Published by Bethany House Publishers on August 9, 2022
Genres: Non-Fiction, Christian Life, Theology
Goodreads
What you believe about God and your place in His Kingdom has everything to do with how you'll fare in the battles of this life. In these pages, Susie Larson shares how you can gain victory in all the hardships and obstacles you face in this life. As you rely on God, you will discover greater discernment, power, and authority, and arise victorious.
Susie Larson writes about facing spiritual challenges and periods of hardship with faith and courage, sharing stories from her own life and delving into relevant Bible passages. Each chapter focuses on a different main theme, such as the importance of being dependent on God or being teachable, and the chapters conclude with a few pages of additional Bible study. Larson designed this book to be appropriate for both individual and group reading, and this could be very valuable as a group study, since Larson asks her readers lots of deep reflection questions. This can foster meaningful connection among group members, pushing them beyond theoretical discussion to become more vulnerable about their lives and spiritual journeys.
Strong in Battle: Why the Humble Will Prevail addresses many different topics, and sometimes seemed scattered to me. The content is repetitive at times, and even though this could work well for a gradual book study, reading through it in a few days made me aware of the many repeated elements and other things the author could have streamlined during the editing process. Also, I found the subtitle somewhat misleading, because the book doesn’t have a major focus on humility aside from devoting yourself to God. Overall, I felt like even though this book has great elements, it was all over the place and never gelled together as well as it needed to. I also didn’t care for the extremely heavy reliance on metaphor, or the emphasis on affirmations. Even though Larson offers true and biblical affirmations, it just doesn’t fit with my personality to want to use them.
However, even though I didn’t connect with this book as much as I had hoped, it is full of great wisdom for people dealing with long-term trials. I appreciate the author’s vulnerability about how the absence of earthly healing for her chronic illness has sometimes made it difficult for her to believe that God is good and loves her. Her honesty and her commitment to biblical truth have already been a great encouragement to many people, including one of my cousins, who found this book timely and deeply encouraging as she endures some extended trials. Because my less impressed perspective is clearly a minority opinion, I would still recommend this book, knowing that most people will enjoy it more than I did.