Review: The Daniel Fast by Susan Gregory

Posted on January 22, 2012 by Ryan Gustason

As a fellow blogger, I appreciate Ms. Gregory’s approach to writing. She is the author for The Daniel Fast blog which contains many tips and recipes for conducting a Daniel fast. The first chapter of the book is devoted towards getting to know who she (the author) is. She describes her motivation for writing the book, and her relationship with Jesus Christ.

Chapter two introduces the concept of fasting. It highlights pericopes of scripture which describe fasting and lists three types of fasting as follows:

Absolute fast- no food or drink
Normal fast- only water is consumed
Partial fast- where only certain foods and drink are consumed

Fasting is for a purpose. Not simply as a diet fad, but rather as a way to mold yourself and draw closer to God. Fasting does nothing to change God. It is all a discipline to help us get our flesh under control and focus more keenly on the Spirit of God and drawing closer to Jesus.

Chapter three goes into the life of Daniel and the choices he had to make while living in captivity. He could have chose the easy route but instead decided to stay focused on serving the God he knew to be true! The next chapter follows with how a Daniel fast will affect change in our spirit, body and soul. The next is a detailed listing of 5 steps to success! This concluded the first pat of the book.

The second part of the book includes a food list of recommended foods to purchase while doing the Daniel Fast. It also contains 115 pages of recipes with the last portion of the book devoted to a meal planner and frequently asked questions.

The recipe and food list take up the majority of the book and what I found to be the most useful portion of the book. The book is paperback and constructed of typical quality paper. If you are planning on using the book extensively in the kitchen, I’d recommend either laminating the pages or making a photocopy of the recipe and using that (be sure to shred afterwards to avoid copyright lawsuits)!

Anyway, my review gives it a thumbs up for background info on the Daniel fast and for the recipes.

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the publisher through the BookSneeze.com® book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Review: Jesus Calling Devotional Bible

Posted on December 21, 2011 by Ryan Gustason

This is a review of Jesus Calling Devotional Bible, Enjoying Peace in His Presence in the New King James Version by Sarah Young.

Sarah Young is a missionary with her husband Steve to a Japanese congregation in Perth Australia. She was born and raised in Nashville, TN. She holds multiple degrees in counseling and psychology. She is a church planter with Mission to the World, a Presbyterian evangelistic initiative.

First, let me say that I really enjoy the New King James Version of the bible. It is a solid reworking of the KJV or Authorized Version of the bible and has one of the best available Greek New Testaments to back it up. Of the plethora of available new translations on the market, I would still prefer the KJV, but I would get the NKJV if forced to use a modern translation for whatever purpose. It reads well, is faithful to the majority type set, and is a literal translation rather than a Dynamic Equivalence translation which I’ve never really been a fan of.

I was given the electronic version to read, using my Kindle App on my iphone, but according to the publisher (Thomas Nelson) the following features are available in the print version:

260 scenarios with devotions by Sarah Young
Hundreds of inspiring scriptures highlighted throughout the text
New King James Version® (NKJV) in paragraph format
Index to devotions
Two-color text
Presentation page
Ribbon marker

The devotions are fairly unique. The way they are set up is as prayers or conversations people are having with God, telling Jesus of their pain or needs. Then Mrs. Young answers them with scriptures as if speaking for God from His Word. It is fairly unique, and a pretty nice style to read and relate to in the devotions. As with any study or devotional bible, or really with any NKJV, there are paragraph headings which summarize a portion of the Scripture you are about to read, marked in bold font on the electronic version I am reading. This gives you an easy way to figure out what is going on in the selected pericope you are studying. Here is a selection of the devotion format:

Lord, I need You in a big way today. I’m exhausted from stress and the sleeplessness of worry. Completely worn out. I have no energy for facing another day, especially if today will be anything like the ones before it. My coworkers are coming down hard on me for not keeping up the pace. My family seems constantly disappointed—like I’m not living up to their expectations. Even my friends are keeping their distance right now. No matter where I turn, I just don’t seem to be able to be enough, do enough, give enough to make everybody happy. To be honest, I can’t really blame anybody if they are unhappy with me. I’m disappointed in myself! I feel so weak and out of control that I can’t help but think You must be disappointed with me too. I need Your touch, Lord. Your perspective. Your encouragement and comfort. Please strengthen me for what lies ahead.

