Thank you to Westbow Press for sending us this book to review!

Eleanor MacLellan and her husband, Ig, were out of options when their son Patrick began having problems. From bad grades to school suspensions, Patrick was on a road to nowhere fast. During his junior year in high school, Patrick totaled the family van in an unauthorized road trip. The breaking point, however, was when he was caught for shoplifting and thrown in jail. The end result was a change of scenery for Patrick. He was sent out of state to repeat his junior year at an alternative school for at-risk youth. 

At Hyde School, not only were students expected to perform with high standards, but parents as well. While a senior project is normal for any student entering their last year in high school, his parents learned they also needed to complete one. The goal of the senior project was to operate beyond your comfort zone while doing something worthwhile to help your community. Ig decided on a community service trip to El Salvador. Eleanor, on the other hand, embarked on creating a large canvas labyrinth to donate to her church. As Eleanor reflected on her life leading up to this as well as researching the project, she discovered the labyrinth was symbolic of life itself as there are no straight paths or dead ends such as with a maze; all the surprising twists and turns carry you on a walk towards the rose center, which represents the soul. 

With one family crisis after another, Eleanor's passage also led her to become more confident and stronger as a Christian. She didn't do it alone however. Obviously, she had her family but she also had a group of close friends who helped her with funding, designing and creating the labyrinth. Together these special companions journeyed through life's toughest battles including many hardships, pain, loss and grief. 

The author cleverly wrote each chapter chronologically in "circuits" to coincide with the labyrinth path from the entrance to reaching the center. For example, Circuit One is primarily the beginning of the story and upon entering the labyrinth, a brief description of the path is provided. Accompanying each chapter also includes a small diagram of a labyrinth. This has two shades of gray. The darker shade displays the previous path taken while the lighter shade displays the current path the chapter is about.

Thank you Bohlsen Group for sending us this book to review!

The book of Hebrews is not one of the easier books in the Bible to read.  Fred A. Schreeren, who wrote Dynamic Studies in Hebrews, goes over each and every verse in this thirteen-chapter epistle.  The Bible study is broken down into twenty sessions that are designed for weekly Bible studies.  Even though snacks are usually a given at a Bible study, I thought it was amusing that this study says to “assign refreshments for next week.”  

Most of the sessions are around ten pages in length and involve referencing and comparing verses from both the New and Old Testament to those in Hebrews.  Some of the sessions recommend assigning someone to read and summarize other books (God’s Appointed Times, Christ in the Passover) for the next session.

I like how each study gives you a warm up question that will set the tone for the current study.  I have to admit that I changed my point of view from the start to the end of the study on at least one occasion.  One question that I changed my mind on was: How do you normally respond to someone who gets in trouble?  While my initial answer was “Not much pity if they deserved it”, after reading and studying on how much Christ suffered on our account, I was convicted about how I’m lacking in the compassion department.  

There are some great Old Testament comparisons to Jesus being the high priest of the New Testament to the Old Testament’s Melchizedeck.  This Bible Study also goes over the necessity of the new covenant.  The author also makes the case that Paul is the author of Hebrews since he was longing to see Timothy, references believers in Italy, and last but not least, it has his signature ending: “Grace be with you all. Amen.”

Thank you Zonderkids for sending us this book to review!

Glimmer Girls: London Art Chase is written by Natalie Grant who many know as a four-time Grammy nominated singer.  She is now using her creative talents toward writing books that pre-teen girls will like.  As an 11-year old, I thoroughly enjoyed it.

In London Art Chase, twins Maddie, Mia, and their little sister Lulu are going to London for their mom's concert tour. They have a nanny named Miss Julia who takes are of them while their parents are gone. Their mom is named Gloria Glimmer, and she is a famous Christian pop star.

While their family is packing to go to London for Gloria's concert tour, the sisters decide to hold a fashion show, as many young girls enjoy playing dress up.   Once packed, the family heads to the airport and flies off to London.  Unfortunately, Lulu's suitcase with her toys didn't make it there.  While Lulu hoped to investigate the matter, they were re-united with it after a few days.   Later in the book the whole family will embark on a case regarding a stolen painting.

