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Winning the War Within: The Journey to Healing and Wholeness
Using his own story as a poignant, evocative illustration of God's grace and healing, Jason Vallotton--with a contribution from his father, bestselling author Kris Vallotton--invites you to reframe your understanding of pain in terms of redemption. It is possible to steward the deepest hurts in your life so that God can lay the foundation for your future. While it might seem incomprehensible that good can ever come from such profound pain, you will discover that God not only can heal your wounds but will use the healing process to equip you for a restored, fulfilled, and powerful life!
- GenresChristian
224 pages, Paperback
Published May 5, 2020
33 people are currently reading
68 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
May 9, 2020
In Winning the War Within, Jason Vallotton, explored the topic of the war that is within us and how we all try and avoid the conflicts in life. He looked how Jesus describes a believer’s life and how in His name we can cast out demons, speak in tongues, pick up snakes, and place hands on people believing for their healing. He shared how we all have suffering and storms in life and we have to learn to preserve. In the book, he reveals the heartache he experienced when his wife left him after nine years. He describes how he dealt with his loneliness, disappointment, rejection, and the pain of letting go of the vision of happier ever after. He explains how we was able to work through his pain of prison and to get wholeness.
He explored the concept of the God’s spot and he asked everyone to look at who we are putting at the center of our lives. He shared how he struggled with this and he put his wife in his God’s spot. He expressed how he had a high pleaser personality and he hated conflict. He backs this up by looking at Psalms 23 and how this scripture explains how God is our Shepherd and how God is with us through the valley of the shadow of death. He discovered four ways to re-center our God spot and how we can let God back on the throne over our lives. He traces back to his childhood and how he struggled with fear and how it even led to him in accepting Christ a lot of this was out of fear of being left behind after watching a film. In his childhood, he sneaked into his parents to sleep on their floor and he had fears of dying and being alone. When he was fourteen-year-old he shared how he hated being home alone and how he would load a gun every day in case someone broke into their home. He revealed how he was taught by his dad to take every thought captive and how he learned to change his thoughts. He was able to overcome strongholds of fear and to recognize the lies before they took over control of his life.
I would recommend this amazing book to anyone who is experiencing struggles in their own lives and they are having a difficult time dealing with conflicts and they are overwhelmed. I immensely connected with his story of being afraid of being alone and how a film of being left behind drew him into receiving Christ. I was also led to salvation in the same way it was just a different movie then his was. I related to his personal story and have experiencing some of the same fears he has. I liked how he looked at the God’s spots in our lives and how we can change it and redirected it back to God being the center of our lives. In reading the book, I can’t help but wonder if maybe this Covid-19 virus is also supposed to bring us all back to Christ being the center and it’s to show us all that jobs, church, friends, family, school, and anything else isn’t supposed to our God for our lives. We are supposed to have Him at the center. I also liked how he included discussion questions at the end of each chapter to guide readers into thinking about their own lives and help them to find their wholeness. I believe this book has the power to assist readers into dealing with their pains, shattered dreams, and wounds and help them in working through the path to wholeness.
"I received this book free from the publisher, Bethany House/ Chosen for my honest review.”
He explored the concept of the God’s spot and he asked everyone to look at who we are putting at the center of our lives. He shared how he struggled with this and he put his wife in his God’s spot. He expressed how he had a high pleaser personality and he hated conflict. He backs this up by looking at Psalms 23 and how this scripture explains how God is our Shepherd and how God is with us through the valley of the shadow of death. He discovered four ways to re-center our God spot and how we can let God back on the throne over our lives. He traces back to his childhood and how he struggled with fear and how it even led to him in accepting Christ a lot of this was out of fear of being left behind after watching a film. In his childhood, he sneaked into his parents to sleep on their floor and he had fears of dying and being alone. When he was fourteen-year-old he shared how he hated being home alone and how he would load a gun every day in case someone broke into their home. He revealed how he was taught by his dad to take every thought captive and how he learned to change his thoughts. He was able to overcome strongholds of fear and to recognize the lies before they took over control of his life.
