When you hear a good friend quote the same book numerous times in a variety of settings over many months, you pay attention!

My friend Connie kept giving out word gems from Jesus Over Everything by Lisa Whittle. I finally stopped and asked more about it one day. After a detailed conversation, I decided I definitely needed to read it and wanted to do so with others. A small group of friends and I read this book together and met to discuss it over several weeks.

I don’t remember a time I underlined, starred, circled, dog-eared, and post-it noted (:)!) a book more! What I love about it is the authenticity and vulnerability of the author along with the concrete applications for life. Such good, relatable encouragement and conviction as well.

Between the front and back covers, we found rich wisdom about living our lives with honesty, service, and commitment! The author addresses our daily life distractions and internal self-talk vs. knowing who Jesus is and knowing who we are in Him, with encouragement to look at our lives and habits and grow in awareness of our interaction with ourselves and others.

This book overflows with encouraging conviction, and humble, kind, and honest dialogue about living out authentic faith. Remarkable pages to read by myself and engage in robust conversations with friends.

I’m reading it again this summer and one of my favorite sections is entitled Choose Real. This resonates so much with me because real people are who I want to hear from and also the kind of communicator I want to be for others. We need to know we are not alone in our struggles, our stumbles, our messy hair-no-makeup-day selves. Jesus didn’t come to save a perfect world. He came in His perfection to save us in our imperfection. We are all in need of a Savior and the more I go along in life, the more I realize we must be willing to live out this truth of real to encourage and come alongside one another.

Not one of us has the perfect physical appearance, life, home, job, kids, family, vacation, etc. no matter what it might look like on Instagram. I stand most grateful to my sister in Christ, Lisa Whittle, for pointing us back to the truth of Jesus and for reminding each of us to look to Him over everything else in this earthly existence.

A huge shout out to my friend, Connie, for talking about this book so much. When we get excited about someone else’s life-giving words and we talk about it, we point others to seek encouragement there as well. Thank you, my friend.

This book will forever stay close to my Bible. It is truly life changing.

Happy Sunday! I hope you know you are a unique creation, made for this place and time, dearly loved by your Creator!