In London the family gets to stay in a really nice hotel and visit the National Gallery during their free time.  They also got to visit Buckingham Palace, and the Tower of London, where they were awestruck by the jewels that belonged to many princes and princesses over the centuries. On their trip the family also learned that their great-great-great-great-great grandfather founded the London police force and was knighted as a result.  Besides learning about their lineage, the girls also learned a thing or two about  solving mysteries. I won't spoil them, so you'll have to read the book to find out more!

Thank you Bohlsen Group for sending us this book to review!

The author Frank Wilkins was an agnostic that was seeking factual evidence that God exists.  There have been many documented miracles in recent history and numerous “coincidences” that have impacted our world’s development in a huge way.  Did you know that a mysterious fog settled in the Battle of Long Island that let George Washington evacuate his 9,000 men without being detected and with no loss of life?  Without this “providential fog” as history books describe it, America’s history could have been altered severely.  

Another interesting historical figure is Joan of Arc, an insignificant peasant girl that was guided by visions and helped Charles VII recover France from English rule.  Her leadership and military victories as a mere teenager are unheard of and leave little explanation other than divine appointment. As a side note, the game Jeanne d’Arc covers much of the same events!  

The author also talks about a personal encounter with demonic possession and how he has found faith in God through Catholicism.  While many Catholics may appreciate the accounts of apparitions describing themselves as the “perpetual virgin” or the “lady of the rosary”, other Christian denominations will disagree with those titles.  I was also turned off by the author’s recommendation to pray daily to St. Michael the Archangel.  1 Timothy 2:5 states that we have one mediator between God and man and that is Jesus. 

More recent miracles mentioned in the book include the visions and predictions given by the "virgin Mary" to three shepherd children in Fatima, Portugal.  The apparition predicted and described World War 1,2 and that two out of the three children would not live long lives while the third died in 2005.   All three of the children were given a glimpse of hell and their whole town got to witness and document the sun dancing in the sky on October 13, 1917.  While these events are well documented, these visions could very well be demons rather than Mary.  After all, Satan can appear as an angel of light (2 Cor 11:14).

Thank you No Starch Press for sending us this book to review!

Teach Your Kids to Code is a book designed for parents and kids to work together and learn the Python programming language.  The author, Dr. Bryson Payne has been teaching computer science to students of all ages from kindergarten to college age pupils at the University of North Georgia.  There are ten chapters that will cover the basics of installing Python, pygame, and learning about graphics, variables, loops, conditions, animations and accepting user input.

Most of the heavy lifting is done by the Python libraries turtle and pygame.  With turtle kids can learn to make programs that generate spirals and other neat shapes in various colors. After launching a turtle program or two you’ll quickly realize how it got its name as even an i7 desktop takes a few minutes to render the final product.

The coding itself is pretty straight forward and the book does an excellent job explaining what each function does and pieces it together bit by bit and combines it into a final program at the end.  One important factor that my daughter and I both learned is that spacing/indenting is critical in Python.  If a function is not properly indented, the program will simply not run and there will be no error code to assist you in the debugging process.  Typos are relatively easy to catch with the syntax errors, but indentation, not so much.  Fortunately, the source code and required media files are readily available on the book’s website.

Thank you Harper Collins for sending us a copy of this book to review! 

I've never heard of Tim Hawkins or the term Jackwagon before. Tim Hawkins is a Christian comedian whose humor is suitable for the whole family to enjoy, despite some whiskey references here and there.  Since I didn't get an explanation of the title in the 209 page book, I looked up the term jackwagon and discovered that it's another way of calling somebody lazy or worthless. 

Diary of a Jackwagon is a collection of humorous and random thoughts and stories compiled in a span of twenty years.  There are forty-one chapters that are typically  a couple of pages each and there is no chronological order to them.  At the end of each chapter is a "Tweet Thought" which is a short joke ideal for the likes of Twitter.  My favorite one is "Mr. Literal then proceeded punching himself in the face in an effort to fight back tears."

