Christian Book Notes

Piper, Noel. Do You Want a Friend? Illustrated by Gail Schoonmaker. Wheaton: Crossway Books, 2009. 34 pp. $12.99.  Purchase at Westminster Books for $8.39.

Noel Piper has once again written a Christocentric children’s book. Her previous children’s book, Most of All, Jesus Loves You! has been used to introduce the One who loves with an unending love. Now, in Do You Want a Friend? our children are introduced to the One Friend who will never leave you and will always be willing and able to comfort you in times of trouble.

There are two things that I really liked with this particular children’s book. First, once the story of a boy wanting a friend is established, a series of questions about what type of friend you are looking for—One who loves you, One who comforts you, One who prays for you, etc.—is answered with a passage from Scripture

The second thing I really liked about the book were the illustrations by Gail Schoonmaker. She shows friends of every age, race and gender hanging out together on each page. Moreover, at the end of the book, you are left with an image of a family gathered together on their couch praying together with John 3:16 at the passage of choice.   The inclusion of John Newton’s One There Is, Above All Others at the very end of this book makes this a great resource for family worship.

This children’s book would make a great birthday or Christmas gift for any child under the age of seven.

I would like to congratulate Ron Rudd, Virginia Graves, and Michael Lumpkin on winning a copy of Adopted for Life. Ron Rudd was our grand prize winner as he won the autographed copy!

In the Lord’s providence, all three winners are directly involved in pastoral or children’s ministry in the local church. I am excited by this and pray that God would use this book to bring an awareness of the necessity of adoption in His church both physical and spiritual.

I would personally like to thank everyone for the response to this giveaway–our first here at Christian Book Notes. I was blessed and humbled to read the many comments.  Please, if you have not already purchased this book, get it now and make it a reading priority this summer.

Finally, we have many more give aways planned, if the Lord wills, in the coming weeks and months. To remain in the know, please subscribe to the email list or the RSS feed. We will never sell or give away your email address. God bless and thank you.

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