Book Review: Sun Stand Still

I have been reading Sun Stand Still by Steven Furtick for the past few weeks. This book came to me free from Waterbrook Multnomah publishers and it couldn’t have come at a better time. I began reading this book at the same time that Brent lost his job and I obeyed the call to stay at home after this school year. The subtitle is “What happens when you dare to ask God for the impossible” and that is exactly what we have been doing the past month or so…asking God to provide for our needs with very little income and provide a job for Brent that allows us to financially survive after I quit working. I was excited to receive this book, hoping that it would give me much needed encouragement for what could be a very challenging season in our lives.

My favorite quote in the entire book is, “Live a life that can be explained only by the existence of a God who is infinitely great.” The perception of this book is that we should live out our audacious faith by asking God to do BIG things in our lives. However, asking God for the impossible may not always be some huge act…it may be as simple as obeying him. In my finite mind, it makes no sense that I, knowing my husband lost his job just minutes before, should tell my principle that I am going to be a stay at home mom. But I want my life decisions (which are ultimately already decided by Him) to only be explained by my God who is infinitely great.

Furtick encourages the reader to have a vision. He gives the example of the vision he had while at a U2 concert in the Time Warner Cable Arena in North Carolina. He leaned over to his friend and said that one day he wanted his church to fill that arena for a worship service. That vision became reality on Easter Sunday 2010. To me, that vision is HUGE and although God can definitely bring big dreams to reality, we need to be careful to not think that in order to have audacious faith we must have a large vision. Living out lives of faith looks different in each life of the believer. For some it may be big like growing a church to fill an arena or moving your family to Papua New Guinea to spread the Gospel to unreached people groups…but it also may seem small like starting a new ministry at your church or taking a job that means decreased or no income but great eternal benefits. Furtick doesn’t really address those who have been called to live out their faith in the smaller things. No matter how big or small your vision, the common denominator is having the faith and obedience to lay it all down before the Lord and say yes no matter the cost.

(I received this book for free from Waterbrook Multnomah Publishing Group in exchange for this review)