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Goodbye to Goodbyes by Lauren Chandler and Catalina Echeverri

EQUIP19 Picks - 10 books chosen and reviewed for you by our EQUIP team

Our culture talks so little about death, a book like Goodbye to Goodbyes is a must-have for every child’s book collection. Lauren Chandler effectively retells the story of Lazarus’s resurrection (John 11:1-44). But she doesn’t stop there. Chandler helpfully expresses what this story means for us, as friends of Jesus, both in the present and in our future heavenly reality. It is a book full of hope and joy.  

While this book would traditionally be considered a children’s picture book, it speaks so beautifully of the reality of resurrection and hope, both through its words and Catalina Echeverri’s stunning illustrations, that it’s a book for adults too. A friend gave our family this book after our two-year-old daughter passed away. As I have read it to myself and to my son, my grief-ridden heart has been reminded that because of the resurrection, our good-bye is not a forever goodbye.  

“We all have to say goodbye sometimes. Some of them are short goodbyes. Some are long. Sometimes a friend of Jesus who we love gets sick and we’re sad. Sometimes, because they die we have to say goodbye. It feels like a forever goodbye. Jesus knows is it sad to say goodbye. So Jesus came to end goodbyes.”  

The EQUIP19 Picks will be available at the conference book shop on Saturday June 22. And for a limited time, online via our ministry partner, Reformers Bookshop.

http://reformers.com.au/equip?aff=6

A percentage of the sales from books bought at EQUIP19, and via the above link will support our CMS missionary, M.

Meet Nicky Gangemi

Nicky has been involved in organising the EQUIP Teens conference since it started in 2015. This year she produced a Devotional on 1 Corinthians 13 for the girls – it’s a beauty. She hopes that it will help them to keep thinking about these chapters and what it means to love one another.

She’s married to Steve and, along with their little boy, they call Ingleburn home. She works part-time for The Salvation Army producing written resources.