I would recommend this amazing book to anyone who is experiencing struggles in their own lives and they are having a difficult time dealing with conflicts and they are overwhelmed. I immensely connected with his story of being afraid of being alone and how a film of being left behind drew him into receiving Christ. I was also led to salvation in the same way it was just a different movie then his was. I related to his personal story and have experiencing some of the same fears he has. I liked how he looked at the God’s spots in our lives and how we can change it and redirected it back to God being the center of our lives. In reading the book, I can’t help but wonder if maybe this Covid-19 virus is also supposed to bring us all back to Christ being the center and it’s to show us all that jobs, church, friends, family, school, and anything else isn’t supposed to our God for our lives. We are supposed to have Him at the center. I also liked how he included discussion questions at the end of each chapter to guide readers into thinking about their own lives and help them to find their wholeness. I believe this book has the power to assist readers into dealing with their pains, shattered dreams, and wounds and help them in working through the path to wholeness.
"I received this book free from the publisher, Bethany House/ Chosen for my honest review.”
May 11, 2020
[Note: This book was provided free of charge by Chosen Books in exchange for an honest book review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.]
This book presents its reader with a bit of an enigma. On the one hand, the author has a great deal that is worthwhile to say about the healing and wholeness that people can experience even after rather traumatic and unpleasant aspects of their life. Yet this is a book that is also very coy about a great deal. This is a book whose emotional resonance depends on the credibility of the author as someone who can speak of healing and wholeness, and yet when the author speaks about his divorce, he does so in a way that seems to be a cop out and that does not go into the soul searching about the author's own weaknesses and failures that led to the rupture with his wife. To be sure, he may not have been even mostly to blame, but the sort of breakup he describes is one that does not happen without there being some substantial failures on his part, and this book does not appear to be owning up to those.
This book of a bit more than 200 pages begins with a foreword by Heidi Baker as well as an introduction and a preface that states that Kris Vallotton only wrote the frame of the story along with some comments while his son Jason wrote the majority of the material within the middle. The book begins with a discussion of Little House On The Prairie (1) and then a discussion of what is on our God spot and how to put God back in His proper place (2). The author then speaks about the issue of justice by discussing the breakup of his marriage (3), as well as an exploration of the precious fruit of hard times (4). The author shares his thoughts about unlocking the inner man (5) as well as the way that we need to deal with the pain of our lives (6). This leads to a discussion of the power of forgiveness (7) as well as the contrast between true and counterfeit love (8). The author then discusses red-flags and self-awareness (9) as well as the importance of intimacy (10). Finally, the book ends with a discussion of the new standard that God has for restoration (11) as well as the final frontier of hope.
Whatever one feels about the author and his religious beliefs and practices, and there has been a fair amount of criticism of both this book does deal with very important topics. It is vitally important that we recognize the importance of forgiveness and mercy in our lives. Given the sort of world that we live in, we will have dings and bruises as a result of the experiences we have. And a great many people fail to live the best life that is possible to them because of the baggage of resentment and wounds that they carry with them. Even if you are considerably hostile towards anything that reeks of the false prosperity gospel, it is clear that a lot of failure comes from our failure to forgive and to let God handle the wrongs we have suffered and not to let them be a burden upon our hearts and minds and relationships. If the author's testimony is not as vulnerable as he would think it to be, this work is still one that deals with an important subject in a thoughtful and worthwhile way. A lot of people are going to be able to relate to the subject material and the author deals with it well.
This book presents its reader with a bit of an enigma. On the one hand, the author has a great deal that is worthwhile to say about the healing and wholeness that people can experience even after rather traumatic and unpleasant aspects of their life. Yet this is a book that is also very coy about a great deal. This is a book whose emotional resonance depends on the credibility of the author as someone who can speak of healing and wholeness, and yet when the author speaks about his divorce, he does so in a way that seems to be a cop out and that does not go into the soul searching about the author's own weaknesses and failures that led to the rupture with his wife. To be sure, he may not have been even mostly to blame, but the sort of breakup he describes is one that does not happen without there being some substantial failures on his part, and this book does not appear to be owning up to those.
This book of a bit more than 200 pages begins with a foreword by Heidi Baker as well as an introduction and a preface that states that Kris Vallotton only wrote the frame of the story along with some comments while his son Jason wrote the majority of the material within the middle. The book begins with a discussion of Little House On The Prairie (1) and then a discussion of what is on our God spot and how to put God back in His proper place (2). The author then speaks about the issue of justice by discussing the breakup of his marriage (3), as well as an exploration of the precious fruit of hard times (4). The author shares his thoughts about unlocking the inner man (5) as well as the way that we need to deal with the pain of our lives (6). This leads to a discussion of the power of forgiveness (7) as well as the contrast between true and counterfeit love (8). The author then discusses red-flags and self-awareness (9) as well as the importance of intimacy (10). Finally, the book ends with a discussion of the new standard that God has for restoration (11) as well as the final frontier of hope.