I must admit that I smiled most of the time when reading this book and there were several moments where I laughed out loud.  I showed a friend the Turquoise Toilet chapter and she laughed herself to tears.  I'm not sure if the story is true or not, but it talks about Tim taking his kids to Home Depot to give his wife a much needed break.  He didn't anticipate buying a toilet but felt obligated to do so after it was gently used by one of his children.  

I enjoyed the comparisons of today's playgrounds to the ones I grew up with as a kid.  I too remember the ground being made of gravel or concrete with real see-saws and slides made of steel that are both fast and HOT in the summertime.  The parody songs about junk food and home schooling are entertaining as well.  

Thank you Bohlsen Group for sending us a copy of this book to review!

There are many theories about the end times, the anti-Christ and the mark of the beast.  I have read theories of the anti-Christ being the current or future President or Pope.  While the Catholic church is referenced as the “wounded head of Revelation,” the author, Ezra Celestin believes that the Beast of Revelations is not an obvious target.

The Catholic church got its “wounded head” from the reformation movement and the Protestants are still in the dark to the truth, unlike the Seventh Day Adventists.  E.G. White is quoted in the first chapter saying “We have many lessons to learn, and many, many to unlearn.  God and heaven alone are infallible.  Those who think that they will never have to give up a cherished view, never have occasion to change an opinion, will be disappointed.  As long as we hold to our own ideas and opinions with determined persistency, we cannot have the unity for which Christ prayed.”  Despite the obvious ties with the Seventh Day Adventist church, this book was an insightful read.

I got quite the history lesson with the fall of the Roman empire, the origins of the reformation movement, the French Revolution, and World War II.  There are many Bible verses quoted to back up claims of the four great kingdoms being Babylon as the head of gold, Media and Persia are the breast and arms of silver, the belly and thighs are Greece and the legs of iron represent Rome in Nebuchadnezzar’s vision.  Daniel’s vision of the four beasts are translated as the lion representing Babylon, the bear is Media and Persia, Greece is the leopard with four wings and four heads, and Rome is depicted as the beast with ten horns.  

*spoiler alert* As for the beast itself, it’s none other than the Unites States with its calling down fire upon Japan in World War 2.  Also, if you add up the number of people in the president’s cabinet, legislative and judicial branches the number comes out to 666.  With the Republican and Democratic parties, the United States fits the description of the two-horned beast while the United Nations is the image of it.  */spoiler*

Trimillennialism: Revelation 20 and the Final Judgment 
Author: Ritchie Way

Thank you Bohlsen Group for sending us this book to review!

In Revelation 20, there is a passage that has been debated for thousands of years. Here it is, in full:

"Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain. And he seized the dragon, that ancient serpent, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years, and threw him into the pit, and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he might not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were ended. After that he must be released for a little while.

Then I saw thrones, and seated on them were those to whom the authority to judge was committed. Also I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for the testimony of Jesus and for the word of God, and those who had not worshiped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Christ for a thousand years. The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were ended. This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy is the one who shares in the first resurrection! Over such the second death has no power, but they will be priests of God and of Christ, and they will reign with him for a thousand years.

Thank you Bohlsen Group for sending us this book to review!

When Melinda Cerisano, the author of Heaven Is For Animal Too, was ten years old she asked a Methodist minister if animals go to heaven.  He told her that they did not since they lacked souls and were not made in the likeness of God.  As a certified animal trainer, behaviorist, and accomplished equestrian, she was not satisfied with that answer and  set out on a seven year journey to prove that animals do indeed go to heaven when they die.

This 257 page book began as eight verses in the Bible that comforted Melinda and several of her friends when they suffered the loss of their pets.  After seeing how these verses (Gen 1:30, Hos 2:18-19, Pro 12:!0, Ecc 3:21, Joel 1:18,20, 2:22, Rom 8:20-21) affected her friends and even brought some of them closer to God, she embarked on her journey to write a book. While she doesn't claim to be a theologian, she does cite and reference various Bible translations, texts, and scrolls in their original language.  

