Laurence Chaderton was a noted preacher and the Master of Emmanuel College in Cambridge England. After preaching for two hours one day he paused for a just a moment and the entire congregation stood up and shouted, “For God’s sake go on!” So, he preached for another hour.

I really wanted to like this Bible. However, its taken over a year for me to review this Bible for a reason. Frankly it was just not a Devotional Bible that I could use on a regular basis.

This Bible uses the New Century Version (NCV). I had never used the NCV much prior to obtaining this Bible and frankly I’m not impressed. The NCV is a revision of the International Children’s Bible and the language seems simplistic and choppy to me. The devotionals and notes added throughout the Dad’s Bible were decent but weren’t something I found all that helpful. I did like the overall design of the pages, but I’m not fond of hardback Bible’s

Here’s the bottom line: the Dad’s Bible is a novelty/gift Bible that will be given as gifts to thousands of dad’s on Father’s Day but frankly it’s probably not a Bible that will get used by many of those father’s on a regular basis. So, if you’re looking for something other than a tie to give go ahead and buy it. If you want one yourself you’ll soon find numbers of these showing up at your local thrift store.

** out of *****

Truth be told I had a real struggle as I was preparing to preach my message for Sunday morning. Recently I had been preaching through the book of Acts and had reached halfway through the book and felt like God didn’t want me to go any further. My original intention had been to preach on through the book. This left me without clear direction of where I was headed in my messages for a few weeks. A week ago Sunday God helped me to preach from 1 Corinthians 10 on “A Warning and a Way of Escape.” But, as I was preparing to preach this last week I was not completely clear on which direction to go. I felt like God wanted me to preach a series on Jesus leading up to Easter Sunday, but for this past Sunday it was one of those times when I was not completely clear what to preach. Those of you who are preachers will probably understand my situation completely – those of you who are not probably not so much…

Anyways I really struggled between two messages. However, God keep bringing me back to what I wound up preaching on Sunday morning. It was however one of those times when you get up to preach with a little more fear and trembling than usual!

But God came! Not that I felt like I preached particularly well. But God’s Presence came and spoke to hearts. My message was “Jesus – A Friend of Sinners.” Thank God He is and praise God my sister came back Home again!

Following the altar service I had one of our teenage African-American bus kids come up to me with his eyes wet with tears. In the past this boy has caused some trouble in his Sunday School class and you wonder if he’s catching anything at all by coming.

This past Sunday he stayed for morning worship which is something he normally doesn’t do. After the altar service he met me up front with tears in his eyes and tried his best to express to me that he was thankful for my message. I put my arm around him and told him that Jesus was his friend too. He smiled and pointed at his face and said, “These are tears of joy” and walked away.

I love it when God comes!! All the praise goes to Him!

Unfortunately we occasionally have a problem with our internet during our live streaming/recording and this recording is only a partial one.

Do you care enough to proselytize?

Throughout the book the author’s sound a clarion call to allow our lives to flow out of our relationship with Christ.

…following Jesus doesn’t mean trying to create a weapons-grade theological system to analyze, explain, and contain Him. Neither does it mean trying to obey His teachings by the power of our volition. When you say yest to Jesus, you are saying yes to a person, not to a proposition. Just as when you propose to your spouse, the proposal is not to propositions but to a human being. in vowing to be a disciple of Jesus, your “vow” is like any other vow of love in all of love’s varieties. You pledge your allegiance not to the vows, but to the person you love. the padlock of wedlock is not the vows; it’s the love. The padlock is a love-lock.

When you vow allegiance to Jesus, you are pledging allegiance to journey together without knowing everything about where you’re headed, and without expecting everything to be spelled out in some prenuptial. But you do know with whom you want to travel through life. And you know who the “head” of the relationship is.

So, Christianity is not an allegiance to a complex doctrinal or ethical system, but a passionate love for a way of living in the world that’s rooted in living by Jesus, the way, the truth, and the life.

This is a great book and one in which I highly recommend. It is written very well and the authors do a great job keeping your interest.

***** out of 5

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from Thomas Nelson Publishers as part of their BookSneeze.com book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 : “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

“Why does the Church stay indoors? They have a theology that has dwindled into a philosophy, in which there is no thrill of faith, no terror of doom and no concern for souls. Unbelief has put out the fires of passion, and worldliness garlands the altar of sacrifice with the tawdry glitter of unreality. The Holy Ghost cannot conquer the world with unbelief, nor can He save the world with a worldly Church. He calls for a crusade, a campaign, and an adventure of saving passion. For this enterprise He wants a separated, sanctified and sacrificial people.” — Samuel Chadwick

1. Resolve to Do All for God’s Glory (1, 4, 23)
   1 Cor. 10:31 “Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.” 
2. Resolve to Live in Order to Die Well (5, 6, 7, 9, 17, 19, 50, 52, 55)
   Romans 14:8 “For if we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord. Therefore, whether we live or die, we are the Lord’s.” (For Young People – # 46)
3. Resolve to Study and Pray Well (11, 28, 29)
   2 Tim. 2:15 “Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.”
4. Resolve to Speak Well (16, 31, 34, 36, 70)
   Eph. 4:29 “Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers.”
5. Resolve to Eat and Drink Well (20, 40, 41)
   1 Cor. 10:31 “Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.”