"Jesus is_________ " by Judah Smith

I am such a blessed girl! In the last couple of months I've received advanced readers copies of books that came out from my top 3 favorite authors and speakers in exchange for some tweeting, facebooking, Amazon reviews and promotion. I am glad to promote what I already believe in and I loved "Jesus is _______" by Judah Smith.

I truly believe that Judah Smith is one of the greatest communicators and pastors of our generation. I say “our” as a 30-something mother of four who had the privilege of sitting under Judah’s teaching for a year and a half and who was profoundly impacted by his teaching on grace, which is the very heartbeat of this book. Much of the material I had heard before in sermons, but reading it again was incredibly impacting, especially as a person who likes rules and has depended more in the past on morality than Jesus. There is nothing that has changed my life more than hearing from Jesus, instead of trying to be good. And the message of this book is that grace is a Person. Yes, it’s quotable, tweetable and easy to read but also deep, profound and funny at times.

I will leave you with one of my favorite passages from the book : "...Rules are easier to deal with than grace. That’s a big part of their attraction. That’s why we keep making up rules even when we can’t keep the ones we already have. Rules are tidy. Grace is messy, unpredictable, unquantifiable. I can hold my life up against a set of rules and easily determine if I’m a good person or a bad person. I can do the same with your life, and I can do it from a distance, without having to mess with relationship and compassion and the grittiness of real life. Not so with grace. Grace risks its reputation.... it doesn’t get so distracted with doing good things that it forgets about people. But once you’ve embraced grace, you’ll never let go. ...we need help, so God gives us grace. And his name is Jesus"

You will not regret reading this book and I pray that it will bring you closer to the Person of grace in Jesus.

http://www.amazon.com/Jesus-Is-Find-New-Human/dp/1400204755/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1361575621&sr=8-1&keywords=judah+smith