Monday, July 15, 2013

Unveiling Grace: The Story of How We Found Our Way Out of the Mormon Church



A fascinating and truly gripping story, Unveiling Grace, allows a rare glimpse into the Mormon church. Lynn K. Wilder writes about her family, how they converted too, and from Mormonism, and all the other stuff in between. I personally have a heart for Mormon people, seeing how sincere they are, I always wondered what goes on inside their world and how do I introduce the TRUE gospel to them. This book equipped me with what I was looking for.

It’s a unique perspective because it allowed me to see why people become Mormon, what happens when you become a Mormon – and what it takes to maintain being Mormon. It taught me many of the interworking’s of the Mormon church and doctrines they believe and teach. I believe and know from personal experience that nothing is more effective in teaching other’s about the truth unless you know where they are coming from and can show that you understand what they teach but can show them that they are wrong – that’s exactly what happened in this book. It provides the information needed to understand the Mormon church and how Mormon’s act and think.

I love how in the back of the book, although done throughout the book, it gives a chart showing the discrepancies between what the bible teaches and what the book of Mormon teaches. In no way does this book bash the Mormon church, but it points out, respectfully, how wrong the church is and how contrary their beliefs are from the true gospel.

With all this information mixed in with a divine story I could not put this book down. I feel ready, equipped, and compelled to go out and share this story and the good news of the true gospel to any Mormon that crosses my path.

If you have any interests in learning why the Mormon church teaches a false gospel, and what exactly that false gospel is, or if you have missionaries coming to your door, friends, family, or anyone that is Mormon in your life I HIGHLY recommend this book. This book has the power to change lives.
Thank you to Zondervan for providing me with a copy for my honest review of this book, it has truly been a blessing to read and encourage everyone to read it too!

Tuesday, July 2, 2013

NIV Leadership Bible: Leading by The Book - By Zondervan



A leader faces decisions and consequences (good or bad) almost on a minute-to-minute basis, in fact we all do no matter what status we have and the NIV Leadership Bible attempts to guide the reader into making Godly and wise decisions. The bible it self is well made and beautifully organized. Beautiful cover, great sized print, but unfortunately the publishers chose to leave out red lettering for Jesus, something I value.

The “leadership” part of the bible is organized into 52 weeks, with each week being structured around a particular skill (week 1: Long-range planning; week 2: Structure/ Organization; etc.). Each week is further divided into a 5-day outline always introducing the skill, e.g. long-range planning, and who God is, who I am, how it works, and what I do. Essentially this is a daily devotional (for 5 days of the week), which talks about the skill and perhaps a character that portrayed that specific character or a story in which it is seen.

The readings/devotionals are really a quick read, some a minute or 2, others a tad bit longer, but in my opinion do not have to much depth or anything profound to say. Sure there are some days which contain more substance then others but in general I did not walk away having learnt anything new. The real substance of the daily devotionals, for me anyway, was not reading what the authors had to say any particular day but sitting meditating and trying to apply what I just read for myself in my daily life – but to be perfectly honest though this bible makes it easier to do this because it lists the skills for you, it is in no way necessary and if one sits and mediates and tries to apply scriptures to their daily life anyway then they probably wont come up with anything new reading the daily devotionals in this bible.

There are other aspects of the bible which are nice such as character profiles, which relate to leadership in some way, introductions to each book in the bible, which are also more about the leadership skills that are found in the book then a thorough introduction of the books. As well as “insights” boxes all throughout the bible which are small blurbs here and there discussing a skill or personal development issue relating to a verse or passage in scripture, something I found of zero value to me personally.

Again though these features are nice, they are put there to show leadership skills and qualities, not for a thorough and in depth look at character profiles and introductions to each book – there are study bibles meant for that. So for the purpose that this bible is a leadership bible I say it attempts to do the job well, it brings in as much opportunities as possible to talk about leadership skills and qualities, I just feel a lot of it lacks substance. These are my personal opinions and statements, I given this bible for my honest review of it.