Last week I discussed the importance of reading to your children and provided a couple of links for choosing some quality books -possibly as Christmas gifts for your young ones. I also mentioned that “reading parents who set the example” are crucial to raising children who are readers. I know that I mention this issue often -that parents should read. Please understand that I appreciate the challenges we all face. After you tend to children, family, church, jobs, dishes, laundry, lawns, oil changes, basketball games, youth groups, dentist appointments, and a gazillion other items on the schedule, it is next to impossible to read a book for 15 minutes -you’re ready for bed! I could go on and on about discipline and priorities (which are important), but as I look at my own life I believe the key is delight. We all do what we love to do -at least when we have time to spare. Duty and discipline are essential, but what really sustains habits and routines is delight and joy. One will pray out of a sense of duty, but delight in prayer makes one “pray without ceasing.” Duty often leads to joy, but delight, joy, and passion sustain the habit. Reading is the same with me. I was not much of a reader until I was around forty years old and someone put a particular book in my hand. I read it and found delight. I was amazed at what I had been missing. So, I started reading -one book and then another and then another -now I can’t stop. It is a delight and joy -and a discipline and priority -that I incorporate into my life nearly every day. And, by God’s grace, I see evidence of the same delight in my children. I simply want you and your children to find the same delight in reading.

So, please find linked here my Book Recommendations 2014. I have also included the previous two lists; Book Recommendations 2012 and Book Recommendations 2013. I list books that I think might be good starting points for folks who don’t regularly read. I send these not to cram another activity into your busy schedule and not to heap another measure of guilt onto your weary soul. I’m the fellow with a slice of his mom’s homemade coconut cream pie-“Here, just try it, take a bite. Oh man, you won’t believe how good this is.” The attached lists have lots of delightful pie.