Grin with Grace by Kathy Carlton Willis

About the Book:

Have you ever felt the need to bite your tongue or grit your teeth? Grin with Grace explores ways to genuinely smile in the face of adversity and challenging circumstances. Sometimes, we just need to grin with grace! God blesses us with His grace, and it impacts our relationship with Him and with others.

 Each chapter features five sections:
• Grin with Grace contains real-life stories and observations. You’ll laugh at the humorous confessions and wacky insights, and relate to Kathy’s transparent honesty. Be inspired to see grace in your everyday life.
• Grow with Grace features a grace word study. Kathy examines Bible verses and personalizes the meaning to your situation. Workbook prompts allows you to write down your thoughts as you read along.
• Go with Grace offers life application. Pick one action step and make it work for you, or pick all of them—but do something to live out your grace-walk.
• Give with Grace advances life application further, equipping you to become an instrument of God’s grace to others. You’ll be inspired to take what you’ve learned and give it away to others. This is when faith becomes ministry—when your focus expands to see the needs of others.
• Your Grin with Grace Challenge describes a grace-challenging scenario to give you an opportunity to exercise your newfound grace. It allows for speculation and judgment calls, to prepare you for the what-ifs that happen in life.

About the Author:

Kathy Carlton Willis writes and speaks with a balance of funny and faith—whimsy and wisdom. Not many funny girls also have Bible degrees! Kathy is a pastor’s wife, which gives her plenty of opportunities to grin with grace. She shines the light on issues that hold women back and inspires their own lightbulb moments. Almost a thousand of Kathy’s articles have been published in books, magazines, newspapers, and online publications.

She’s affiliated with several Christian writer and speaker organizations and serves as a consultant in the industry. Kathy’s tagline describes her best: Light and Lively: His Reflection/Her Laughter. Learn more at: www.kathycartonwillis.com.

Margie’s Comments:

When I received the opportunity to post a review** of Grin with Grace by Kathy Carlton Willis, I accepted because the topic of grace is one that is dear to me. As I learned over twenty years ago in Christian counseling for clinical depression, not only have I been saved by grace, I have also been called to live in grace.

Kathy has written Grin with Grace for individual topical Bible study, but as a Bible study leader, I’m excited about recommending this for any group Bible study. (Grin with Grace DVDs will be available for personal or group use in a few weeks.) There are twelve chapters, perfect for a 12-week study. But Kathy includes a seven-week schedule that can be modified to fit your group. There’s a Study Guide at the back of the book that gives leaders suggestions in guiding a group discussion each week.

Kathy’s conversational style makes it easy to identify with her stories of learning to Grin with Grace and to clearly see what Scripture has to say on each week’s topic. The chapters deal with various aspects of living in grace. My favorites are “The Sufficiency of Grace,” “The Freedom of Grace,” and “The Strength of Grace.”

Now that I’ve read the book, I plan to go back through it at a much slower pace, filling in answers to questions and challenges throughout the study. I look forward to sharing this study with others, and finding new Grace-Gal Pals. (I already have several, but there’s always room for more!)

**I received a free copy of Grin with Grace from the author in exchange for a review.