Tag Archive | sacrifice

Memorial Day

Reading Time: < 1 minute

I’m not military but have had family members who were. In spite of that, I have held great admiration for our men and women in uniform. So many have died to protect the freedoms we hold dear and today is our day to pause, reflect, and remember their sacrifice.

And maybe we need to ask ourselves: Are we helping to preserve our freedoms from within? Do you vote? Have you read the constitution? Some have said, and I believe it, that if our nation is to fall, it will be from within, not without. Day by day, and week by week, we see the values our soldiers have fought and died for being trampled.

In honor of them…we too should be willing to fight for our country in our own way, in our own communities.

Have a blessed day of remembrance.

Spatzle Speaks: Obedient Unto Death (Book Review)

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Mom doesn’t often read Biblical fiction but Liisa Eyerly’s novel, Obedient Unto Death is a suspenseful story of the early church that she at times struggled to read because it was so tense. In spite of that, the novel had moments where she surprised me by laughing out loud.

A young scribe is murdered during a covert Christian worship service. Sabina, a member of this outlawed religion, can’t believe a member of this new faith could be the killer. But when her Roman magistrate father arrests the church bishop for murder, she reluctantly admits all is not brotherly love and harmony among the faithful.

Who would have killed this man? Could it be the church’s bishop? Sabrina can’t believe that would be true. As she strives to prove the man’s innocence she is confronted with the fact that all the followers she’d considered her church family, were not all filled with love and peace.

Sabrina works hard to uncover the truth about who murdered the scribe but the journey is filled with twists and turns and unexpected dangers. Her father can only provide so much protection and will she ever be able to find a husband in the midst of this drama? Will she be able to uncover the truth in time or will she end up in prison as well for being a follower of Jesus?

Intrigue, mystery, and a dash of humor at points, makes this a difficult book to put down. I give it five bones because I’m a dog and that’s how I roll.

Spatzle Baganz, book reviewer for the silygoos blog because that’s how we roll.

Spatzle Speaks: Evidence Not Seen (Book Review)

Reading Time: 2 minutesThis fabulous tell of mystery and family secrets by Carlene Havel is a great addition to the “Love is . . .” series by Prism Book Group. Evidence Not Seen beautifully illustrates “love keeps no record of wrongs.”

Jeff Galloway grew up with his father in prison and his mom single-handedly raising him. A grown man and a successful attorney he comes to a crossroads when his girlfriend dumps him for greater fortunes in another town. A chance encounter brings Melanie Clark into his path and the soft-hearted social worker stretches his faith in fresh ways while helping come to grips with the past as his father is released from prison.

Did his father commit the crime? if he is as innocent his mother claims, why would he go to prison for it? Where was the proof? As he investigates he is forced to learn to let go of the past as he realizes the truth of all that happened 27 years ago and start afresh to learn the integrity of the father he’d long disdained.

This story looks at our own perceptions and beliefs and the associated emotions that can knock us off stride and away from truth–and love. Melanie becomes a force to help him realize the truth and let go of the past, and forgive. This beautifully told story deserves five bones. I’m a dog. I don’t do stars.

5 bones for blog

Spatzle Baganz, book reviewer for the silygoos blog because that's how we roll.

Spatzle Baganz, book reviewer for the silygoos blog because that’s how we roll.

Spatzle Speaks: Through Raging Waters (Book Review)

Reading Time: 2 minutesRagingWaters copyRenee Blare has done it again with a fast paced romantic suspense that will be hard to put down. The last we left the Snowy Range Chronicles, in To Soar on Eagle Wings, Steve Mitchell had married Rachel Fitzgerald. Now a new adventure hits the area featuring Rachel’s best friend as her brother who his also Steve’s best friend. And life is going to get rough in Through Raging Waters.

Mother nature is doing her best to wash out the town of  Timber Springs and Ranger Steve Mitchell is going to do everything he  can to prevent that. Obstacles continue to rise and when his father-in-law suffers a heart attack in the middle of he storm he calls on his best friend, and son of the pastor, Paul Fitzgerald to assist. Unfortunately Paul is going to be need for even more than saving his dad’s life.

