Reviews

Helpful steps to care for ourselves

Major Zach Bell (Area Commander, Greater Houston Area Command, USA Southern Territory) reviews Boundaries For Your Soul by Alison Cook and Kimberly Miller* B OUNDARIES For Your Soul is a useful resource to help us care for the emotional needs of the people we serve and ourselves.

Salvationist Alison Cook and her co-author, Kimberly Miller, have gathered knowledge from their combined 25 years of advanced education, biblical studies and clinical practice to set forth an approach to emotions that combines evidence-based psychology and biblical wisdom.

The book is divided into three sections that build on each other. The first offers a nice introduction that looks at the parts of the soul and the role of the Holy Spirit at the centre. It includes the concept of taking a ‘you-turn’, which involves taking charge of yourself rather than blaming others.

The second section spells out how to care for the various parts of your soul, and the last section offers great insights to help you deal with specific emotions, such as anger, fear, anxiety, sadness, envy, desire, guilt and shame. These emotions could potentially be paralysing and harmful but this book helps you address them in a healthy way.

All three sections contain real-life stories that can relate to our own situations. They include quizzes and life-application questions, which allow us to apply what has been learnt.

I found that the ‘five steps of taking a you-turn’ relate well to my work in ministry. They are: focus ‘on the part of

your soul that’s bothering you’; befriend ‘the parts of your soul that you’ve dismissed as troublesome’; invite ‘Jesus to be near a struggling part of your soul’; unburden ‘the hurting parts of your soul’; and integrate ‘those parts into your internal family’, so that the parts of you that were at odds can take on new roles. As The Salvation Army, we try to lighten the burdens of those we serve: physically, through our tangible social services, and spiritually, through our worship. We truly hope to welcome all whom we serve into our family, which is what makes us so much stronger.

These five steps are what we emphasise in our ministry activities on a daily basis but not normally when it comes to ourselves. We can be so focused on everyone else at times that we lose sight of the needs within our souls.

I challenge you to pick this book up and read it. As we focus more on bringing God’s care to our own souls, may our ministry to others be strengthened and go deeper.

O Boundaries For Your Soul is available from amazon.co.uk priced at £7.91 (paperback) or £6.99 (Kindle Edition). Download a free chapter from thomasnelson.com/p/boundaries-foryour-soul

* Adapted from a review in Word & Deed

A book for everyone

Major Susan Robinson (Norwich Mile Cross) reviews Second Helpings by Peter Mylechreest T HE second book written by Major Peter Mylechreest lives up to the anticipation since his first book, Light Bites. However you choose to read it – a thought a day, all at once, in one or two sittings or using a thought for a talk or even a sermon – it will not disappoint. The chapters include such gems as ‘God’s Dwelling Place’, ‘Whoops!’ and ‘No Matter What’ that will teach you and make you sit up and say, ‘I didn’t know that.’ It will make you smile, bring back memories and touch your emotions.

Second Helpings is a good, useful and helpful resource that can be used time and time again. It will be a springboard for teaching, listening and discussion. It should be kept where it can be seen and easily got at, and will become well used and loved.

It is something that can be read by everyone from young adults upwards. If you are a speaker or teacher, this book is for you. If you want to grow in your spiritual life, this book is for you. If you want to worship, this book is for you. It’s a book we all need, whoever we are.

Infinitely more

Lieut-Colonel Jayne Roberts highlights the need for spiritual growth rooted in God’s love

STUDY PASSAGE: EPHESIANS 3:16–19

FOR the past three years, my husband, youngest daughter and I have lived in a house near Purley Oaks station in south London. I have yet to discover any nearby oaks but we did have plenty of other trees between our garden fence and the railway line at the end of the garden. Each summer we enjoyed the rich canopy of green leaves that completely masked the passing trains on the busy London to Gatwick line. Sadly, in recent months, those trees have been cleared away in preparation for new homes to be built on what seems an impossibly small plot of land next to the railway.

In October 2019, our daughter entered the Trees for Londoners ballot. The Woodland Trust offered 30,000 free trees to be sent in packs of two per successful applicant. She applied and then forgot all about it until a thin cardboard box was delivered to our home in November. We were excited to see the trees – a wild cherry and a rowan. We opened the box and discovered two unpromising long ‘twigs’ and a planting guide. The saplings were placed in a bucket of water for a few days until they could be planted in the garden. Now we wait in hope to see if they will grow and fulfil their intended purpose, to improve air quality and also to restore something of the verdant beauty we formerly enjoyed. We are going to need a lot of faith and patience. In Ephesians 3, Paul’s prayer is for God’s people to grow and flourish spiritually. It is a prayer for empowerment, of being rather than doing.

