The Word of Promise: The Gift of Psalms
About a year or two ago I was excited to learn about the production of The Word of Promise. It was to be the most thought out and produced audio reading of the bible ever. They got many great actors such as Richard Dreyfuss, Sean Astin, Jason Alexander, and Gary Sinise to be readers for the audio set. The Gift of Psalms is from that same collection. It is a devotional of what is said to be the fifty most inspirational Psalms. Just like The Word of Promise they spared no expense on this devotional.
Lets first take notice of how neatly this book comes packaged. It has a nice hard bound cover that seems to be coushined and super glossy pages with different script syle fonts. Its really designed to be that devotional you leave on the coffee table so it looks nice but you never actually read. Once you start reading it, you want to just leave it on the coffee table because its not that inspirational.
The devotionals seem to distract you from the heart of the Psalms. They try to relate and make you look deeper into the Psalms, but in doing so they miss the mark on the meanings of Psalms. Each devotional ends with a short prayer. I found the prayers to be great ways to end each devotional. Sometimes its hard to know how to pray over what I read and these helped me with that.
The book comes with three audio cds that are readings of the Psalms. The readings weren't great but they were not bad. I feel they were over produced. To much trying to set the mood or to be mystical. Sometimes I just want a nice voice reading to me, something natural. The scripture used is all from the King James Version of the bible. I really don't like this version because I find it hard to relate too, but I decided to give it a try. After going through this book I still don't like the King James Version.
Overall I would say don't run out to buy this book right away unless your really wanting some kind of devotional to get you through the Psalms. If you can find it on sale go ahead and pick up a copy. Like the title says The Gift of Psalms, this book would be really nice for a gift for someone.
