Risen: The First 40 Days of Your Christian Life – Review

Risen: The First 40 Days of Your Christian Life is a 40-day devotional from C. Philip Slate for new Christians. Rather than covering deep topics, this book focuses on building a foundation to prepare new Christians for larger and more complex subjects. It’s written for those that were recently baptized – the people that satan often attacks first. To help strengthen new Christians, this book provides 40 spiritual activities, one per day for their first 40 days.

The exercises include Scriptures to read and information about them. They provide references for you to lookup in your translation of choice. Some include a verse to memorize. The focus isn’t on theology, but it does include it (as it’s difficult to lay a foundation without it). When theology is discussed it’s handled expertly and keeps it as simple as possible, often just quoting clear Scripture without deep explanations. Because of the way it’s handled, it seems to be non-denominational.

Topics include baptism, grace, the Lord’s supper, the Bible in English, congregation, service, God (a simplified discussion just using clear Scripture), temptation, singing, sanctification, the coming judgment, prayer, handling persecution, living for God, being a disciple, maturity, and lots more.

I enjoyed reading Risen: The First 40 Days of Your Christian Life. Each of the lessons is well-written and applicable to both new-converts and growing Christians. They help build a strong foundation without getting into confusion or denominational details, leaving room to grow. Like any study material, I recommend using it for reference and doing your own study. With this in mind, I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in building or strengthening their foundation and especially for new converts.

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DeWard Publishing provided this bok in exchange for an honest review.