—Tracy

His Faithfulness ACCEPT EACH DAY EXACTLY AS IT COMES TO YOU. By that, I mean not only the circumstances of your day but also the condition of your body. Your assignment is to trust Me absolutely, resting in My sovereignty and faithfulness. On some days, your circumstances and your physical condition feel out of balance: The demands on you seem far greater than your strength. Days like that present a choice between two alternatives—giving up or relying on Me. Even if you wrongly choose the first alternative, I will not reject you. You can turn to Me at any point, and I will help you crawl out of the mire of discouragement. I will infuse My strength into you moment by moment, giving you all that you need for this day. Trust Me, by relying on My empowering Presence. See also Psalm 42:5; 2 Corinthians 13:4; Jeremiah 31:25 (From Jesus Calling by Sarah Young) FOR MORE ON THIS TOPIC, SEE PAGE 1023.

Thomas Nelson, Inc.. Jesus Calling Devotional Bible (Kindle Locations 1803-1827). Thomas Nelson, Inc.

As you can see from the selected devotional from Genesis chapter two, it offers encouragement and hope, which is typical of most devotionals I’ve come across. All in all, it is not a bad devotional for encouragement through God’s Word.

I have received this Kindle Edition of Jesus Calling Devotional Bible for free in return for my review of said devotional from Thomas Nelson via www.booksneeze.com. I was not required to write either a positive or negative review, and this review reflects my opinion of the book.

Review: Olivetree Biblereader for Mac

Posted on December 16, 2011 by Ryan Gustason

Olivetree Biblereader for Mac version 5.0.2 is available on Apple’s App Store. The system requirements are as follows:

Mac OS X 10.7 or later, 64-bit processor

First, let me say that I absolutely love the iPhone version of the Biblereader+ and have been using Biblereader+ starting with PalmOS, migrating over to Windows Mobile 2003, and the eventually moving to the iPhone. The reader has always been solid on mobile platforms, and some would argue that they are the leader in mobile Bible viewers. So needless to say I was very excited to learn that they had finally gone over to making a Bible reader for a Desktop / Laptop operating system. I was also slightly disappointed to learn it was only available for Lion! Fortunately for Apple, I just had to try it out for myself, so I’ve upgraded to Lion last night for the sole purpose of getting Olivetree’s Biblereader for Mac. It is easy to install, just go to the Mac Store and download / install Biblereader. My initial reactions are very positive. Accordance Bible could learn a thing or two about interface design from Olivetree.

The left hand side of the screen is taken up by a quick access list which displays recently viewed Bibles, or all Bibles depending on the configuration you’ve set up. The bibles can be downloaded to your App with the built in downloader. If you’ve been a user of the free mobile Biblereader then the interface of the Mac edition will come naturally to you as the design seems to have been imported from the iPhone version of their App. For instance, on the left is a screenshot of the famous verse chooser that they’ve been using for quite some time on the iPhone (and I assume the droid as well). In three clicks you’re taken to the exact verse you want to read in whatever Bible you happen to have open at the time. This is the easiest bible browser I’ve come accross on the mobile platform and is infanately more useable than flipping through a long list in sequential order. By clicking on a verse number it allows you to enter a comment on that verse which you may then sync with Olivetree’s cloud service to allow syncing between your laptop and mobile phone device.

