Also by this author: He Will Be Enough: How God Takes You by the Hand Through Your Hardest Days
Published by Crossway on January 17, 2023
Genres: Non-Fiction, Christian Life, Parenting, Theology
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Where Do You Turn When Motherhood Isn’t What You Expected?
Each mother’s story is unique. While motherhood brings joy and love, it can also bring pain and heartache. It’s often different than expected and it can be hard to know where to turn when difficulty and loneliness rise up. God Is Still Good: Gospel Hope and Comfort for the Unexpected Sorrows of Motherhood invites women to experience God’s comfort and leads moms to put their hope in Christ, despite the unexpected trials of raising children.
Katie Faris knows well the challenges of parenting. As a mother of 5, she has experienced the trials of motherhood but also knows the comfort of our Savior, Jesus. Through 9 chapters, God Is Still Good offers a biblical context for suffering and hope, answers common questions, and addresses prevalent temptations and lies that mothers are likely to face.
Each Chapter Ends with Bible Verses and Questions: Great for individual study or easily adaptable for a women’s ministry or small-group use
Biblical Context for Suffering and Hope: Points to biblical figures who teach readers about grief, suffering, and comfort
Lie and Truth Chart: Appendix includes 10 lies that women are tempted to believe during suffering, with 10 biblically grounded answers to those lies.
This concise, highly readable book shares encouragement for Christian mothers who are suffering. Katie Faris shares some about her own experiences, and she includes varied examples about other things mothers might be dealing with, such as raising kids without a spouse, dealing with adoption and foster care struggles, suffering from an adult child’s destructive choices, or dealing with racial discrimination against one’s children. Faris validates how additional difficulties make motherhood even more challenging than it already is, and throughout this book, she shares encouragement from Scripture for struggling moms.
In God Is Still Good: Gospel Hope and Comfort for the Unexpected Sorrows of Motherhood, Faris unpacks stories about motherhood struggles from the Bible, emphasizing that these stories speak to universal themes regardless of one’s time period, culture, and specific problems. She also writes about Scripture passages related to suffering and endurance, and helps mothers think through biblical responses to lies that they may believe about God, themselves, and their motherhood struggles. Each chapter is easy to read and concludes with an example prayer, other Bible passages to look up, and reflection questions. The focus on biblical teaching will encourage women who are used to reading fluffier women’s ministry books that don’t get to the heart of things.
Faris writes some about her struggles raising children with a rare genetic disorder, and about her lament and processing after a miscarriage. She gives the book a personal touch without oversharing, and focuses on core spiritual themes that other mothers can relate to. However, even though I appreciate her desire to focus on biblical teaching over subjective experiences, it could have enriched this book for her to include additional testimonials from women with different struggles. She gave wide-ranging examples of other types of suffering, but just a paragraph or two from another mother at the end of each chapter could have made this book even stronger.