As the flood continues to escalate wiping out everything in its path and the storms keep coming, Steve calls on Paul and others to a rescue mission in the mountains. Paul hasn’t done any of that since a disaster traumatized him in his past but he steps up and his controlled life is slowly eroded in the process. He’s only just started to open his heart to love again with Melissa but is forced to set that aside to do the head into danger. Getting injured and relying on his annoying brother wasn’t part of his plan, but maybe that’s just what God needed to use to get through to his heart and faith locked away deep inside.

Melissa Hampton has been battling on several fronts: her mysterious beginnings being discovered in her mother’s keepsakes, her budding affection for the enigmatic pharmacist, brother to her best friend, Paul and the challenges of working for BJ Parker. When BJ is in danger she tries to find him only to realize the one who is really in trouble is Paul. She realizes she has more courage than she expected when forced into challenging circumstances to save the man she loves.

The best part of the story is that Paul has a dog. Yup. A great dog. They call it a therapy dog but hey, aren’t all dogs therapeutic? I think that’s what I am to my mom. So because it’s a non-stop action-packed novel filled with faith and love, I’ll give it five bones. I’m a dog. I don’t do stars.

Spatzle Baganz, book reviewer for the silygoos blog because that's how we roll.

Spatzle Baganz, book reviewer for the silygoos blog because that’s how we roll.

 

 

5 bones for blog

 

Healing Grace (Book Review)

Reading Time: 3 minutes

Lisa LIckelI’ve read and reviewed several books by my friend, author Lisa Lickel, so when she asked about a re-do of a previous book, I jumped at the chance. Once I started reading Healing Grace though I quickly realized that this book was different from the rest. It’s not a mystery. It’s not necessarily a romance. What it is, is spellbinding as it drew me in and I couldn’t be satisfied until I got to the last page (which means yes, I read it all in one day).

Grace Runyon has faced overwhelming losses and burdened with guilt over the last of them, the death of her husband to cancer, she runs away from her Tennessee town to a tiny place in Michigan. Grace has known from a young age that she had a spiritual gift of healing, but it had not saved her husband. While no one else blames her for his death, she cannot forgive herself and struggles with God, the giver of the gift, who had withheld it’s power.

Impulsively buying a little cottage home, she ends up neighbors to the Marshalls and faced again with the need to heal as Ted is suffering from an unnamed illness that is debilitating and will eventually kill. She falls in love with Ted through his son Eddy, a little boy who captures her heart but also stirs the grief of the little boy she had lost herself due to a car accident.

Healing-Grace200x300[1]Grace decides to re-enter the work world as a physician’s assistant and at times finds her gift of healing being exercised in secret at the clinic to help her patients. This comes at a cost however. Some healings cause her deep emotional and physical pain that mirrors her patient’s agony, although recovery is quick. Soon many in the town question whether she is a witch, although her gift has never brought harm. Coupled with her perceived failure in her past, self-doubts arise and Grace faces a crisis that tears apart her soul.

I don’t want to be a spoiler for the story. It is a worthy read and one I hope to read again. Lisa’s dives into a minefield of emotions as well as the theological minefield of spiritual gifts since some schools of thought believe certain gifts like healing are not for this age. I disagree. I was impressed by her balanced view of spiritual gifts. Gifts are from God. They are used for the church (body of believers) and they are not used at our will, but His.

Gifts sometimes come with a cost as we serve and pour ourselves out as an act of worship. Grace illustrates that powerfully.  The final scene of the book is riveting. You can disagree if you want about the dispensation of gifts but let’s be clear, nothing Lisa writes indicates a “psychic” or “satanic” power at work. Is it real? It’s fiction,  but I wouldn’t put it past God to work in the way she describes.  For this I applaud her because she masterfully illustrated biblical truths: like love requiring sacrifice and the challenge believers all have to set aside self and pride, and even the desire for the love and affirmation of others, in order to be used.

I’ve enjoyed all of Lisa Lickel’s novels that I have had the privilege to read. Healing Grace, however, is by far the best of them all.