God's Grace & Grit

In God's Grace & Grit: Surviving Your Fairytale, Snelling and Tompkins share their experiences with relationships and faith. Both authors are what I would consider fairly "new" Christians, and they acknowledge the effect that their lack of relationship with God had on their previous marriages.

While the concept and title of the book piqued my interest, I was initially leery of reading it. Too many times, books like this tend to be geared toward women in committed relationships. I was pleasantly refreshed by the tone and tenure of the book. In spite of the fact that it is written primarily to the woman in a relationship (dating, engaged, married), it also addresses issues that engulf Christian singleness.

I did find a few places that were out of sync with my own personal faith, belief and understanding of scripture. (Again, the authors are what I would consider "new" Christians.) While there was a section addressing Jewish tradition, bordering on mysticism in one of the early chapters, along with an interpretation of Jacob's ladder that I had never heard previously, it did not permeate the rest of the manuscript.

It was a quick, easy read that definitely impacted my faith journey and I will be adding it to my permanent collection of religious non-fiction texts. The authors were transparent, engaging and information was provided to be thought provoking, as well as to facilitate and encourage change. I highly recommend this book and will be suggesting it to my friends as a must-read this year.