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Once a Day Country Faith is a devotional type book that takes one (and on a couple of occasions two) musicians , their favorite verse and their thoughts on said verse(s).  

Some Artists include.          

  Christy Lee Cook.          Jason Crabb.   

Randy  Owen (from Alabama).       Josh Turner.      Billy Dean

Rodney Atkins.             Dustin Lynch.        Kiefer Thompson (fromThompson Square)

Carrie Underwood.          Eric Paslay.      Lauren Alaina

Both of the Bellamy Brothers.     Jannie Frickie.    Easton Corkin

Canaan Smith.      Billy Ray Cyrus.     Trisha Yearwood.   

For the most part, as a country girl at heart, I enjoyed the book.  It took me 2 days to read…..BUT, I have a big problem!

Not so much with the artists per se BUT with Zondervan who compiled this collection.   As another reviewer pointed out there are some fantastically deep and very encouraging insights, but on two different occasions  I think the devotional fell way short!

#1- one of the author musicians said ” this May sound simple, butI think our world could stop fighting over differences in religion if we all realized that we really believe the same thing.  God, by any name you choose is Love. It’s that simple.” ……..WHOA SLOW THAT PRETTY PONY DOWN!    Not quite.  She shows herself quite uninformed.  God is not a God of contradiction and by making that statement that is exactly what she is stating.  You will be shocked if you sit down with Other religions bibles and read hatred and scorn for other faiths and nationalities!……and just as a side note this book is called Country FAITH.  there is a drastic difference between Faith and Religion.  

#2 Another author/singer starts off her thoughts with this phrase “Amidst all the Bible’s lofty language……”   My question is what Bible are you reading?  In a book that shows great mercy, grace, love and compassion how can you say it’s lofty?

So here’s my rating…I give it two and a half stars.  I can’t recommend this book because I don’t want to confuse others that might be struggling in their faith and yet, like I said earlier, there are aome great testimonies and very deep thoughts, and by those I was very impressed!

 

ANESSA

The last 72 hours has been…exhausting.  Nothing I can say or do to change that.

I sit here with tea an open notebook…..and writer’s block!   

I have much work to be done, but in the midst of all that I have had to hold an extremely obcessive child.  He’s been obcessive in so many ways over the last three days.  A difficult transition faced head on today.  A new school.  I was s proud of that brave little boy.  He has been so brave over the last week….so excited for the new.  That is until we were finishing our tour of his new school on Friday.  By the end he clutched my arm and was whimpering this piteous sound that was all too familiar…..it was the “I’m overwhelmed and have had enough” whimper.

We had dinner out, then on the way home it went KABOOM.  A huge explosion in the backseat that resulted in flailing hands and feet, screaming and then ended in body heaving sobs.  Sobs that carried with it……”I don’t want to leave my old school I love it there, please don’t make me go, why must I go there.  I will miss all my friends I will never see them again, they will forget me.”…for 15 minutes til we got home the poor kid just sobbed and  secretly hiding our tears from him so did his mommy and daddy in the front seat.  The weekend was HORRIBLE!  Outbursts.  Frustration.  Obsessing over every little detail.

Another lament to my poor hubby in the car on Saturday.

Then Sunday afternoon……”Mommy if I don’t like my new school can I go back to my old one?”  

*SIGH*

No amount of time in God’s word or prayer can prepare you for certain things.  Tonight as I sat holding my screaming son rocking back and forth, singing Jesus Loves Me and Amazing Grace, my heart pleads for comfort.  For my son overwhelmed by all things new, and for myself….there is nothing worse than watching your child suffer.  It doesn’t matter how much I try to help.  And trusting God for those things is oh so hard to do!  And yet I must, with every bit of strength I have in me…I must trust God.  

I know that God love us so much He sent His Son to die……..so He cares! AND THAT MY FRIENDS IS WHAT WE ALL MUST CLING TO IN OUR WEAKNESS,

Whether it is cancer, a car accident, a lost job or autism.  No matter the trial!

REVIEW AND A GIVEAWAY: The Virtue Training Bible

Have you ever thought to yourself……”I wish that kids came with a manual!”

What if I told you they did! Your response might sound a lot like this…
“Yes Mary, I know. You are going to say the Bible is the ultimate life manual, but it is just too difficult and time consuming to know all the verses to any given subject.”

I know it’s challenging to run a home, manage schedules, raise godly kids, and be in ministry. And friends I have a full four year bible degree. And yet that was still SUPER hard for me. I had great intentions, but great intentions will only get you as far as you can throw them!

So back a year or so ago I was introduced to the Child Training Bible! As we have used it time and time again, I told my hubby that they needed to make one of these Bible’s based on the positive attributes we want our kids to embody…..AND low and behold a little less then a year later what should show it’s pretty little face in my Facebook newsfeed….THE VIRTUE TRAINING BIBLE! And what a blessing it has been!

We love and use both Bibles!

I highly recommend them, whether you are a mom or dad, grandparent, aunt or uncle, teacher, school administrator . These two tools can help your kids grow in their walk with God.

But what if you don’t interact with kids at all? This is a great way to study the Bible and the godly virtues it describes.

So I think it only fair to share a couple of struggles I faced in putting this bible together…..
1. It’s tight! The tabs have to overlap!
2. Use the right size Bible. I accidentally bought the smaller sized pew bible….yeah that was a bad move.
3. With all the tabs and highlighting, I started with highlighters but quickly decided colored pencils were the way to go! ( I really liked using the Crayola Twistable Colored pencils!.)
4. DO NOT do this in the car! I got myself so frustrated. I thought I was using my time wisely…..totally not worth it!

So outside of those really minor things, I highly recommend this tool! You will find that is truly is worth the time put into making it as you watch your child’s heart change!

So my next big question…….WHO WANTS A SET OF VIRTUE TRAINING BIBLE TABBERS?

You are responsible to buy your post it flags, and highlighting tools.

All you have to do it comment here and let me know why you want these TABBERS.
I will choose the winner next Friday!

GO CHECK THEM OUT,

VIRTUE TRAINING BIBLE

———————-THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED ————
CONGRATULATIONS ANESSA YOU WON!!!—————————-—