God Gave Us So Much - Book Review

God Gave Us So Much is a limited-edition treasury of three books by Lisa Tawn Bergren. The wonderful watercolor illustrations are by Laura J. Bryant. Contained in the quality hardback book are God Gave Us the World, God Gave Us Love, and God Gave Us Heaven. The stories are primarily a running dialogue between Little Cub and her Mama, Papa, and Grampa Bear. In God Gave Us the World, the polar bear family visits a museum where they see bear habitats from all over the world. Mama explains how God is our Creator and made a world filled with bears who are all different, as well as what they eat and where they live. It's Grampa Bear's turn to answer Little Cub's questions in God Gave Us Love. When Little Cub gets irritated by her otter friends, Grampa Bear teaches her about the gift of love. He explains the three different types of love in a way that is easy to understand. The story concludes with Grampa Bear telling Little Cub that God shows his love for us through our friends and family and by sending his Son to save us. The last story, God Gave Us Heaven, is my personal favorite. Little Cub has lots of questions for Papa about heaven. She learns that nothing bad happens in Heaven and that we won't have any burdens, only blessing. Papa covers all the bases by explaining that bears don't become angels when they die and how Jesus is our "bridge" to heaven.

As an adult who is familiar with the Bible, it is easy to see that the author sticks to Scripture, especially in the last story. Heaven is a difficult concept to understand, let alone teach young children but Ms. Bergren does a good job of trying to explain it. I shared this book with my three year old and seven year old sons. We had to break it up and only read one story at a time because my three year old started losing interest near the end of each. The boys enjoyed the stories but didn't ask for a second reading. However, the last story was a starting point for a discussion between me and my seven year old and it revealed some things about my son's belief system that I wasn't aware of. I don't see this book as the bedtime story type, but rather an introduction to some concepts that may inspire more questions from your little cub.

Disclaimer: I received this book for free from Waterbrook Multnomah for review. These are my honest opinions of the book.