Thanksgiving marks the start of the holiday season. With all the bustle and busyness, many of us ironically find it harder to be joyful and content during this season of giving thanks, social gatherings, and celebrating our Savior.
To focus on Christ during the stretch from Thanksgiving through Christmas and then into the New Year often requires being extra intentional. These four books are our top recommendations for this season. Each one relates to a specific way you may be trying to be intentional this year.
We are often encouraged to "count our blessings," especially around Thanksgiving. But truly biblical gratitude is much more than this. In Growing in Gratitude, Mary K. Mohler unpacks Scripture to help us grow in gracious gratitude—thanking God for who he is—as well as natural gratitude— thanking him for his blessings.
Life doesn’t always go the way we hope it will. Around the holidays, this can be especially apparent to us as we still face real-life challenges even though we want to feel content and celebratory.
If Only, by Jennie Pollock, walks readers through the process of taking our eyes off the things we wish we had and instead enjoying the character of the God we do have—a God who is good, who meets all our needs, and whose promises are worth the wait.
As social gatherings take place around the holidays, you’re likely to spend time with loved ones and acquaintances who are unbelievers. If you’re seeking and praying for opportunities to share Christ in those gatherings, check out Mere Evangelism by Randy Newman. This practical, engaging book offers ten insights into sharing Christ in real life by drawing on lessons from C.S. Lewis, whom God used in the conversions of countless people.
Busyness, social gatherings, and other elements of the Thanksgiving-to-New-Year stretch can be hard on the heart and mind. Whether you just struggle with worry in general or you’re dealing with severe anxiety, Hope in an Anxious World by biblical counselor Helen Thorne offers biblical, practical help.
Words of help and hope form the Bible for both Christians and non-Christians who feel anxious.
Bethany McIlrath loves to get lost in a book and to help others discover their next read in her marketing role at The Good Book Company. When she's not reading stories, she's usually writing them or dreaming about them as she comes up with real-life creative adventures for friends, her husband, and a doorbell-like dog named Indy. Serving in children's ministry is also one of her greatest joys.
