God Hearts Me: A Devotional Journal for Girls is a great resource for a variety of Bible verses on various subjects from a bunch of Bible versions and translations. The richness of sources of Bible verses gives this journal the feeling of being a bunch of friends sharing their favorite verses from their own Bibles.
There are short devotions showing God's love for each of us through His making us, knowing us, listening to us, protecting us, comforting us, giving us what we need, keeping His promises, giving us joy, giving us hope, giving us strength, forgiving us, and having a plan for us. Each devotion is followed by verses about that topic from the various versions and translations of the Bible. Then, there is space for you to write about how you feel about God and life and that devotion's topic.
I fell in love with this book because I had one place where I could find Bible verses from almost all my favorite editions of the Bible. There were neither any verses from the New American Bible or the New Revised Standard Version, nor any verses from the books of Tobit, Judith, or Maccabees, as found in Catholic Bibles.
The book of Tobit is a great encouragement when I have been very sad and mad at the world. The book of Judith shows the strength and power of a woman who loved God and trusted in His helping her and her people. Maccabees is a history tale of rebellion of the Hebrew people against others in the land God promised Abraham. All of these books provide verses that can encourage and strengthen the faith of all of God's children, no matter their age.
Even though I'm an adult and the book is styled for girls, I found it useful to think through the situations presented and what my answers would be. Instead of bullying in school there's gossip in work places, or strife in families. I can see this book applying beyond the age and gender assigned by the cover.
Despite the last few paragraphs, I gave the book 4/5 stars because of the good that it does provide for readers. I really liked the variety of Bible editions sourced for the verses. I also really liked the devotions and the questions for application asked. The various Bible verses would be good for memorization to keep God's words of love and encouragement in your heart through the difficult times in life when you don't have your journal handy.
I received an advance copy of this book to review through the NetGalley program in exchange for my honest opinion.
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