of this volume contains the entire text of “The Believer’s Daily Treasure; or , Texts of Scripture Arranged for Every Day in the Year,” published in 1852 by the Religious Tract Society of London, England. The material is reprinted as it appears in the copy of the book which Abraham Lincoln owned, and therefore contains the several inconsistencies and typographical errors found in the original edition.

This is a bit blurry

This plate of Lincoln and his Log Cabin was given to us by Dear’s grandmother Nettie. It is from Wayne City, Illinois.

I’m including the July 13th entry from the devotional with no corrections…

13

Communion with God 

 a Source of Joy

There be many that say, Who will show us any good? Lord, lift thou up the light of thy countenance upon us. Thou has put gladness in my heart, more than in the time that their corn and their wine increased. Psalm iv. 6, 7.

Lord, what is life? if spent with thee,
In humble praise and prayer,
How long or short my life may be
I feel no anxious care:
though life depart, my joys shall last,
When life and all its joys are past.

For more Show & Tell Friday click on over to Kelli’s at There’s No Place Like Home…

All the photos from this post are being held hostage by Photobucket as of July 2017.

Future Grace ~ John Piper ~ Quote

 I thought this was an interesting way to describe covetousness. I’m on page 275 now in this book and have about 125 more pages to go. It has been a real good read for me.  Blessings.

The Fight For Contentment, That Is, Faith in Future Grace (p. 222)

When you stop and think about it, that’s just what the definition of covetousness implies. I said that covetousness is desiring something so much that you lose your contentment in God. Or: it’s losing your contentment in God so that you start to seek contentment elsewhere. But this contentment in God is just what faith is.

Recall from Chapter sixteen how Jesus said in John 6:35, “I am the bread of life; he who comes to Me shall not hunger, and he who believes on Me shall never thirst.” In other words, what it means to believe in Jesus is to experience him as the satisfaction of my soul’s thirst and my heart’s hunger. Faith is the experience of contentment in Jesus. The fight of faith is the fight to keep your heart contented in Christ – to really believe, and keep on believing, that he will meet every need and satisfy every longing.

The Curate of Glaston ~ George MacDonald

 I can’t believe I’ve been blogging since March and I haven’t shared a MacDonald quote yet. I so enjoy reading his fiction. I hear that his fantasy is great but I have a problem understanding some of it and enjoying it. I was introduced to MacDonald by reading Sir Gibbie. That hooked me for good on his fiction. MacDonald has a lot to say about the church in his day and much of it isn’t complimentary. He also has a way of showing true Christianity at work in daily situations and this is what draws me to his books. If you haven’t read any of his books yet I recommend them to you!

The Curate of Glaston, by George MacDonald

“But perhaps even then you had more knowledge which, they say, only life can give.”

“I have it now in any case. But of that everyone has enough who lives his life. Those who gain no experience are those who shirk the King’s highway for fear of encountering the Deity seated by the roadside.”

From Lilith by MacDonald, a book I had trouble understanding. This quote, however, I understood and stand convicted by it…

“I sighed – and regarded with wonder my past self, which preferred the company of book or pen to that of man or woman, which, if the author of a tale I was enjoying appeared, would wish him away that I might return to his story. I had chosen the dead rather than the living, the thing thought rather than the thing thinking! “Any man,” I said now, “is more than the greatest of books!” I had not cared for my live brothers and sisters and now I was left without even the dead to comfort me!”

Letters to Malcolm ~ Spritual Growth ~ C.S. Lewis ~ Quote

If our heart condemn us, God is greater than our heart.” And equally, if our heart flatter us, God is greater than our heart. I sometimes pray not for self-knowledge in general but for just so much self-knowledge at the moment as I can bear and use at the moment; the little daily dose.

Have we any reason to suppose that total self-knowledge, if it were given us, would be for our good? Children and fools, we are told, should never look at half-done work; and we are not yet, I trust, even half-done. You and I wouldn’t, at all stages, think it wise to tell a pupil exactly what we thought of his quality. It is much more important that he would know what to do next…

The unfinished picture would so like to jump off the easel and have a look at itself!”