By highlighting a portion of text, you will see a plus sign pop up. Click on that plus sign to open up the menu shown on the right which allows you to enter a note on that portion of selected text, highlight that text in a color or bookmark that text. The whole look and feel of it seems polished. By clicking the little arrow icon as shown on the left, you will expand the currently selected window into it’s own window. Also, to add bookmarks is a simple as clicking the ribbon in the top left hand corner of the bible or book you are in. See the picture on the right for a screenshot of what the ribbon looks like. Olivetree should be commended on the work they have accomplished with BibleReader Mac. Now the one place they don’t excel is in speed of searching. Now with Accordance (My choice for gold standard in search speed) searching is near instantaneous. So quick it is impossible to time with a stop watch, however with Biblereader there is a definite lag. You can literally count one thousand one… one thousand two before the hits appear. Now as to how they are displayed, it is easy to tell that they are porting this over from iOS devices. The search results pane are very similar to what you’d expect to see on a mobile phone App. The other interesting thing about it is all the books you’ve purchased for the mobile reader can be downloaded for free on the Mac version. Olivetree also has some competitive pricing on their texts. A lot more competitive than Accordance which seems to want to break the bank even when buying public domain texts! All-in-all I’d give this App solid marks in just about every category.

Review: eSword 10.0.5

Posted on December 10, 2011 by Ryan Gustason

A review of the bible software program e-Sword version 10.0.5.

e-Sword is an excellent freeware bible study application designed for Windows PCs. The specifications required to run this program are listed as follows:

Windows XP, Vista or Windows 7

Pentium based PC (or equivalent)

800 x 600 resolution or greater

The screenshots I’ll be using throughout this review will be of my e-Sword install on my Mac using WINE. See my tutorial on installing e-Sword on a Mac for instructions on how to get this bible study software up and running on a Macbook using Snow Leopard.

The image on the left is the bible navigation pane which is displayed on the left when you open up e-Sword in the default layout. This allows for quick and easy access of any book of the bible with 2 to 3 clicks. Of course you could just type in the reference by typing your verse reference in the box shown in the image on the right. You can also browse for a reference by clicking the bible icon shown to the right of the text box shown in the picture. This will open a pop-up box allowing you to browse to the specific verse you’d like to view. This is fine, but I wish that it would open multiple verse reference at once. Accordance allows for this simply by typing all references you want in the verse search window and then clicking the search button. This is very valuable if your reading a bible study and it gives multiple bible references you wish to read at once rather than going sequentially. In fairness to e-Sword, I have not run into many bible study programs that can accomplish this besides e-Sword. By clicking on the binocular icon, you are able to enter into an advanced search dialog box. This allows you to apply more filters and refine your search. The problem is that it still will not allow for a multiple verse search to be entered.

The actual layout of the program I found to be very intuitive. The main program window is split into 4 separate sections. They are editors, dictionaries, commentaries and bibles. In previous versions of the program, you could access other reference works called topical files by going to the editor window, selecting the topic file in the drop down list located on the bottom of the window and then browsing the table of contents in yet another drop down box on the top of the editor window. Well, you can still do this, but now in version 10 Rick (the maker of the software) has added the Reference window which is available by going to the Tools>Reference Library menu option.

I personally find this a lot better and enjoy using the reference module window. Now the topic files are available in a refx format which is a read only format unlike the topic editor (topx) format which was user editable.

The user community is very active! Bible Support is the unofficial / semi-official forum for finding thousands of extra modules which you can download and install into your base e-Sword package as well as help on just about everything you can think of relating to e-Sword. The site also has created a nice 10.x user’s manual for e-Sword which was well done and valuable for the newbie to e-Sword. I have also uploaded it here for easy download, but you must understand that it is not to be sold or made available in any form that would require paying money for it’s use. Officially supported modules are available through the built-in download feature of the program. This reminds me a lot of the Sword Project’s module installation feature which has been available in their software for years and years.

Version 10 has several new features, including sermonaudio.com integration that allows you to listen to various sermons and bible studies sorted by bible reference, the aforementioned reference modules, and continuing support for STEP modules.

Review: Accordance 9.5.1

Posted on December 9, 2011 by Ryan Gustason

Accordance 9.5.1, a review.

Accordance is a Bible study program designed for the Macintosh operating system. The specifications for running Accordance 9.5.1 are as follows:

Accordance 9 is fully Intel native and optimized for Mac OS 10.6 and up. It also runs on PowerPC Macs and OS 10.4 and up (users with earlier Mac OS X or OS 7-9 can install the Classic version).

