(*Article first published as Book Review: 14 Secrets to Better Parenting by Dave Earley on Blogcritics.)
I'm always scouting for good books on parenting, Christianity, children and so on and when I saw this book's availability on NetGalley, I immediately asked to review it. And oh boy, I just love this book! Here is my review of this book from Dave Earley entitled: "14 Secrets to Better Parenting: Powerful Principles from the Bible".
Author: Dave Earley
Publisher: Barbour Books (April 1, 2011)
ISBN-13: 978-1616262259
Hardcover: 224 pages
Product Dimensions: 6.5 x 5.4 x 0.7 inches
Description from the Amazon product page:
"Wondering how to raise great kids? Turn to the Bible’s book of Proverbs for guidance—that’s where author Dave Earley found many of his 14 Secrets to Better Parenting. From “Focus on Training” to “When You Have No Other Option, Keep Praying!”, these principles will help you create the kind of home environment conducive to raising successful children. “When our children were born over twenty years ago,” the author says, “I researched what the Bible had to say about parenting and made a list of principles. I considered writing my findings up as a book, but refrained from getting it published until our children were grown and I could see how the principles worked. Guess what? They work! We can joyously say today that all three of our boys are living lives that honor the Lord.”"
This entire book is written based on the book of Proverbs. As I read through each chapters in the book, I couldn't help but agree and realised there's so much to parenting!
The writing style of Dave Earley is like Max Lucado and Zig Ziglar, in the sense that the author dispenses his parenting advice together with biblical verses for you to understand more on and ponder about.
The author starts with the questions on why should we trust in God as the expert on parenting and why the books on Proverbs in particular. On page 14 of the book, he explains that the book of Proverbs is unique as it is written from the perspective of a parent giving encouragement and instruction to a child. Read Proverbs 4:1-2 (NIV)
I like the statement on page 17 where it says "Parents who make their children's immediate happiness the goal of their parenting are making a huge mistake, If happiness becomes the primary target, character flaws would go uncorrected and behavioral problems will be overlooked. The children will be spoiled and overindulged." In my opinion, too often we as parents are afraid of disciplining our child; either we are too soft hearted to punish them when they do something wrong or we think they are still too young to understand the concept of punishment or apologizing for their mistake. Read: Proverbs 23:13 (NIV), Proverbs 29:15 (NIV), Proverbs 29:17 (NIV)
I also learned that it is best that the same person who disciplines the child should be the same one to console them afterward. That way, the child will understand the connection between discipline, love and developing character and all. There is also some points on resorting to spanking as a method of discipline which you should read on to understand more.
In summary, this book emphasize highly on the power of wisdom, in the sense that how we as parents should focus our parenting on developing our child's wisdom.
I am very inspired with how wisdom helps greatly in our children growing up to be a God fearing and God loving child. I am so glad to review this book and it will definitely stay in my iPad for repeated readings!
Do get a copy of this book if you want to equip yourself with more parenting wisdom and knowledge.
You can also purchase the 14 Secrets to Better Parenting: Powerful Principles from the Bible (14 Bible Secrets Series)
book from Amazon
.
I received no monetary compensation for this review, I was provided with a galley proof of the book via my association with netGalley as a reviewer in order to facilitate my review. All opinions expressed in this post are my own. Please do your own research when purchasing products, as your opinions may differ from mine. And if you'd like to read my previous book reviews, you can do so by reading this post of mine called "My Book Reviews"