I hate to add anything to a C.S. Lewis quote but here goes…lighten up on yourself, trust the Lord, thank Him for what He is doing in your life, be filled with contentment knowing He will accomplish what He wants with you, cooperate with what He is doing right now, rejoice that you are His child. Again I say rejoice dear ones!

When People Are Big and God is Small ~ Review

When People Are Big and God is Small – Overcoming Peer Pressure, Codependency, and the Fear of Man ~ by Edward T. Welch

I am going to list the chapter headings so you have a better idea of what Welch covers in this book.

Part One: How and Why We Fear Others
2. “People will see me”
3. “People will reject me”
4. “People will physically hurt me”
5. “The world wants me to fear people”
Part Two: Overcoming the Fear of Others
6.   Know the Fear of the Lord
7.   Grow in the Fear of the Lord
8.   Biblically Examine your felt needs
9.   Know your real needs
10. Delight in the God who fills us
11. Love your enemies and your neighbors
12. Love your brothers and sisters
13. “The Conclusion of the Matter: Fear God and Keep His Commandments”

I enjoyed reading part two over part one. At the end of each chapter he has “for further thought” sections that are very helpful. This is a book that we all can benefit from reading.

The Dallas Morning News says ~”Need people less. Love people more. That’s the author’s challenge…He’s talking about a tendency to hold other people in awe, to be controlled and mastered by them, to depend on them for what God alone can give… [Welch] proposed an antidote: the fear of God…the believer’s response to God’s power, majesty and not least his mercy.”

This is a biblical, helpful, convicting, and encouraging read…

I’ll leave you with one more quote from the book, pg. 113 ~ Grow in the Fear of the Lord ~

The problem is clear: People are too big in our lives and God is too small. The answer is straightforward: We must learn to know that our God is more loving and more powerful than we ever imagined. Yet this task is not easy. Even if we worked at the most spectacular of national parks, or the bush in our backyard started burning without being consumed, or Jesus appeared and wrestled a few rounds with us, we would not be guaranteed a persistent reverence of God. Too often our mountain-top experiences are quickly over-taken by the clamor of the world, and God once again is diminished in our minds. The goal is to establish a daily tradition of growing in the knowledge of God.

That challenges me to ask: What is my daily tradition of growing in the knowledge of God?

Spring Reading Challenge Wrap Up

 

  • What was the best book you read this spring? Fiction: Clouds of Witness by Dorothy L. Sayers , Non-Fiction: Seeing and Savoring Christ by John Piper
  • What book could you have done without? I didn’t have a long enough book list to have to have an answer to this one. They were all worth reading.
  • Did you try out a new author this spring? If so, which one, and will you be reading that author again? Yes, the new author I tried was Dorothy L. Sayers and I will definitely read her again.
  • If there were books you didn’t finish, tell us why. Did you run out of time? Realize those books weren’t worth it? I never got around to Harry Potter #6. I’ve read it before and wanted to read it before #7 came out…
  • Did you come across a book or two on other participants’ lists that you’re planning to add to your own to-be-read pile? Which ones?  Yes, Stepping Heavenward by Prentiss. I bought it and am reading it.
  • What did you learn — about anything — through this challenge? Maybe you learned something about yourself or your reading style, maybe you learned not to pick so many nonfiction books for a challenge, maybe you learned something from a book you read. Whatever it is, share! I learned that I can read a lot more than I have in the past. There is time to read. I’m a multi-book reader (more than one at a time). I’ve learned I’ll enjoy and digest non-fiction more if I only read a chapter at a time. I have a stack of 4-6 books on my nightstand and I try to read a little out of each in the evening instead of watching TV.
  • What was the best part of the Spring Reading Thing? Meeting other readers and seeing the hundreds of books I’ve never read.
  • Any other thoughts, impressions, or comments. I like to take reading a step further by recording any sections of the book that stand out to me.
  • I will definitely participate in a fall reading challenge!
  • I’ll be posting a review of  When People Are Big and God is Small soon. 🙂

Thanks so much to Katrina at Callapidder days for hosting this event so magnificently and unselfishly…