With the advent of Accordance 9.3, OakTree has created an enhanced user interface designed for new users to immediately jump into using Accordance. It is called the Assistant Window.

The Read section allows the user to type in a verse or book of the bible and open a window displaying the passage in the user’s preferred bible. Alternatively, it also allows the user to open a window displaying devotional readings to choose from.

The next section, Find, allows the user to locate word or words in a wide range of selections wether it be the bible, or User add-on modules and texts.

The last section, labeled Learn, includes hyperlinks to Oaktree’s various resources for learning how to use the software including the built in help and the Accordance Forum.

The assistant window is one step in improving Accordance’s usability for the average experienced Mac user who is new to Accordance. Accordance has been notoriously known as non-intuitive for the average user. It relies on keyboard commands and menu options often buried in menues.

The main window is known as a workspace.

This is a screenshot of the main view of Accordance. The focus is on the search features. At the top of the screen you’ll see a search bar with various options to allow you to search words or verses. The search algorithm is extremely fast. In fact it is the fastest search algorithm of any bible software I have tested wether PC or Mac.

Checking the interlinear checkbox immediately opens the English, Greek (Hebrew) the Strong’s number and the parts of speech the word belongs to. This is very handy for conducting word studies or verse studies. Triple clicking a word will open the default lexicon and display details of the underlining Greek (Hebrew) word in a separate workspace.

Although this is a very powerful search program, (for example right click and choose search for… lemma, root, inflected or tag in any appropriately tagged or marked bible such as the Novum Testamentum Graece (Tischendorf)), it is sometimes unclear on how to search through all texts and modules you might have purchased, or user created modules you might have made using Accordance’s built in user module authoring system. To search through everything in your whole entire library, for example, you must go to Amplify>Search>Search all…

The resource pallette as shown on the left provides an interesting way to access your resources. By clicking the appropriate icon you have access to purchased English, Hebrew, Greek and graphical texts and modules. One of my favorite resources and one I personally think should be included in the base software package is the timeline module. A screen capture is shown on the right of the timeline module. It is a graphical representation of the history of bible people and kingdoms. Not only that, but it also displays the timelines of contemporary histories of nations such as the Chinese and the Egyptian dynasties. Another way cool feature of the timeline is the ability to add your own events to the timeline. There are also alternative timelines labeled ‘conservative’ and ‘critical’ which will shift the dates based on which-ever timeline you believe to be more correct.

The program is well designed with a very active user community who enjoy sharing tips and hints on the Accordance Forums. If you get stuck with a particular problem, more than likely either Helen, Dr. J or one of the other community users will be able to answer your questions or point you in the right direction. My username there is fireandsalt, which will probably be no surprise to those who know me as I tend to use that username all over the internet on various bible, theology, and techie forums.

All in all I give this the following ratings:

Review: A year with Jesus

Posted on November 27, 2011 by Ryan Gustason

A year with Jesus by R.P. Nettelhorst is a devotional designed to take you through Jesus’ words in one year’s time with a one to two paragraph devotional to reflect upon. It is a paperback edition that I am reviewing, and it feels very flimsy and the paper appears to be low quality and will more than likely yellow after a short time. I am not at all impressed by the physical quality of the book, binding included. I have seen paperback or softcover books that were of much higher quality than this edition printed by Thomas Nelson.

As to the actual content, the book is divided into several sectional / topical headings which divide the 365 day journey thematically. They are as follows:

Love and Hate
Truths and Lies
Arrogance and Humility
Friends and Enemies
Belief and Disbelief
Patience and Impatience
Deserved and Undeserved
Good and Evil
Fidelity and Treachery
Life and Death

Following this table of contents, a one page introduction to the devotional is presented stating the author’s desire to get the reader involved with a loving relationship with Jesus Christ. After this short introduction, the devotional series begins using Day 1, Day 2, Day 3 and so on to Day 365.

