Great Christian Books for Kids

Everyone in my family is a bookworm. We’re not ashamed to admit it.

My wife especially loves to read. Have you heard of people who “speed-read”? Well, my wife has her own version. I call it “speed-of-light reading”. I’ll ask her, “So, how’s that new book on the Amish you’ve been reading?” And she’ll say, “Oh, that was two books ago.” I’ll say, “I thought you just started that book this morning.” And she’ll say, “Yeah, it’s been a slow reading day.”

I, on the other hand, love books more out of necessity than recreation. Thanks to my doctoral program work right now, I suspect that I will probably die soon from blunt force trauma (aka “being crushed to death under the weight of all my reading”.) Nevertheless, I honestly do love every single page of it.

As much as we both love books, it almost pales in comparison to our children. They love to “read” books and have books read to them. Like all parents, though, we want to be sure…

…that we give our kids good books. We especially want to give them good Christ-centered books. That is much easier said than done.

You’ve probably heard by soapbox before about my love/hate relationship with Christian material like VeggieTales. I love their animation, storytelling, and entertainment. It’s quality work. However, I hate that they simply retell Bible stories as good moral lessons.

Morality is important, but it is not the ultimate point of the Bible. Jesus is. If all I give my kids is moralism, I will raise little “know it all” Pharisees. What we need to produce are little sin-conscious, Jesus-lovers. So, when it comes to buying Christian books for kids, I’ve been making a list of the very best ones along these lines.

If you have a child or grandchild who loves to read, keep this list handy for birthdays and Christmas time. These are all excellent books with an excellent message focused and centered where it should be: upon Jesus.