Saturday, January 25, 2014

Book Review and Giveaway: Praying for Boys

I've been honored to be part of the Launch Team for Brooke McGlothlin's new book "Praying for Boys: Asking God for the Things They Need Most".  I was given a free copy of the book to review and one to give away but as always, my opinions are my own :)

Parenting is one of the toughest and most rewarding jobs I have.  It is a such a huge responsibility when God places these little ones in our care.  Being mom to my son both fills my heart with joy and sends me to my knees regularly.  Yet after growing up without any brothers, I am sometimes puzzled how best to encourage and pray for my son.  Over the past year or so, I've been blessed by The MOB Society (Mothers of Boys) through blog posts, prayers for the day, and encouragement in all forms on their site and their Facebook page.  So when I heard one of the authors behind MOB was releasing a book, I was excited and sure it would be good.

This book Praying for Boys: Asking God for the Things They Need Most by Brooke McGlothlin exceeded my expectations.  It is not simply a parenting book nor a devotional written for parents of boys.  It is a unique combination of the two, concisely sharing the author's passion of prayerful parenting, while giving readers accessible tools to add fervent scriptural prayers to their parenting faith walk.  It encouraged me in so many ways and challenged me to be more intentional about my prayers for my son.

The book contains 21 chapters of areas in a boy's life that need prayer from "Heart Change" to "Fear" to "Fruit of the Spirit" and so much in between.  Each chapter explains the importance of that area of prayer, nuggets of parenting wisdom, and a list of scriptural prayers to guide you in praying for your son, over your son or with your son.

Throughout the book the author meets the reader right where you are with honesty and passion.  She reminded me again that no matter what I do, I cannot change my son's heart.  Heart change is God's job, prayer is mine.  The extra blessing of these scripture-based prayers in this book is that as I pray them, God's word is resonating in my heart as well, influencing my heart and day.  As I've found so many times, my prayers for others impact my heart as much or more than the one I'm praying for.

Brooke also included some great tips on using the prayers in the book, how to integrate them into your daily/weekly routine, and even how to use the book in bible/book study group.  I think Brook has put together in this book a wonderful resource for moms of boys, not something to just read once and leave on a shelf.  Instead, it is a book you can open again and again, especially when the day has brought you to the end of yourself and you need help finding the words to pray.

“Raising boys brings one adventure after another, but we’re losing the beauty and importance of training up godly men. Our boys need faithful Christian parents now more than ever. We can choose to rejoin the war for the hearts of our sons…today.” ~Brooke McGlothlin

More About the Author

Brooke McGlothlin is Co-founder of Raising Boys Media, where moms and dads come to discover delight in the chaos of raising boys. You can find her writing about fighting for the hearts of her sons at the MOB Society blog, or living a life in pursuit of Jesus at her personal blog www.brookemcglothlin.com.  A normal day finds Brooke homeschooling her two boys, wrangling two large Labs, Toby and Siri, writing to bring hope to the messes of life (in the midst of her own messy life), and falling more and more in love with the man she’s had a crush on since the third grade (who just happens to be her husband).




** GIVEAWAY **
Its been a while since I've hosted a giveaway on this little blog so its exciting to have one again.  I want this drawing to be open to everyone, not just moms of boys.  Its a great book for dads and grandparents too.  I think parents of girls can also benefit from much of this book and if you are not parent I'm guessing you know someone who is that you could bless with this book!  US residents only please.  If the giveaway form isn't working for you, please just write a comment as your entry below and I'll make sure to include you.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

4 comments:

  1. This post caught my attention because I just blogged the other day about raising my 2 year old son to be a man of God. I'm praying more lately about what God wants from me as a mother more so than what I want.

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  2. Wow, this book sounds really great! As the mom of two boys, I never expected to be a mom to only boys, even though I had a brother growing up the girls outnumbered him, so it's definitely uncharted territory for me. My mother-in-law, who raised a family of three boys, has been very helpful when it comes to my questions about raising more than one boy. I am always on the lookout for great books about parenting and raising boys and this one would be perfect for me. I've been blessed because when my husband took at job at a new church at the youth pastor almost two years ago, we came into a church where I was able to make friends with two other ladies who have only boys who are the same ages as mine and I'd love to share this book with them as well.

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  3. My son Sam is 20 months old. Though my son may be on a slightly different path than others because of his diagnosis of Down syndrome, I want to train him up to be compassionate and strong and to love Jesus with all his heart, just like my husband does. It sounds like a book like this would be a perfect tool for doing that!

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  4. I would love to win so that I can be more in tune with my BOY. I used to think there was no difference between boys and girls. Boy, was I EVER wrong. :)

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