ESV Children’s Bible

What an excellent transition the ESV Children’s Bible from Crossway provides for young people between the ages for reading Bible storybooks and study editions for adults! For example, “The Bible, God’s Message to Us” introduces children to this “ancient book full of God’s mystery and truth. Full of wonder and power,” then goes on to explain why the Bible was written and some ways to respond.

Additional front matter also helps children get grounded before going on to the highly accurate but readable ESV (English Standard Version) text, while the back pages include such helpful information as “Who is God? What is God Like?”

The back matter also shows ways “God Makes Himself Known” and lists the Ten Commandments with explanations for each. Going “From Old To New Testament,” the study aids discuss “Jesus: God’s Righteous Son” and the meanings of the Gospel, salvation, and sanctification. In addition, a dictionary defines words often used in Sunday School, church services, and Bible classes with clear definitions for the A to Z terminology ranging from “abide” to “zeal.”

A defining moment for this edition, however, occurs in the lively Bible storybook illustrations interspersed throughout the text. That format makes the ESV Children’s Bible a good choice for children just learning to read and also those who absorb information better through pictures than words. For children who have begun to look up Bible books, chapters, and verses themselves, the layout eases the search with a red banner across the top of each page to highlight the actual Bible text.

©2014, Mary Harwell Sayler, Bible Reviewer


ESV Children’s Bible, hardback



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The New Catholic Answer Bible

Whether in a Protestant or Roman Catholic Bible study group, someone inevitably asks, “Why do Catholics ____?” In The New Catholic Answer Bible, Our Sunday Visitor provides intelligent, biblical answers to the questions most likely to fill in that blank.

For example, the page insert entitled “Does the Church Teach Evolution?” includes these responses:

“The entire universe, including the human race, is not the result of chance, but of God’s purposeful, loving design (see Gn 1:1, 31).”

and

“Human beings are not simply more advanced animals; they bear the image of God in a unique way (see Gn 1:26-27).”

For another example, the page for “What Is Original Sin?” says: “Unlike personal sin, resulting from the wrong choices of individuals, original sin does not result from our own doing. It is contracted, not committed; we are conceived with it (see Ps 51:7)” because of the Fall in the Garden of Eden where our original parents used free will to disobey God. However, “The sacrament of Baptism cleanses us from original sin. It restores us to original righteousness and fellowship with God (see Acts 2:38, 22:16).”

Throughout this edition, you’ll find an abundant supply of Bible references, relating to each colorful page insert. Many of the key questions relate specifically to the Catholic Church, such as “Why Does the Church Have Religious Orders?” or “Why Do Catholics Pray for the Dead?” but others address questions people ask in general, such as “Why Does God Allow Evil?”

The biblical response to that big question required more space, but to give you an idea of the thoughtful answers, “God allows evil in part because it is a necessary risk of creating sons and daughters who are free to love or not to love…. At the same time, no matter how terrible the evil caused by sin, God is great enough and wise enough, to bring out through that evil, an even greater good (see Gn 50:20, Roman 8:28). The resurrection of Christ is in fact a glorious example of how God can create joy from sorrow, beauty from horror, victory from defeat, and life from death.”

In addition to question-answer page inserts and insightful footnotes throughout the book, this edition includes articles on the divine revelation and history of the Bible in the front matter and a three-year reading plan in the back pages. If you want to learn more about the Catholic faith and doctrine to deepen your life as a parishioner or to broaden your understanding of a Christian perspective outside your denomination, The New Catholic Answer Bible will answer those needs and more.

©2014, Mary Harwell Sayler, Bible reviewer


The New Catholic Answer Bible, paperback



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Let There Be Light

Earlier this week, I began thinking about the importance of a children’s picture book of the creation story, and so I started writing down thoughts of poetry and the perfect mind of Love and the potential for exquisite artwork wrought of color and light to show the beauty and diversity inherent in all the wonders God creates. And then the book arrived from BookSneeze – even lovelier and more poetic than anything I’d envisioned.

That’s not surprising, of course, as the loving man, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and the highly gifted artist, Nancy Tillman, joined talents in giving us the creation story, Let There Be Light.

Each page bursts with color, light, and love, ending those first days in time with this timeless word:

“God looked at everything that he had made and clapped his hands together in delight. ‘Isn’t it wonderful!’ “

Yes, it is!

©2014, Mary Harwell Sayler


Let There Be Light, hardcover, children's picture book



Let There Be Light, Kindle edition



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African Heritage Study Bible

The Original African Heritage Study Bible, published by Judson Press, answers questions I’ve had ever since I began to wonder why few people mention that Egypt sits on the continent of Africa or why artistic renderings of Jesus most often show a Jewish man, Who’s as pale-skinned and blonde as I am.

In the beginning, God made us, male and female, in the image of God, but from the moment we left the Garden of Eden, we’ve been attempting to remake God in our image. Therefore, when I first heard of the Black Madonna, I only saw a remaking at work without considering how those oldest renderings of Jesus’ mother Mary might actually be the most accurate portrayal of a young Jewish woman of Afro-Asian descent.

