Just because I was thinking about my favorite books of the Bible, I thought I'd share them with you. While I do have a clear favorite book, the rest are more so relative to topics. Presented below are the topics and the group of books I love referring to for inspiration and strength concerning the topic. If I'm able, I want to put together study booklets highlighting the topic or theme within these books in more detail. So if that's something you're interested in let me know in the comments below![2]
Book for Motivation in Life
I feel like most of life's scenarios and questions can be found and answered in the following three books:
Job
Job is basically a tragedy that pulls a deus ex machina[1] and ends on a happy note. What could possibly happen in my life that would be worse than what happened to Job? He lost all his children. He lost his wealth. He lost his health. The people were convinced he had some major skeletons in his closet for such tragedy to befall him, so he lost his reputation too. Yet, Job was highly favored by God. The book of Job answers the question of why bad things happen to good people and it reminds me to keep my faith through dark times.
Proverbs
Proverbs needs no explanation. This book is full of gems that grace walls, pictures, shirts, etc. There's a proverb for nearly every situation. The short, succinct messages are easy to memorize, poetic, and profound.
Jonah
When I was a child, my grandmother used to always remind me that "a hard head makes a soft tail"—i.e., when you don't listen you get a lot of spankings. Jonah is the spiritual embodiment of that theme for me. Jonah is most famous for ending up in the belly of a sea creature for 3 days. Why was he in the sea creature? Because he didn't listen to God. Jonah took the long, hard road, choosing to ignore God's calling. Imagine how different the story would be if he'd just gone where God told him to and done what God told him to do in the first place! That's the story of all our lives. We often wrestle with God, trying to go our own way, and in doing so we put our lives and the lives of others in danger.
The Relationship Between God and the Church
I know, you're expecting the gospels, or some other books from the New Testament that talk directly about the Bride of Christ or the history of the church, but actually this set of three (and a quarter) is 100% from the Old Testament. The themes in these books drive home God's love for us in a way that just touches my soul.
Genesis 1-3
Don't get me wrong, Genesis is a great book as a whole, and probably one of the best books of the Bible when it comes to the ratio between importance, interesting, and ease of understanding, but when it comes to the relationship of God and the Church, Genesis 1-3 melts my heart every time. When you truly dig into God creating us, giving us free will, the parallels between Adam (God's created son) and Jesus (God's only begotten son), and the fact that God spoke salvation into existence before He ever uttered the punishment for mankind's sin, it's powerful.
Exodus
Ruth
Most people go to
Esther
How did
Prophecy and the End Times
Seeing prophecy come true is mind boggling. If there's one way to shock yourself into awe of God and the legitimacy of God's Word, it's to read and understand prophecy. That's why my actual favorite book of the Bible is in this set of three wonderful books on prophecy and the end times.
Daniel
Matthew
A list of favorites isn't complete without a book from the gospels! In
Revelation
My absolute favorite book in the Bible is
Footnotes
- Deus Ex Machina means “god from the machine” and is a literary device in which a seemingly unsolvable problem is solved abruptly and miraculously. You can read more about in my series on literary devices.Deus Ex Machina
- Now that I’ve moved platforms, I’m trying to figure out how comments will work. Your patience is appreciated.
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