BookSneeze Archives - Mom of Many

Isaac Newton by Mitch Stokes

This book, from Christian Encounters by Mitch Stokes, is a biography on Isaac Newton. It gives an inspiring look into a man’s life who considered his faith to be the starting point as he delved into the world of science and mathematics. Though a short book, I found it to be very interesting, sparking my desire to learn more of this amazing man from the past.

Through his God given intellect, obsession for detail, and a penchant for solitude and study, he made amazing discoveries, contributing to our world like none other. The part I was particularly encouraged by was the fact that Isaac Newton saw the scientific world as a way to explain God’s wondrous works in nature. It appears that his desire to understand the intricisies of the world was fueled by his study of theology and desire to know God. His life demonstrated his belief that, “To be constantly engaged in studying and probing into God’s actions was true worship.”

The surprising part of Isaac Newton’s life was his obvious humility. Though he was brilliant and ahead of his peers in his discoveries, he was surprisingly quiet about it. Only after a tremendous amount of prodding from his fellow scientists and philosophers did he agree to publish his work. It is fortunate for us that he did and yet it leads me to wonder what other discoveries, the ones he did not share with the world, he made and what a difference it may have made to the world if he had shared them.

This would be a great book to add to your children’s reading list. We need to introduce our children to real men of faith. Our world is so full of fake, self-absorbed people who are sending the wrong message to our kids. This book will provide them with a view of a man who sought God in every area of his personal and professional life. I recommend this book to both adults and students.

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from Thomas Nelson Publishers as part of their BookSneeze.com <http://BookSneeze.com> book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.

Progress through Perseverance

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or whether the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; Whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes up short again and again; Who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, and spends himself in a worthy cause; Who, at best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement; And who at worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly. It is far better to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much because they live in the gray twilight of life, knowing neither victory nor defeat. ~ Theodore Roosevelt

The Reformed Pastor – Richard Baxter

“We must carry on our work with patience. We must bear with many abuses and injuries from those to whom we seek to do good. When we have studied for them, and prayed for them, and exhorted them, and beseeched them with all earnestness and condescension, and given them what we are able, and tended them as if they had been our children, we must look that many of them will requite us with scorn and hatred and contempt, and account us their enemies, because we ‘tell them the truth.’ Now, we must endure all this patiently, and we must unweariedly hold on in doing good, ‘in meekness instructing those that oppose themselves, if God, peradventure, will give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth.’ We have to deal with distracted men who will fly in the face of their physician, but we must not, therefore, neglect their cure. He is unworthy to be a physician, who will be driven away from a frenetic patient by foul words. Yet, alas, when sinners reproach and slander us for our love, and are more ready to spit in our faces, than to thank us for our advice, what heart-risings will there be, and how will the remnants of old Adam (pride and passion) struggle against the meekness and patience of the new man! And how sadly do many ministers come off under such trials!”