A pericope of scripture is written, displaying verses which contain Jesus’ words. These selections are taken from various translations such as HCSB, NKJV, CEV, NRSV, MSG et.al. The typeset is easy enough to read but the low quality of the paper makes this devotional feel cheap. Following that is a few paragraphs explaining the verses and how you can apply it to your life. Pretty standard devotional stuff here.

The one plus I found in this devotional is the research into various terms. For example, Day 3 describes the Latin phrase “lex talionis” or law of the tooth which describes some of the social customs that Semitic peoples practiced during the time of Abram and others continuing in the Law of Moses to Jesus’ time.

A short biography of the author is found here. The author’s website www.nettelhorst.com is a blog containing some interesting articles.

All-in-all I would not recommend this devotional. Save your money and buy something a little higher quality. Again, I am very disappointed in Thomas Nelson Publishers for putting a product out that is this low quality. I expected better from them.

I received an evaluation copy of this book for review purposes by booksneeze.com.

OliveTree now available for Lion!

Posted on November 21, 2011 by Ryan Gustason

Olivetree has been famous for making BibleReader+ for a wide variety of smartphones and pdas for quite a number of years. I have used the PocketPC, Palm and iPhone versions of their products. I must say that for readability and number of free resources as well as for the low price of the paid modules, BibleReader+ is hard to beat! Well now they have finally released their bible app for the Mac! I am glad but a little disappointed as it is for OSX version 10.7 (Lion) only. Considering the majority of Mac users are still using Snow Leopard, I think it is a bad move to release only the 10.7.x compatable version.

But still I applaud them finally going into the desktop platforms and hope they continue with developing it for both Windows as well as Snow Leopard users.

Review: Ascent from Darkness by Michael Leehan

Posted on November 7, 2011 by Ryan Gustason

I have just finished reading Michael Leehan’s testimony in the form of his first book entitled Ascent from Darkness: How satan’s soldier became God’s warrior. His testimony is a powerful witness of what Jesus can do for anyone who is willing to hear Jesus’ call. While I do not agree soteriologically with him, I do agree that God is no respecter of persons and is willing that all should come to repentance and follow Him in Spirit and truth.

The book opens with his traumatic upbringing. He tells of several accidents which placed him close to death and opened him up to seeking an answer for what lies beyond the grave. He then takes you through the journey of several decades of downward spiralling into satanism and you read with horror and compassion the mess he makes of his life. The book continues with his struggles and offers glimpses into his demonic and occult practices.

The book is not for the faint of heart. Mr. Leehan describes the occult as it is. Real. Many of the lukewarm Christians in denominational Christianity today would do well to put down this book and pick up their bible to ‘study to show themselves approved’. If you feel that you would have a hard time reading a testimony based on real events including suffocating animals and resurrecting them via CPR just for the thrill of power you’d have over that animal’s life, then don’t read this book.

If however you are a mature believer in Christ and are willing to ride the coaster into the depths of immorality and lasciviousness Mr. Leehan takes you to in his book, you will emerge confident in the knowledge that God is able to deliver any from the grips of satan.

The book is well written and flows from one chapter to the next lucidly and has no grammatical errors that stood out to me at least. He reserves the last two chapters for the ascent into Charismatic salvation he experienced through lifechurch.tv and other bible study groups he was a part of during the last days before his ‘death’ in satan’s eyes. Satan is the father of lies but he got that part right! Mr. Leehan did die the day satan predicted by being born again into Christ. Again, I believe differently than he does in matters of soteriology however it was refreshing to see the climax of the story as Mr. Leehan repented and turned to Christ. The only thing I would have liked to have read was more of his post conversion life. Did he ever get his life back together in regards to personal and financial normalcy? The book does not say.

One criticism I have of the book, and which bothered me throughout reading the book was the symbol used for the section breaks. It showed a box like symbol constructed of two crosses. One was light colored and the more prominent one was darker in color and formed an upside down cross as seen to the left of this paragraph. It seemed to me that the upside down cross was given an accent which stood out to me at least implying more eminence. The upside down cross has been used as a satanic device for a few decades. Does it mean anything? Probably not, but it did not sit well with me while reading the book.