One might expect something written from an African heritage perspective to want us to consider that thought, but the scholarly articles introducing the King James Version (KJV) go far beyond an Africentric view. Through extensive research of Bible places, names, and cultures, the introductory articles clearly show how the beginnings of civilization and beginnings of our ongoing relationship with God had their genesis in Africa, known then as “Akebu-Lan,” which means “Mother of Mankind” or “Garden of Eden.”

From the beginning, that name remained in usage until ancient Romans renamed it “Africa,” but even then, the country was known to encompass the “Middle East,” a term that didn’t exist prior to the 20th century. I did not know this, and so I read with great interest the footnotes to shaded text that alert readers to “passages, places, names, and information relating to the Edenic/African presence.” What I found even more interesting, though, is that peoples of Africa have retained many of the customs and attentiveness to God as first expressed in Bible cultures.

This rich heritages belongs to all of us, so I hope Christians from every background will get a copy of this excellent study edition that Judson Press kindly gave me to review. Although African-Americans who have experienced any form of oppression will especially receive healing from these pages, the matter-of-fact articles also call for reconciliation between people within the One Body of Christ – a theme that’s been important to me as long as I can remember.

In addition to information highlighting peoples of African descent such as St. Augustine or other saints and popes born in Africa, this edition offers unique features I haven’t found in any other study Bible. For example, the front matter includes a typical listing of the books of the Bible but atypically adds the meaning of each book’s name. For instance, “Judges” evokes thoughts of courtroom scenes, but more accurately, the notes define them as “Deliverers who had to exercise the Judgment of God (intelligence of God) to rule the children of Israel and defeat their enemies.” Or, for the book of Galatians, we learn the meaning of the title as “Gallaic, Greece, Land of the Gauls or simplicity of truth.”

After a listing of the books comes a section entitled, “A Key To The Correct Syllabication of the Scripture Proper Names and Their Meanings,” which tells us, for example that “Aaron” means “light,” “Cush” means “black,” “Zebah” means “sacrifice,” and “Zipporah” is the “Egyptian wife of Moses.”

Numerous articles and color photographs help the text to come alive throughout the book, and at the back, colorful maps clearly show where biblical tribes and places can be located. I also enjoyed reading about “African Edenic Women and the Scriptures,” where we're reminded that “Egypt produced queens as well as Pharaohs,” and “The Candaces of Ethiopia were strong successful women who were instrumental in charting the destiny of ancient Christian Africa.” Indeed, “It is because of the Candace that Ethiopia was one of the first countries to become a Christian nation.”

Throughout the African diaspora, Bible verses rekindled faith for countless people, and so “101 Favorite Bible Verses” have been included as well as a section of hymns. Having heard and loved many “spirituals” since childhood, I passed along those faith lyrics, singing them to my sleepy children while my rocking chair kept time and timeless comfort.

As an Anglo-American whose ancestors survived the first terrible winter at Jamestown and eventually worked alongside African-Americans to build our own blessed nation, I want to thank Editor Cain Hope Felder and Judson Press for this long-needed study Bible. May this highly recommended edition bring respect and reconciliation among all Christians and help us to heal and up-build the church Body of Christ in Jesus’ Name.

©2014, Mary Harwell Sayler


The Original African Heritage Study Bible, large print, paperback



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Catholic Women’s Bible

The word “catholic” means universal, which aptly describes the Catholic Women’s Bible with its timeless, universal appeal to women everywhere. As stated in the introduction by Woodeene Koenig-Bricker (one of my favorite contemporary devotional writers): “We have tried to highlight some of the women without whom God’s plan for humanity would not have unfolded as it has…. Their situations and circumstances may be different from ours, but the longings and dreams haven’t changed.” With colorful inserts to acquaint us with women throughout the Bible, we “come to realize that these women are not just figures out of a distant past. They are our sisters.”

In addition to these unique features, the visually-appealing cover speaks of light and levity and seems to draw the reader to look up and into the pages of scripture.

Published by Our Sunday Visitor, those scriptures comes to us in the revised New American Bible, which includes deuterocanonical books often referred to by Bible publishers as “apocryphal.” Also, other Christian publishers often place deuterocanonical books between the two testaments or after Revelation, whereas a Catholic edition interweaves the books according to their primary category.

At the beginning of this Bible, for example, “The Names and Order of the Books of the Bible” lists “Biblical Novellas” (Tobit, Judith, Esther, and I and II Maccabees) as located between the books of history and books of wisdom. Then, besides Job , Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Solomon (or Song of Songs), “The Wisdom Books” include The Book of Wisdom and The Wisdom of Ben Sira (aka Sirach), whose inspired words continue to inspire those of us who read them.

In referring to the deuterocanonical or apocryphal books, we’re talking, of course, of the Hebrew Bible aka Old Testament. In any New Testament Bible published by any publisher, you will find the same books in the same order with the same devotion among Christians – male or female – in any church anywhere. However, Christian women who want to relate to the women of the Bible will welcome this lovely edition where we meet such interesting but often overlooked people as “Mrs. Noah: Standing by Her Man” or Asenath “Joseph’s Egyptian Wife” or the prophetess Anna with her “intuitive nature” or “Mrs. Peter: The Woman Behind The Man,” each of whom helps us to learn more about ourselves and one another and, ultimately, the “Bride of Christ: The Church.”

©2014, review by Mary Harwell Sayler


Catholic Women’s Bible, paperback



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