The Bible translations used include the New King James Version, the Darby New Translation, the New Living Translation, the New International Version, the New American Standard Bible,  and the Dead Sea Scrolls.  The Interlinear Bible is used for translating between Greek, Hebrew, and English.

I found it fascinating that most of the modern day translations replace the word "soul" for "creature" instead.  With the word soul in place, verses like Genesis 1:29-30 give animals more hope of joining us in heaven one day.  There is an entire chapter dedicated to explaining the word for word translation and its significance.  

Thank you Bohlsen Group for sending us this book to review!

John F. Hunter, the author of Living The Christian Life is a pastor, evangelist, chaplain, and a missionary.  He put together an eighty-eight page book that nicely summarizes the basics of Christianity without going over people's heads.  There are plenty of life stories, analogies, and scripture references to back up the fundamentals of living a God honoring life. 

There are thirteen chapters  discussing salvation, baptism, communion, praying, serving, and reaching out to others.  I like the analogy of the hub, spokes, and rim being all part of a tire much like God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are all integrated into one God.  The author recommends spending some alone time with God and listening to what his purpose for your life is.  Though I'm not sure if I would spend a couple of weeks in the wilderness like he did and deal with ticks, raccoons, and thunderstorms.  To each their own.  

Some of the other life stories are fascinating as well including a vivid dream he had about his unborn daughter and got to meet her nine months later and the mysterious person/potential angel that helped his family out when their truck's engine threw a rod in the desert.  When they got their truck looked at, nobody knew of anyone by the helpful person's name.  

Since I was raised Christian, I can't really say that this book has changed my life much.  I have put into practice many of its teachings including: prayer, fellowship, Bible study, witnessing, worship, and giving.  However, I do recommend this book to new believers and those who are curious to what Christianity is all about.  The language is pretty easy to understand and the concepts are straightforward and easy to follow.  Because this book is so short and I was able to finish it in two sittings, I recommend getting the $3.99 digital version as opposed to the $15.99 paperback.  Unless of course, you're getting it as a gift for someone you love.

Thank you Bohlsen Group for sending us a copy of this book!

Many Christians often wonder if they are truly saved and many non-believers wonder what salvation is all about.  Is it simply praying a prayer and apologizing for your sins, or is there more to it?  Can a person lose their salvation?  Pastor Bill Parker has spent over thirty years studying the Bible and has put together a comprehensive guide for true salvation.

The book What is Salvation contains eight chapters and is 101 pages long.  It looks at salvation from the eternal realm,  legal realm, spiritual realm, and from the glorified realm.  Each of these realms have four common truths.  All four of them are of the Lord, all of them are necessary for the salvation of God's people, and they are all founded upon the Lord Jesus Christ as the salvation of His people.  According to this book "...Salvation, including faith, is a free gift that comes by the sovereign will, power, mercy, and grace of God, not by the sinner's will." (page 60)    The passage this statement is based on is Romans 9:15-16.  

There are many bold statements made by this book and each one of them is backed by scripture.  Many believers debate about the possibility of losing one's salvation.  The stance this book takes is that "Truly saved people can never be condemned or lost again" and that "the reason so many believe salvation can be lost is because they believe salvation can be gained/and or maintained by some condition(s) sinners meet, at least in some way, at some stage, to some degree."  (page 68)  Those quotes are based on passages like John 6:37-40, John 10:27-30, and Romans 8:31-39.  The whole passages are displayed which makes this book a little easier to read without having to crack open the Bible every five paragraphs to look up the reference verse.  

With that said, this book is very thorough and I could only read a chapter or two a day to have enough time to let the information absorb into my non-seminary student brain.   While it wasn't exactly a page turner for me, I did find it well written and relatively easy to follow.  The asking price is a reasonable $7.99 on Amazon and I recommend looking into it if you have any questions about your or any loved one's salvation.

Thank you Bohlsen Group for sending us this book to review!

John Hayden is a Christian certified fitness trainer that uses his skills to train others to stay fit and glorify God.  The goal of Godfit is to challenge believers to be both spiritually and physically well.  If believers stay healthy, they can live and serve others longer.  This 117 page book is broken down into a six week program that has both exercise routines and devotional questions.

