Whether your church observes a formal Lent season or concentrates on Holy Week, Easter is on all our minds. That’s as it should be. In an effort to help us prepare our hearts and turn our eyes to the cross, we asked Rooted writers to recommend some of their favorite resources. Check out the parent side of the blog for more resources to share with families— these may also be helpful with teaching your youth group.
The Final Days of Jesus: The Most Important Week of the Most Important Person Who Ever Lived by Andreas Kostenberger and Justin Taylor
Designed as a day-by-day guide to Passion Week, The Final Days of Jesus leads us to reexamine and meditate on the history-making, earth-shaking significance of Jesus’s arrest, trial, crucifixion, and empty tomb. (recommended by Greg Meyer)
Words From the Cross: Seven Statements to Change Your Life by Ben Birdsong
Words from the Cross is a 7 day devotional through the last 7 statements of Jesus from the cross, with devotional content alongside original art bringing each statement to life. This would be a great resource to use the week before Easter to prepare your heart for a celebration of Jesus’ resurrection. (Ben Birdsong)
A Word In the Wilderness: A Poem a Day for Lent and Easter by Malcom Guite
For every day from Shrove Tuesday to Easter Day, the bestselling poet Malcolm Guite chooses a favourite poem from across the Christian spiritual and English literary traditions and offers incisive seasonal reflections on it. (recommended by Greg Meyer)
Lent for Everyone: Matthew, Year A: A Daily Devotional by NT Wright
NT Wright puts us firmly into the text of Matthew and helps it come alive to us. He invites us to slow down and meditate through the entire Gospel while giving key insights to dwell more deeply on the meaning of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. (Michael Goldstein)
Watchfulness: Recovering a Lost Spiritual Discipline by Brian G. Hedges
Designed for reflection, self-examination, and personal application, with ‘Examine and Apply’ questions at the end of each chapter, this book will chart your course toward greater watchfulness, increased holiness, and deeper communion with the triune God.
A Habit Called Faith: 40 Days in the Bible to Find and Follow Jesus by Jen Pollock Michel
As a believer living in one of the world’s most thoroughly secular cities, Michel wanted to write something that would speak to Christ followers and faith-seekers, providing them a way in to read the Bible side-by-side. She guides her readers through daily selections in Deuteronomy and the Gospel of John, inviting them to explore the possibility that faith “may have as much to do with habits as epiphanies.” (recommended by Anna Meade Harris; Rooted review here)
Remember Death, The Surprising Path to Living Hope by Matthew McCullough
Ignoring the certainty of death doesn’t protect us from feeling its effects throughout the lives we’re living now. But this avoidance can hold us back from experiencing the powerful, everyday relevance of Jesus’s promises to us. So long as death remains remote and unreal, Jesus’s promises will too. (recommended by Greg Meyer)
