PIC No. 67:
• Title: The Most Holy Place: Daily Devotions from the Book of Hebrews
• Author: Jeremy D. Vogan
• Publisher: LightPath Publishing (August 26, 2023, 322 pages)
• Management Bucket #1 of 20: The Results Bucket
Welcome to Issue No. 67 of PAILS IN COMPARISON, the value-added sidekick of John Pearson’s Buckets Blog. This blog features my “PICs”—shorter reviews of helpful books—with comparisons to other books in my 20 management buckets (core competencies) filing system.
52 Weeks and 312 Prayers
On February 1, we inaugurated a new monthly series for 2024, posting them here on the Pails in Comparison blog. (I started in February intentionally—in case your January new year’s resolutions had already been scuttled!)
Each month in 2024, I’m recommending an inspiring book that you can leverage as a spiritual growth tool in your walk with God. Examples:
• FEBRUARY: A Well-Planted Faith in an Uprooted Culture: Praying in the Now, by Ed McDowell
• MARCH: Holiness Day by Day: Transformational Thoughts for Your Spiritual Journey, by Jerry Bridges
Here’s the book for APRIL: The Most Holy Place: Daily Devotions from the Book of Hebrews. Author Jeremy Vogan has written a very unique and humble book.
UNIQUE: No boring intro! With just a two-paragraph preface, we’re immediately greeted with one verse, Hebrews 1:1, and a one-page prayer for Monday. The prayer begins:
“Lord, You know how desperately I need to hear from You. This world is no friend to grace
I catch a glimpse of Your glory at dawn, but by nightfall my vision has faded
I plant Your words deep in my heart, but somehow they get shaken loose every time…”
The prayer continues…and uniquely…there is only one period at the very end of the prayer, followed by an "Amen." (I love that…a stream of praying…nonstop until the day’s prayer concludes. Amen!)
On Tuesday, the one-pager begins with Hebrews 1:2, and another prayer: “Lord, You are not silent…Though it often seems that You are…As though evil has the upper hand…”
I love this book!
• Monday to Saturday daily prayers (take Sunday off)
• 52 weeks
• 312 prayers
• The weeks are not dated—so no guilt. Start at any time.
HUMBLE. Why humble? The author’s focus is on “one of the most profound and astonishing books in all of Holy Scripture” and he urges us—by praying through Hebrews to bathe in “a daily prayer meditation and Old/New Testament Biblical synthesis” using a verse-by-verse discipline.
Jeremy Vogan eliminates the obligatory author bio and filler pages. Honest. No bio. (His Amazon bio is simple, humble.) Just 312 prayers, a one-page preface—that’s it. The Most Holy Place is so refreshing. So focused on the Lord. So needed.
BEYOND EASTER. We just celebrated Resurrection Sunday four days ago. He is risen! This may be the perfect devotional prayer book to continue and enrich your worship from last Sunday. Perhaps you’ve read the book of Hebrews many times—grateful for the “new Covenant written on our hearts, a new and living Way that fulfills the shadow of the Law…”
But…maybe you’ve never connected the dots between the Old Testament and the New Testament? Is “a Sabbath-rest for the people of God” still relevant? Read my review of The Gift of Rest: Rediscovering the Beauty of the Sabbath, by Senator Joe Liberman (1942-2024).
What’s your favorite chapter in Hebrews? I love Hebrews 11 (“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”) And I also love Hebrews 12 (“…and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us.”).
NOTE: According to this website, there are 303 verses in Hebrews, yet the author gives us 312 prayers. (Nicely done, by the way!) I’m wondering after writing this book, if Vogan’s next book will be on 2 John (just 13 verses)…or maybe Psalms with 2,461 verses?
Why read Hebrews again? Eugene Peterson’s book introductions in The Message are always helpful. I especially appreciate his color commentary on why we should read the letter to the Hebrews. He writes, “It seems odd to have to say so, but too much religion is a bad thing.” He adds:
“But more often than not we become impatiently self-important along the way and decide to improve matters with our two cents' worth. We add on, we supplement, we embellish. But instead of improving on the purity and simplicity of Jesus, we dilute the purity, clutter the simplicity. We become fussily religious, or anxiously religious. We get in the way.
“That's when it's time to read and pray our way through the letter to the Hebrews again, written for ‘too religious’ Christians, for ‘Jesus-and’ Christians.”
PAILS IN COMPARISON: Reading this book reminded me of several other must-read books in the Results Bucket, plus other buckets/core competencies.
[ ] A Diary of Private Prayer, by John Baillie (Read my review.)
[ ] For 14 recommended inspirational books and devotional guides, read my mini-reviews, “Inspirational Books for 2024—Pick 2!”
[ ] Crafting a Rule of Life: An Invitation to the Well-Ordered Way, by Stephen A. Macchia (Read my review.)
[ ] Lead with Prayer: The Spiritual Habits of World-Changing Leaders, by Ryan Skoog, Peter Greer, and Cameron Doolittle (Read my review.)
To order from Amazon, click on the title for The Most Holy Place: Daily Devotions from the Book of Hebrews, by Jeremy D. Vogan.
For more reviews, visit John Pearson’s Buckets Blog and subscribe to Your Weekly Staff Meeting. And thanks to the author for sending me a review copy.
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