Month: September 2011

Prayers for Pakistan

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A few days ago I received a nice email from a group of pastors in Pakistan requesting prayers for their ministries. It’s always exciting to me to intercede for Christians in other nations, especially when I have the personal contact to know how to pray.

Please pray with me for a mighty move of God in Pakistan:

  • that God would strengthen these pastors and their ministries
  • for supernatural protection for these congregations, especially Pastors S, B, Y, and N
  • that they would be encouraged by the presence and power of God and the fellowship of the body
  • that the Lord would connect them to many other Christians internationally
  • that the Lord would continue to reveal Himself to them and give them wisdom
  • that their prayer group would experience a new level of God’s presence and revelation
  • for a fresh outpouring of joy and boldness as they share the gospel
  • for creativity in all their work
  • for more and more people to recognize Jesus as Lord and love Him with their lives
  • for the Christians in Pakistan to be connected and unified with each other
  • for them to be blessed with both spiritual and physical provisions
  • that God’s work in this nation would extend to its fullest extent
  • that the Christians in Pakistan would be an example to surrounding nations, encouraging them and propelling them in their faiths
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Review of The Realms Thereunder by Ross Lawhead

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Genre: Fantasy

Series: Book One of the Ancient Earth Series

Loosely Recommended.

I only rarely enjoy fantasy, so I was trying to be extra open-minded as I read this. Actually, I was hoping it would be more about the Old English language and culture and less true fantasy, since the premise is that two students in England find their way beneath the streets of Oxford into a hidden city filled with Old English mythology and folklore. I studied Old English in college and was excited to revisit it; but this story is purely fantastic (as opposed to historical with fantastic elements).

I also felt that the story was trying to cover too much at once (multiple characters in the past and present), which made it a bit hard to follow. I dreaded finishing it until the very end because I wasn’t caught up in the story or characters. But the story ended in a way which actually caused me to want to keep reading. Perhaps I will check out the later books in this series. I imagine the upcoming books will be better now that the background has been thoroughly laid. A true fantasy fan would likely enjoy the book the full way through.

I received a complimentary copy of this book as a part of the Thomas Nelson Book Review Blogging Program through booksneeze.com.

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Review of The Scroll by Grant R. Jeffrey and Alton L. Gansky

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Genre: Fiction/Suspense

Not Recommended.

The majority of this story I actually did enjoy reading. It’s about a team of archaeologists uncovering ancient biblical artifacts in Israel–and that part of it was really interesting.

The lead archaeologist and story hero, Dr. David Chambers, is introduced as a heart-broken agnostic, who has recently given up biblical archaeology to study in South America after losing his fiancée and Christian faith. When the opportunity of a lifetime forces David to dig again in Israel with his ex, he hesitantly takes it. And thus begins the potential for a suspenseful journey into emotional wounds, a search for God, and many physical obstacles–except that these things didn’t happen; at least not in a way that catalyzed feelings of suspense, introspection, and empathy. The archaeological side of the story remained relatively interesting as the book progressed, but unfortunately, the character development stayed pretty basic, and the story became predictable and didn’t really climax.

The final chapters were so bad (rushed, poorly developed, and trying to do too much) that my image of the book went quickly from “this is okay” to “this is terrible; what were they thinking!” There was so much potential in this story, but it just didn’t work.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from WaterBrook Multnomah.

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