QUESTION O What kind of spiritual growth do you hope for in the coming year?

Paul prays that God will strengthen the believers by the power of his Holy Spirit and that Christ will dwell in their hearts. The Greek word katoikein used for ‘dwell’ refers to permanent residence – settling down and really being at home.

The song ‘Spirit Divine’ by Brindley Boon expresses a similar prayer: ‘Come, great Spirit, come,/ Make each heart thy home;/ Enter every longing soul;/ Come, great Spirit, come’ (SASB 311).

Here are two facets of the same process – a deepening awareness of God’s power and a growing relationship with Jesus Christ. Yet there is one active requirement: faith.

Jesus spoke of faith like a mustard seed – something very small with huge potential to grow. Paul’s prayer for strength is followed by an image of botanical growth: ‘I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power… to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ’ (vv17 and 18). The Living Bible expresses it very directly: ‘May your roots go down deep into the soil of

Through the week with Salvationist – a devotional thought for each day by Major Philippa Smale SUNDAY I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith.

(Ephesians 3:16 and 17)

MONDAY Come in, my Lord, come in/ And make my heart thy home;/ Come in and cleanse my soul from sin/ And dwell with me alone./ Thyself to me be given,/ In fullness of thy love;/ Thyself alone wilt make my Heaven/ Though all thy gifts remove. (SASB 411)

TUESDAY And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge – that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

(Ephesians 3:17–19)

God’s marvellous love’ (v17).

This echoes Psalm 1 where the people of God who spend time in his word are likened to trees planted by streams of water. They flourish and bear fruit in due season, constantly nourished by life-giving water. When we are rooted in love we are enabled to experience God’s love in all its dimensions, even though we cannot fully understand it. Spiritual growth will be evident in four aspects: strength, love, knowledge and fullness. In just four verses the writer captures an incredibly complex and rich series of possibilities, interconnected like an extending telescope.

QUESTIONS O How can you ensure you are rooted and grounded in love? O Where do you find spiritual nourishment?

Paul writes from prison, probably chained to a Roman guard night and day, yet he experiences the freedom

and confidence to approach God in prayer on behalf of the Ephesian believers who are so dear to him. He urges them not to be discouraged by his situation, but to grasp God’s love and power to the full.

We can sometimes make our limitations an excuse. However, nothing stopped Paul from ministering the grace of God to his brothers and sisters in Christ. He asked that they would have power ‘together with all the Lord’s holy people’ (v18), a reminder that we need fellowship with each other to be spiritually healthy.

QUESTION O Is there a challenge here for you to offer spiritual encouragement to others?

The final part of this prayer is for believers to be ‘filled to the measure of all the fullness of God’ (v19). As human beings we may question whether we are able to attain such spiritual heights. Let us be reassured that our Creator God knows us perfectly, our capacity and our limitations.

We are deeply loved by God and fully understood, even as we live in the mystery of the one who makes himself known to those who seek him. Songwriter Elizabeth Ann MacKenzie writes: ‘Love surpassing understanding,/ Angels would the mystery scan,/ Yet so tender that it reaches/ To the lowest child of man./ Let me, Jesus, let me Jesus,/ Fuller know redemption’s plan’ (SASB 468). Think about the characteristics of spiritual health found in our study passage – strength, love, knowledge and fullness in Christ. These can all flourish in us through the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit.

LIEUT-COLONEL ROBERTS IS SECRETARY FOR SPIRITUAL LIFE DEVELOPMENT, THQ

WEDNESDAY God’s love is as wide as creation,/ God’s love is as boundless and free,/ God’s love, it can never be measured,/ God’s love is sufficient for me.

(SASB 24) THURSDAY Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the Church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.

(Ephesians 3:20 and 21) Prayer Father God, we thank you and praise you that all things are possible with you. When we put our trust in you, you lead us on an amazing adventure of service in your name. You will lead us to do great things! So let it be.

FRIDAY He is able, more than able/ To accomplish what concerns me today./ He is able, more than able/ To handle anything that comes my way./ He is able, more than able/ To do much more than I could ever dream./ He is able, more than able/ To make me what he wants me to be. (SASB 836) SATURDAY ‘Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.’

( John 14:12 and 13)