Thursday, August 8, 2013

Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers


Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers is about a young woman named Angel a soiled dove in California's gold country in the 1850's.  The term soiled dove, for those who are unfamiliar with the seedy side of history, is another name for prostitute.  This book is supposed to be more modern take/version of the Hosea story but from the viewpoint of Angel the soiled dove.   Angel is a young woman who has been abused in every way by people in her life until a man named Michael is told by God to marry her.  This is her story of the battle of her learning to trust others and most importantly to trust God.

I admit there where parts of this story that where a little to detailed so its not one for a young girl.  I did not think I would enjoy this book but the forgiveness shown is very powerful.  However it does talk about some very touchy subjects such as child sex abuse (which caught me off guard as most try to gloss over that it happened even in the past), sex trafficking, and mental abuse.  I have to admit it was a hard read because of those issues but it did make any of those issues seem great or positive which I have seen even in so called "Christian" novels.  I would still recommend it however it may trigger bad memories for someone who has come out of that type of past so please read with caution.

Sometimes as Christian we forget not everyone who is a believer has come from a nice or easy life so we can't expect every book about someone becoming a believer to be that sweet nicety life.  We need to remember Christ has come for all and not just those who have a goody goody type of past.  Also we need to remember the bible is not exactly PG itself.  This book really shows the struggle of someone that has been horribly treated by the world and see how God raises her up. Francine Rivers is a very talented author to be able to show us God's redeeming love no matter where a person comes from.

I received this book for free from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group for this review and was not required to give a positive review.


Thursday, August 1, 2013

Can laundry be a blessing?

I know a quick answer is yes of course it is, God provides us with clothing. But that's not what I was reflecting on today.

A little over 3 years ago, we almost lost our youngest (I know most of you know this but I bring it up a lot as reminder to people to never take for granted that your children will always be healthy and be with you until you die).  Anyway back to laundry.  See I never thought of laundry as a blessing just a never ending chore like dishes.  However when you are at a children's hospital almost 4 hours away living in a hospital room with your child you want something from your normal routine.  Our son was originally in ICU after being life-flighted from our home then was transferred to a regular room. Once they got his lungs stabilized (his right lung had started to collapse from undiagnosed severe asthma) we were able to leave his room as a couple without leaving his Aunt there with him (until then we made sure someone was always in his room with him).  We still only left him for 15 minutes or 30 if we went downstairs to have a quick meal.  Well one night we realized we must do laundry as we did not bring many clothes and could not afford to buy any.  Turns out the hospital has a laundry room for parents that are staying with their children. 

A hospital parent laundry room made life feel normal after watching our son being so sick.   We could visit like we were just at a laundry mat except when another set parents would come in you would look at each other and just know by their eyes that they have the same mutual understanding about the stress going on in yours and their lives right now.  The laundry room made us laugh which we had not been able to do much up until then.  It made us laugh as one of the washer got so off balanced that it reminded us of our first washer which someone had to sit on to keep it balanced (our oldest learned to read on that washer as a small child I would set him on it and give him a book to look at while it ran so he taught himself to read).  But as soon as we opened the door to the hallway we knew we were back at the hospital.  So yes laundry is a blessing it brought a since of normalcy to us during a time of trial.  Yes I still get annoyed by laundry and still can't stand putting away the clothes but I am thankful I can do it at my home now or at my local laundromat and not at a hospital.  The Lord is good!

Booking Through Thursdays

I am answering the Thursday's question on Booking Through Thursdays.  Today's question is below.

Do you have a preference between “person” in the books you read? Do you prefer third-person to first-person? Or don’t you care?
And … why??

I really don't have a preference.  But if it is in a first-person style then it does not need to switch between different characters in first-person, because I get very confused when an author does that.  Other than that I only care if the story moves along, does not drag, is not over done, that it does not have any sex scenes and very little cussing (yes I read books with some cussing if I am reading books from certain viewpoints or era's then I am going to expect some bad language but not a lot).

However if I am reading a biography written by the person its about I do expect it to be a first person otherwise I don't believe they wrote it. 

Now friends do you have a preference?

Thoughts on my hubby

27 years ago was the summer before my senior year in high school and I went for a walk that would change my life forever.  I just wanted to ...