Book Review: When Life Doesn’t Match Your Dreams: Hope for Today from 12 Women of the Bible by Jill Eileen Smith
Life is full of twists and turns. Relationships falter, careers fizzle, health fades. We may be faced with choices we never wanted to make or have situations pushed upon us we’d never expected. Yet, in all of it, God is at our side–even when he feels far away.
Drawing on her extensive research into women of the Old Testament, novelist Jill Eileen Smith turns her pen to the lessons in trusting God that we can learn today from women like
EveNoah’s wifeSaraiHagarLot’s wifeRebekahRacheland moreReaders will learn from what these ancient women did right–and even what they did wrong–when faced with dashed expectations and deferred dreams. And they’ll come away with the confidence that ours is a faithful God who loves us and is forming us through our trials into the women he longs for us to be.
My Thoughts
First, I enjoyed how the author created a first-person interpretation of each woman. Then, the reflection of each in her experience and the questions were helpful. I focused on each of the women as a separate study and read each portion of the bible to connect it. I then thought about the women as they were in their time, which I believe was the author’s intent. We should look at these women as people and not just figurative characters. So, diving into what they could have been thinking or could have experienced helps to make the story more relatable.