I would recommend this book as a refreshingly real testimony of the spiritual power that works beyond our five senses.

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the publisher through the BookSneeze.com® book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Review: Babylon’s Falling by William G. Collins

Posted on October 11, 2011 by Ryan Gustason

Babylon’s Falling by William G. Collins

This book was a pretty easy read. It flowed well and the story was engaging. If you’ve ever read one of the ‘Sons of Encouragement’ books by Francine Rivers, this story has the same feel. The author does a good job using relevant historical facts found outside the biblical narrative to help flesh out the story of Daniel and the captivity of Judah by Babylon and subsequently by Cyrus and Darius of the Persian Empire.

The story begins at the fall of Jerusalem and the forced dispersion of the Judaeans. The southern kingdom’s king and his royal household are hauled off as slaves. During the months it took to reach their new home of Babylon with it’s famous hanging gardens Daniyyel (as it’s spelled in the book) learns the language of his captors befriending a captain of the guard in the meantime. He soon proves to be a valuable asset and works his way into a position as an apprentice in a school for seers and advisers to king Nebuchadnezzar

Collins then beautifully illustrates life in Babylon and the eventual progression of Daniyyel’s career to the governor of all of Babylon answerable to the king alone. The book traces through the first six chapters of the book of Daniel as found in the Old Testament. He uses creative license well, using much from what is known of the culture of Babylon and later the Persia-Mede Empire. All of the dreams mentioned in the book of Daniel are retold in Babylon’s Falling as well as the tests and triumphs of the fiery furnace and the den of Lions.

If I had one critique of the book, it would be the editing. There were a couple instances of grammatical error such as a repeated word which was overlooked by the editing team. I’m not sure if this was because I received the book before the general populous for the purposes of reviewing Babylon’s Falling, or if it was just a shoddy job of editing. Either way, the editing leaves some to be desired. The creativeness of recasting the story of Daniel was flawless however and made for an enjoyable read and I recommend it to those who enjoy this sort of historical fiction.

I received an evaluation copy of the Kindle edition of this book for review purposes by booksneeze.com.

Review: The Christian Zombie Killers Handbook by Jeff Kinley

Posted on September 25, 2011 by Ryan Gustason

The Christian Zombie Killer’s Handbook by Jeff Kinley

This book is an interesting mix of horror fiction along with a self-help tutorial persuading you to identify and slay the inner-demon within you. The book is divided into twelve sessions and chapters. The author, Jeff Kinley, is the founder of Main Thing Ministries. He is a graduate of Dallas Theological Seminary and the University of Arkansas. His mission is to evangelize and reach teens through Main Thing Ministries which intends to keep teenagers focused on keeping Jesus Christ at the center of their lives.

Now back to the book. If you want to skip the horror fiction portion of this book, read the chapters and skip the ‘sessions’. The story was engaging however; surprising me since I generally don’t enjoy horror books. In fact the last horror book I’ve read was Dracula by Bram Stoker. Parts of the story made me laugh, such as when a co-worker of the main character, Ben, replied: “That really adds to the moment, you have such a gift.” This comment was in response to Kyle (another coworker) announcing he had to go to the bathroom after Ben’s bouquet of flowers for his girlfriend and his’ six month anniversary.

The main focus of the book is dealing with your inner zombie. It is that part of the human nature that rebels against God and intends on doing only that which is self indulging, self seeking and self satisfying. Kinley gives examples from personal life as well as from Scripture on how best to quell our ‘old man’ and put on the ‘new man’. One of my favorite quotes from the book is “Someone has described religion as ‘man’s attempt to reach God’”. How interesting and true for today’s lackadaisical Christian mindset.

All-in-all it is an interesting mix, not one that I’d normally read but interesting none the less. I’d recommend this book only if your already interested in zombies, and more particularly if your interested in eradicating that smudged part of your spirit that was tainted the day Adam fell.