Monday, December 19, 2011

Review: My Favorite Bible

 "My Favorite Bible by Rondi DeBoer and Christine Tangvald - Illustrated by Ariel Pang"
       
         I have 3 kids at home so I am always looking for ways to get my kids exited about the Bible and Bible stories.  Our household owns many children's bibles, some I like, some not so much. When I saw this one I figured I'd give it a shot.
         First of all this Bible was put out by the same people that produce God's Word Translation. Keeping that in mind, this Bible is consistent with the type of language you would find in that translation; simple and easy to understand. It is written as a story narrative which makes it easy to read to the kids before bedtime. These narratives are also conveniently broken up into chunks that provide discussion questions and activities at the end of each section to help your children learn from what they just read. There is also a key verse at the end of each section for memorization or simply just to tie it into actual scriptural language. That being said, as much as I enjoy the narrative Bible for kids, I what to make sure the actual scriptural text is emphasized as I read through the word with my children; to KNOW the word well and not just the stories therein.  This is my biggest criticism in this Bible.
          The illustrations are a little too "fluffy" than I would like, but overall, well done and visually appealing. There are a few other children's Bibles that I can think of that have better illustrations.
           This children's bible will not collect dust on our shelf, the discussion questions and the way it is broken up into chunks makes this Bible stand out where many others don't, though it still has it's weaknesses, it will find it's way into story time once and a while at night with my kids or at least make a great gift to someone who is a new parent.

"Book has been provided courtesy of Baker Publishing Group and Graf-Martin Communications, Inc.
Available at your favourite bookseller from Revell, a division of Baker Publishing Group".