Before you begin, you should make sure you have the required equipment including dumbbells, kettlebells, and a Bible.  The book also recommends using a photo of yourself for inspiration.  There's a core strength assessment that is highly recommended to complete in order to gauge your fitness level.   There is a spiritual questionnaire to evaluate your religious life as well.

Each workout is between twenty and thirty minutes long.  There are various warm-up and cool down routines to choose from.  If you're unsure of how to do an exercise, there are video examples on http://www.godfit.com.  The videos are password protected but the password is in the book (page 5).

Thank you HarperCollins for sending us a copy of this book to review!

The videogame industry is a huge multi-billion dollar industry.  It started and flopped in the early eighties with notable failures like Atari burying between 700,000 to three million copies of ET in a landfill.   Nintendo and Sega continued on and started a battle that defined a generation.  Console Wars is a 576 page book written by Blake J. Harris and weaves the history of these two companies based on over two hundred interviews from family, friends, and former employees of Sega and Nintendo.    

In 1990 Nintendo was dominating the videogame market with its 8 bit Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) and soon to be released 16 bit Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES).   Even though Sega's Genesis was the first available 16 bit console, it didn't get much recognition and as a result it failed to sell very well.  That changed when Tom Kalinske was personally recruited by Sega of Japan's president to become the CEO of Sega of America.  

When Tom started at Sega, he didn't know much about videogames, but he did know how to market things with huge successes including Barbie, He-Man, and Flintstone multivitamins.  He specialized in uphill battles and this story is no exception. It's so good, a feature film is being made about it!

The book goes into the humble beginnings of Sega, Nintendo, and eventually Sony's endeavors into the videogame industry.  Nintendo has an interesting past with their playing cards origins and briefly owning a hourly rental hotel.  They definitely became more family friendly later on which gave Sega a target for their aggressive commercials aimed at slightly older gamers.  Sonic the Hedgehog gave Nintendo and their mascot, Mario, a run for their money.  

Thank you No Starch Press for sending us a copy of this book to review!

My kids have learned many programming languages like JavaScript and Ruby thanks to the helpful books published by No Starch Press.  Build an HTML5 Game assumes that you are familiar with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, and will teach you how to create a game from start to finish using them.  You don't have to be an advanced coder to read this book, but some foreknowledge will go a long way since you won't be learning the basics of these programming/scripting languages. 

This 198 page book written by Karl Bunyan will teach you how to make a browser based bubble popping game similar to Bust-A-move.  There are eight chapters and the first seven are dedicated to programming the game while the final chapter discusses other HTML5 capabilities such as retrieving data, webSockets, WebGL (for 3D) and security.  The final chapter also makes some suggestions on other games HTML5 would be well suited for including solitaire, platformers and match-3 games like Bejeweled.  

You won't be getting any history lessons as the first chapter has you diving in and coding right away.  Some of the goals achieved during the development process include randomizing the game board, calculating the firing angle and stopping point for the bubbles fired, dealing with collisions, keeping track of the score and handling new levels and the game's ending.  

Throughout the book, there are many helpful explanations and points to consider.  While the author recommends using Google's jQuery files, we have found the program to run better with them hosted locally.  The source code is readily available to download and view if you're stuck and can't figure out why the game isn't running. 

 Thank you Bohlen Group for sending us this book to review!

Extravagant Graces is written by Jeanette Chaffee, a survivor from the TWA Flight 840 that had a bomb detonate in mid-air. She goes into detail with her story and how she believes that a guardian angel was among the passengers to spare the structure of the plane and many of the lives within it. Upon sharing her story over the years, she has chronicled twenty-two other stories that defy luck and show God's grace in the midst of chaos.

There are two plane crash stories and two stories of martyrdom. Many people are familiar with the five missionaries who were speared to death by the Ecuadorian Acua tribe in 1955. Not only does this book retell that story, but it goes into details about the lives of the widows and how the Auca tribes people heard the musical score from the 2005 movie, Beyond the Gates of Splendor, before it was even released!

