By This Shall They Know Review

By Chelsea Burden

Please see this post if you want some explanation for why this post is odd.

Rating 5 🌟️🌟️🌟️🌟️🌟️ Content rating G. The characters are talking about love, so there are deeper topics, but nothing notable, if you want to read it do!

Sidney and Stanley, for being the oldest, the “mature” ones they have such an immature outlook on life. Maybe it comes of being older, but we are always changing, always being changed, whether we notice, want it, think we need it, or anything. Yes somethings should stay the same, but change is life.

Whether we are talking about a minor changes that will hopefully have major impact, (like rearranging my stretching routine to not have my head between my knees for seven minutes) major visible changes, (like be convicted to dress modestly) major invisible changes, (like having a chronic illness) or any sort of subtle changes that a year or two down the line you go “hmm?!” (like discovering two years after going gluten free that I no longer got cavities)

Some changes are good, others are bad, and the rest just are. Some you see coming, some sneak up on you, and some you wait for but don’t know when they will happen.

I understand wanting to change the world, but often you don’t know what you’ve done. A smile, murmured prayer, kind word or deed can inspire or comfort someone and might go on and be amazing. You can go somewhere, do something, never go back, and years later have people point to you as the reason for the change.

So do your best, ask God for help, and don’t worry.

Quick rundown on things that are not part of my essay on change.

CHELSEA I wanted a whole sermon in the book or at least most of one. It gave me very much vintage serious Christian fiction vibes and that calls for a full sermon, step it up!

I really enjoyed what she had to say about love.

And finally if I joined a community half like that and half like the one I grew up adjacent to I’d have my dream t-shirt in weeks. (as it is I’ll have to wait a few years, but I hope to have it by the end of the decade)