A book review of Intentional Faith: Aligning Your Life with the Heart of God by Allen Jackson
Stars: ****
Thomas Nelson (2020)
Christian Self-Help
240 pages
Disclosure: I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. This post contains affiliate links.
Summary: Many Christians experience low points in their faith, times when their spiritual lives have grown cold, stagnant, or routine. They feel frustrated and desperate to reconnect with God. Yet encouragement alone is not enough. We need God’s power to bring transformation, and we need specific tools and a focused intent to know the Lord. Drawing upon years of pastoral ministry and his own experience, Allen Jackson has developed a 100-day plan to reinvigorate a believer’s life, organized around ten declarations of intent.
A simple investment of twenty minutes a day will create an unstoppable momentum in readers’ lives. Their hearts are opened to new possibilities with God where his purposes unfold and where the fruit of his rewards are found.
Intentional Faith
This seems like a simple book but it was very helpful. I chose Intentional as my word of the year a few years back but didn’t really know how to make my life more intentional so I sort of forgot about the word and didn’t do anything with it.
The book essentially has a plan to be more intentional with your spiritual life at least. First you are introduced to the basics ten declarations of intent such as Intend to Grow, Intend to Pray, Intend to Work with Integrity or Intend to Practice Forgiveness.
After all are explained, the author invites us to one hundred days of faith. A commitment page is included to read and sign if you want to take it seriously and really commit to being more intentional. The appendices include a 100 day plan to read the whole New Testament as well as a bunch of prayers based off the ten intents as well as other prayers such as for protection, anxiety, depression, temptation, rejection, healing and addiction. Personally I don’t like premade prayers but if that’s your thing, they were very nice.
The section on Intend to Pray really explained how I try to do thing with regards to praying little bits here and there instead of large prayers just before bed or in the morning. The author gives examples such as saying a one line prayer before you get out of bed in the morning, when you pull into the parking lot at work, when you leave the office, when you walk into the front door or when you put your head down to sleep.
I say prayers in my head at the grocery store, on a walk, in the bathroom, even in the middle of the night before I flip over and go back to sleep. It works well for me and I know that I am consistently praying. I highly recommend it.
In the Intend to Work with Integrity section, it mostly talks about working outside the home but also refers to work you do in the home such as caring for your children or cleaning your house. I am still very much working on it myself, but the book reiterated an idea I’ve heard before, specifically for housework, about thinking about the work as you doing it for God. If you are cleaning the house to worship God, to make him happy, than it doesn’t matter that the house becomes dirty again right after or that your husband didn’t notice because you are doing it for Him.
Overall it was a great book and one worth getting.
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