In the 1960s Phyliss and Phil Masters went to Dutch New Guinea to reach out to the cannibal Yali tribe. After converting several tribesmen, including the shaman's son, there was some hostility. This cost Phil his life in 1968. Amazingly, Christianity still thrived within the tribe and when a plane crashed nearby later that year, the only survivor was a nine year old boy that the tribe took in as an attempt at peace.

Not all of the stories are heavy hearted, like the one of Shirley Dobson leaving her hometown of thirty years to move to Colorado Springs. Her husband, James Dobson, joked that she left drag marks from California all across the Rockies. By their faithfulness, their ministry has flourished and is still going strong today!

Thank you James Samuel Gutshall for sending us a copy of your book to review!

Sweet Gentle Rain is a collection of poems and short stories that the author has written and gathered together since the mid 1980s.  In 2006, he received a trophy from the International Society of Poets for reciting his poem "Breakers" in Las Vegas, Nevada.  Inside this twenty-seven page book, you'll find poems about thankfulness, hardships, wonder, searching, time passing, grandkids, and annoyances. 

Some of the poems are light hearted while most of them are thought provoking.  Almost all of them are spiritual in nature and give thanks to God, our wonderful creator.  Each of the poems are accompanied by photographs or paintings.  All of them are fitting, but some of them are higher quality than others.   

As a mother of three, my favorite poem was "Ladybugs and Squirrels" talking about the curiosity and short attention span of his grandson, Nicholas.  My ten year old daughter enjoyed reading this book as well.  Sweet Gentle Rain can truly be enjoyed by young and old alike.  There is one alcoholic reference in the book and sadly it contains a grammatical error on page 19, "And drank way to[o] much wine".

 Sweet  Gentle Rain  is self published through Xlibris and is available online for over  $18.  I find that price too steep for my liking.  Fortunately,  the kindle version is more reasonably priced at $3.99.  

Written by: Benjamin K. Corum
Published by: Tate Publishing and Enterprises, LLC
Released: February 10, 2015
Price: $21.99

Thank you, Benjamin Corum, for sending us this book to review!

As an aspiring writer, I've spent quite a bit of time looking into the publishing industry and what it takes to get a novel published. One of the things I have learned from well-established authors is that publishers will pay you for your works. If you write it and write it well, then a publisher would publish it. Or it's possible that you can submit it to an agent, and they will find a publisher for you.

Although rewarding, this can be a difficult and challenging road to take. Publishers – especially those that take submissions from authors themselves, without an agent – receive thousands of submissions a year. Some submissions never even get read. 

In these days of the Internet, though, it is possible to publish a novel without a publisher. Companies like Amazon's CreateSpace or Lulu give an author the power to present their books to the digital marketplace for anyone to purchase. However, not all of these books will be of quality. Without the filter of agents or publishers, anything could be listed, and if there's any truth to Sturgeon's Law, 90% of it will barely be worth your time. 

Thank you Bohlsen Group for sending us this book to review!

Many Christians celebrate Christmas on December 25th and Easter on a Sunday in late March or Early April.  What if our traditions were proven to be wrong?  Patrick Cavanagh is Putting Tradition on Trial using astronomy and ancient Greek texts as evidence against an Easter Sunday resurrection.

I recently did (and highly recommend) a Bible Study called The Life of Jesus Christ Love. Life. Message. Mission. with my small group at church.    It's a great study that's easy to read and one of the chapters had a nice day by day break down of the last week of Jesus' life on earth.   Most Christians accept that the Last Supper was on a Thursday and that he was captured later that night and put on trial and to death on Friday.   Traditionally, Christians believe and celebrate Jesus' resurrection on Easter Sunday.  

While united in celebrating Easter, Christians have often contemplated the year of Christ's death. Many believe it's either 30, 31, or 33 CE.    Using astronomical calculations of the full moon in 14 Nisan, Patrick Cavanagh suggests that Christ died on Tuesday, April 15th in 32 CE and that by late Friday (approximately 72 hours), the women were informed that He had risen.  These are some pretty bold statements and the author makes a compelling case for them by providing Greek text and the works of Josephus to analyze key dates and how they all piece together.  