Whatever one feels about the author and his religious beliefs and practices, and there has been a fair amount of criticism of both this book does deal with very important topics. It is vitally important that we recognize the importance of forgiveness and mercy in our lives. Given the sort of world that we live in, we will have dings and bruises as a result of the experiences we have. And a great many people fail to live the best life that is possible to them because of the baggage of resentment and wounds that they carry with them. Even if you are considerably hostile towards anything that reeks of the false prosperity gospel, it is clear that a lot of failure comes from our failure to forgive and to let God handle the wrongs we have suffered and not to let them be a burden upon our hearts and minds and relationships. If the author's testimony is not as vulnerable as he would think it to be, this work is still one that deals with an important subject in a thoughtful and worthwhile way. A lot of people are going to be able to relate to the subject material and the author deals with it well.
July 1, 2020
Jason Vallotton has a powerful testimony of how God worked in his life after his marriage ended. He knows heartache and pain and he knows he must rely on Jesus to get him through.
I can see where a lot of people might read this book and find comfort and even walk toward healing.
In the chapter entitled “The Power of Forgiveness” Jason wrote something I agree with: “Compassion literally activates true forgiveness, therefore releasing you from the emotional and spiritual bondage of unforgiveness.”
I agree with that completely. Once I saw my abuser with compassion instead of hate it was much easier to extend forgiveness to him.
But the deeper I got into the book the more I cringed with the self-reliance this book promotes instead of God-reliance. He talked about walking a woman through healing and telling her to say, “I love myself.” Yikes!! Don’t we need to know God loves us before we can even begin to love ourselves? I can say I love myself but until I know that God loves me nothing much will change. Then he has her says, “I forgive myself.” Shouldn’t we be focused on God forgiving us before we work on forgiving ourselves? If I don’t get that God forgives me how could I ever forgive myself.
In a later chapter he tells the reader to pay attention to your feelings and take personality tests…really? My feelings change depending on the day, minute and time of the month. I don’t think I should pay too much attention to those.
I could share more that I take issue with but then I feel like I am being mean. A month ago I probably would have eaten this book up but now my heart has changed and I think getting more grounded in a Biblical foundation and I don’t feel like this book does that. My opinion only.
A copy of this book was given to me by the publisher. All opinions are my own.
I can see where a lot of people might read this book and find comfort and even walk toward healing.
In the chapter entitled “The Power of Forgiveness” Jason wrote something I agree with: “Compassion literally activates true forgiveness, therefore releasing you from the emotional and spiritual bondage of unforgiveness.”
I agree with that completely. Once I saw my abuser with compassion instead of hate it was much easier to extend forgiveness to him.
But the deeper I got into the book the more I cringed with the self-reliance this book promotes instead of God-reliance. He talked about walking a woman through healing and telling her to say, “I love myself.” Yikes!! Don’t we need to know God loves us before we can even begin to love ourselves? I can say I love myself but until I know that God loves me nothing much will change. Then he has her says, “I forgive myself.” Shouldn’t we be focused on God forgiving us before we work on forgiving ourselves? If I don’t get that God forgives me how could I ever forgive myself.
In a later chapter he tells the reader to pay attention to your feelings and take personality tests…really? My feelings change depending on the day, minute and time of the month. I don’t think I should pay too much attention to those.
I could share more that I take issue with but then I feel like I am being mean. A month ago I probably would have eaten this book up but now my heart has changed and I think getting more grounded in a Biblical foundation and I don’t feel like this book does that. My opinion only.
A copy of this book was given to me by the publisher. All opinions are my own.
October 23, 2021
This book at times was a struggle to get through as it correlates so close to my life now. However it packs a punch and gets straight to the heart of understanding the process it takes to come out on top. To not fall into a victim mentality but hope in Jesus Christ will finish the good work he has started in you and for you.
May 26, 2020
We all need to be healed and whole! I can’t recommend this book enough
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews