Published by Good Book Company on August 1, 2024
Genres: Non-Fiction, Christian Life
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Be encouraged by stories of the Holy Spirit’s work in the midst of everyday life, and reflect on how to grow the fruit of the Spirit in your life too.
What does the fruit of the Spirit look like in everyday life, and how can we become the people the Holy Spirit calls us to be?
Author Kristin Elizabeth Couch invites you to explore the fruit of the Spirit through captivating stories of people she’s known: there’s a father who goes missing in a snowstorm; a boss who shouts like a drill sergeant; a neighbor with a refrigerator full of eggs; and Grandpa, who smells of Old Spice!
By combining memorable stories with rich meditations on Scripture, Kristin encourages us to see that God is at work even in life’s mundane moments, and that although our growth may seem slow, in the Spirit’s power we really can become more like Jesus.
As you reflect on the fruit of the Spirit, you will long for it more deeply, pray for it more fervently, and see afresh how the Spirit is at work in your own life and the lives of others. Put deep roots into God’s word and enjoy bearing more and more of his good fruit.
This Christian living book celebrates the Fruit of the Spirit, exploring what these virtues look like in everyday life. Kristin Elizabeth Couch shares stories from her life to illustrate love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. In the introduction, she explains that we grow in virtuous character through the Holy Spirit’s work in our lives, and that these virtues come from our relationship with God, and are not behaviors that we have to muster up on our own to meet God’s approval.
This book teaches about the Fruit of the Spirit in a gospel-centered way, and is full of vivid, well-written stories from the author’s life. Couch shares examples of how she has seen the Fruit of the Spirit in different people’s lives, and she also tells some stories about vices, sharing stories about people who behaved in impatient or harsh ways that sharply contrasted with others’ virtues. Couch shows what a difference it makes to other people for us to show spiritual fruit in our interactions with them, and she weaves in Scripture passages throughout each chapter to reflect on different virtues.
Although I mostly enjoyed this book, I am docking my rating because of graphic violence in one of the stories Couch shared. At the beginning of the first chapter, she startles readers with the horrific details of a car accident that nearly killed a child and horribly disfigured him for life. The awful details were some of the most graphic that I have ever read, and I say this as someone who has read a lot of books about World War II and the Holocaust. I have read many truly horrific things, but this is near the top of the list, especially because it came out of nowhere. At least when I read nonfiction about wars, I’m prepared for violence. When I am reading a Christian living book primarily targeted to women, the last thing I expect is to read a graphic description of an unspeakable horror.
I cannot understand the logic or reason behind telling the story this way. Couch could have told us about a father’s love for his disabled, disfigured child without giving the reader all these graphic details, and that would have been far more appropriate. At the bare minimum, there should have been a trigger warning at the beginning of the chapter, but it didn’t need to be written this way at all. She could have made the exact same points without vividly dramatizing the details of the accident. The only reason to write it this way is for shock value, which shows no consideration for sensitive readers with highly visual imaginations, people with anxiety, or people with similar trauma histories.
Deep Roots, Good Fruit: Seeing the Fruit of the Spirit through Story & Scripture is a unique book that combines personal storytelling with Bible teaching to explore themes about the Fruits of the Spirit. I found the book thought-provoking, engaging, and encouraging overall, but feel obligated to give the trigger warning that the author and the publisher did not. If you don’t think you can handle reading the details about the car accident, you can skip page 16. At the very least, you’ll know to expect it. Overall, I enjoyed this book, but that part was so jarring and awful that I feel obligated to focus on it in this review.