Putting Tradition on Trial continues to assimilate other historical events like the births of John the Baptist and Jesus in 3 BCE and Herod's death in 1 BCE.  Most people believe that Herod died in 4 BCE.  The book also mentions how the former pope Benedict stated his beliefs that Jesus birth had to be sooner than the currently believed timeframe of 5 or 6 BCE.  Since I'm not Catholic, I usually take statements from the pope with a grain of salt.  

Thank you St. Martin's press for sending us a review copy of this book!

CNN is doing a six-part series titled Finding Jesus and it discusses prominent figures and relics associated with Jesus and Christianity.  Finding Jesus: Fact. Faith. Forgery. is the companion book written by David Gibson and Michael McKinley.  The book covers John the Baptist's role and remains, The James Ossuary, Mary Magdalene's roles and remains,  the Gospel of Judas, the True Cross, and the Shroud and Sudarium.  

Each chapter discusses the relic or person's history, significance and authenticity.  According to the book, early churches were required to possess a relic in order to be considered credible.   The black market for Christian relics thrived then and it's still alive and well in the twenty-first century.  There are many verified hoaxes when it comes to bones of supposed prophets.  While some churches unknowingly acquired pig bones, other churches like one in Bulgaria, has a bone  from a Middle Eastern man.  Could it really be from John the Baptist?

The James Ossuary is another hot topic for several reasons.  Since Catholics believe that Mary remained a virgin, how could Jesus have a brother named James as the ossuary claims? The Catholic author(s?) suggests that Jesus had step brothers from a possible previous marriage of Joseph's.  The relic itself is a bit questionable since the inscription has two different authors and writing styles.   While the ossuary is genuine, the inscription on it could very well be fake.  The forgery was taken to court, but the accused forger was acquitted.

The gnostic gospels are brought up on two occasions with the Gospel of Judas and the Gospel of Jesus' Wife.  The Gospel of Judas paints the relationship of Jesus and Judas in a different light and shows them working together on the betrayal instead of it being one-sided as the other gospels proclaim.  The gospel claiming that Mary Magdalene was Jesus' wife is just as sketchy with many words and context missing from the text used to base this argument on.   While that argument isn't very convincing, the book suggests that Mary Magdalene could have been the woman who had demons expelled from her, and possibly the adulterer that Jesus pardoned.  

Thank you Thomas Nelson for sending us this book to review!

The world can be a pretty depressing place with natural disasters, murders and needless deaths occurring everywhere on a daily basis.  Turning on the evening news shows more bad news than good.  It doesn't take much for anybody, Christian or not, to lose heart with all of the negative media we're bombarded with.  

Dr. David Murray writes about ten ways Christians can be a joyful believer in a gloomy world.  To back up his claims he provides both Biblical and scientific anecdotes.    The foundation verse of this book is Nehemiah 8:10: "...for the joy of the LORD is your strength." No matter how down in the dumps we are, we can always call upon the Lord's strength.   Another verse referenced is Philippians 4:8: "Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things."   How true is that verse?  Dr. David Murray suggests that Christians meditate on it daily.  I agree with him.  Not only can it improve our outlook on life, it can strengthen our bond with God and improve our physical and mental health. After all, happiness is 10% circumstance, 50% genetic and 40% choice.

Other suggestions from the book include forgetting the negative things and focusing on the positive influences in our lives.   No matter where we are: at church, at home, or at work.  We are to be biblical examples of being thankful, forgiving, praying, and celebrating diversity.  There is no sense in constantly reflecting on past mistakes, we are to live in the here and now and make the best of it.   The Happy Christian also tells us that we should actively praise people and to pray before criticizing people.  The healthiest balance of criticism to praise ratio is 1:5.  This is especially true in marriages and in the work place.  Positive workers have proven to be better performers.  Marriages last longer if spouses know that they are loved more than they are criticized.

Even though I consider myself pretty happy and laid back in general, I enjoyed my time in this book and learned a lot from it.  The Happy Christian is a great book for any believer who can use a little morale boost.