March 2025 Reads: Grieving, Prayer, Holes

Getting these out late. I'll blame the travel schedule!

Grieving: You Path Back to Peace by James White

This may be White's most pastoral book. Usually associated with his debates and staunch defense of his theological convictions, it is rare to see White take a step back and offer encouragement from a pastoral perspective. When this happens, however, it is truly a blessing.

White gently reminds his readers that yes, Christians grieve too, no, you aren't the only one to feel this way, and that you should give yourself the time you need to process through your grief.

He explores what upward healthy grieving patterns look like as opposed to downward patterns, and that the key difference between the two is hope. From there, White goes on to give practical advise on how to actually do the real work of grieving. He helps the reading through things like transitions, sifting through belongs, and dealing with spontaneous emotion. He warns about common pitfalls and things that can take us by surprise, especially at holidays. He answers some of the tougher questions that often get asked in our grief. Finally, he closes with a summary of the book to remind you what you've read and to encourage the reader the God is at work, even in our darkest moments.

This book is simple, pastoral, warm, kind, short, and full of genuinely good advice. It' a book I would feel comfortable handing to someone struggling in their grief to help them navigate their feelings in a Christ-honoring and uplifting way. 

Does Prayer Change Things? by R.C. Sproul

This is part of the "Crucial Questions" series from Ligonier Ministries. 

Sproul provides a simple primer on prayer with this small paperback. His outline is neatly alliterated, covering the place, purpose, pattern, practice, prohibitions, and power of prayer. 

For someone who has no background to understanding the whos, whats, whens, and whys of prayer, this could be a helpful resource. He covers the Lord's Prayer and offers the ACTS acronym for a way to structure our own prayers. He warns against things that might hinder our prayers. He closes with a discussion on texts that speak to the power of prayer. On the whole, its a solid and basic boilerplate primer of prayer. 

Despite it's solid structure and coverage of the basics of prayer, this book was one of the more disappointing books I've read in a long time. This isn't because there was anything particularly wrong with this book. It's fine. Its just that it left me feeling like the main question from the title was largely left unanswered. 

You know how you can see an article or video thumbnail that offers a compelling title, and then when you click to read the article or watch the video you discover that the actual article/video has very little to do with the title? Clickbait. We all know about clickbait. 

To me, this book was clickbait. It asked a huge question: does prayer change things? But then it barely addresses the issue with a very cursory answer. I thought the entire book was going to unpack this question and wrestle deeply with related questions like 

• If God is sovereign, how do my prayers affect anything?
• What if I don't pray?
• How much does our individual faith affect the answers to our prayers?
• Why does Jesus say to be persistent in prayer if God hears and knows all things?

He does touch on a couple of these, but not in any great depth. The rest of the book completely ignores the hard questions as he pivots to talk about the basics of the pattern and practice of prayer. As a result, I felt like I got clickbaited. I came for an in depth discussion on the tensions of God's sovereignty as it relates to prayer from one of the world's leading Calvinistic thinkers of our era, and I left with yet another basic breakdown of the Lord's Prayer and the ACTS acronym. 

This is the most negative review I've ever written for a book, and it solely has to do with expectations. If If I knew I was getting a well-rounded primer on prayer, I think my review might be different. If someone wanted a basics book to get them started in their prayer journey, this may be a book for them. If someone was new to the faith and brand new to prayer, I may look for a resource that is even simpler than this because Sproul can be a bit wordy and I suspect that could be overwhelming for those new to these discussions.  

Bottom line: It's not a bad book. It's just not what I was lead to believe it was based on the question in the title and what I expected from the author. 

Holes by Louis Sachar

This book was actually read in February, but I forgot to include it in that post. This was a read-aloud book with my children before bed. 

This is a story about Stanley, a young man whose family is apparently cursed due to the actions of Stanley's no-good, dirty-rotten, pig-stealing, great-great-grandfather. Falsely accused and convicted of stealing a pair of cleats, Stanley is sent to a juvenile work camp to "build character" by digging holes. For the rest of the story you will have to dig in to the book for yourself (see what I did there?).

This is one of my all-time favorite books, and the movie adaptation is one of my all-time favorite movies. This isn't a movie review, but I will note how rare to have a movie adaptation that is just as good as the book itself. In this case, Sachar wrote the screenplay and had a significant hand in shaping the movie through various kinds of input. The net result is a class movie to pair with a classic book, and you cannot go wrong enjoying either one.