Remarkable Hope by Shauna Letellier is like a guide to renewing your hope in God. We have all been disappointed in life circumstances. It's hard to have hope when we are so disappointed in our outcomes. This book specifically highlights those times. The Bible is full of stories where people felt hopeless. When we don't see the full picture it's hard to imagine that the trials in our life could ever bring anything good. Yet, the Bible also shows us in each one of those stories that our faith in God is founded and sure. In this book the author shares those stories from the Bible that teaches us about hope. She also includes her own teaching which goes more in-depth showing us what hope really is.

The author does a wonderful job in retelling the stories in her own way. The teachings are also very informative and interesting. While it's hard to know just how accurate a retelling is, I do enjoy them because it is a look at how someone else imagines it to have happened. Regardless of whether the author's stories are one hundred percent on par with how it happened, she does capture the essence of the story and stays true to it's meaning.

I really enjoyed this book because of how hard it is to feel hopeful sometimes. I suggest this book to anyone who is going through a trial or as a gift for someone else who is in a difficult time.

I received this book free from NetGalley in exchange for this honest review.

We experience a string of catastrophes and we wonder about the hope we are to have in the promises of God. Hope is to be the anchor of our soul but we feel like our boat is capsizing. We are overwhelmed by disappointment.

Letellier shares her teaching on hope in a unique way. She expands on stories from the gospels, adds a teaching and then a prayer. Her stories are of people experiencing disappointment in their relationship with Jesus. There are Simeon and John the Baptist. Both had expected a liberating Savior. Simeon saw a baby and John saw the inside of a prison cell. Mary and Martha expected Jesus to come immediately and heal their brother Lazarus but watched him die instead. The disciples on the way to Emmaus had expected great things but wondered if they had believed in a false Messiah. Letellier tells eight stories.

My favorite story was of Jairus. Letellier began her story showing how Jairus cared for the synagogue. She caught me up in Jairus' emotional desire to have Jesus heal his daughter and the pain he must have experienced when the notice came she had died. How irritated he must have been at Jesus' delay by healing the bleeding woman. How disappointed he must have felt, thinking all was lost.

I like her teaching after each of the stories. She helps us understand God does not always remove the trials. God's timing is not ours. We think it is too late and surely God has abandoned us. Yet in the end we receive more than we could ever ask or think.

This book is good for people puzzled by the unpredictability of God. It is good for people who like to learn through stories. It is good for people who want to learn how to dive into a Bible story through imagination. Letellier challenges us too, such as in the story of Peter walking on the water. Our we devoted to Jesus Himself or to what we think He should be doing for us?

I like this way of teaching but I do have one caveat. I am always a bit hesitant with fictionalized accounts of Jesus and His ministry. Imagining what Jesus might have said and putting it in print makes me nervous. I do recommend this book, however, as an innovative way to gather glimpses of how God revives hope in a way we could never have imagined.

I received a complimentary egalley of this book from the publisher. My comments are an independent and honest review.