While summertime means something different to everyone, the promise of its relaxed pace and lazier days are perfect for poolside or backyard reading. No matter whether you’re chasing kids or grandkids while they are out of school or road tripping across the country, here’s a reminder to pour a glass of iced tea or pop a seltzer and relax into a good read.
You’ll find us personally reading these 10 picks all summer long:

TruthFilled by Ruth Chou Simons | 7 Sessions
Study of the Book of Colossians as Ruth Chou Simons leads you through a practice of preaching gospel truth to yourself by studying Paul’s example. In every changing season of life, you can rest in God’s character, rehearse your identity in Christ, respond in faith, and remember God’s provision for you. In today’s culture, there’s no shortage of self help, easy fixes, and worldly advice, but only the truth of God’s Word was meant to fill you up and satisfy you fully.
Want to join us for the online Bible study beginning June 10? (Leaders, this is a great way to preview a study before leading your small group through it in the fall!) You can learn more and sign up here.

Breathe by Priscilla Shirer | 5 Sessions
One of the greatest challenges among women in our culture is taking time to cease from all the activities and just breathe. We are in bondage to busyness. We constantly strive to complete the limitless to-do lists that hinder us from experiencing all that God has for us. By neglecting time for tranquility, serenity, and repose, we limit our Christlikeness and miss out on some of God’s greatest gifts. In the Old Testament, Sabbath was given to the Israelites as a gift, and it is still a gift to us today. If you are weary, worn out, and exhausted, then the concept of Sabbath will change your life.

Seek First the Kingdom by Christine Hoover | 8 Sessions
Join Christine Hoover in this 8-session, print-only study to reorient yourself solidly around the kingdom and the King who gives life in abundance. If you’ve ever been disappointed by the unfulfilled promises of your false allegiances, if obedience has ever felt like shackles to you, or if you’ve wondered where you belong in the story God is writing, there’s good news for you: Jesus is a benevolent King who gives.

Chasing Shadows by Lynn Austin
Hey, fiction fans! From best-selling novelist Lynn Austin comes a powerful story about three women whose lives are instantly changed when the Nazis invade the neutral Netherlands, forcing each into a complicated dance of choice and consequence.

Under the Magnolias by T.I. Lowe
T. I. Lowe’s gritty yet tender and uplifting tale reminds us that a great story can break our hearts—and then heal it in the best possible way. In 1980 South Carolina, Austin Foster is barely a teenager when her mama dies giving birth to twins, leaving her to pick up the pieces while holding her six siblings together and doing her best to stop her daddy from retreating into his personal darkness.

The Well-Watered Woman by Gretchen Saffles
Gretchen Saffles knows what it’s like to feel overwhelmed and unable to flourish. And in this book, she leads us to the Well of fullness, the Word of freedom, and the Way of fruitfulness to show that God’s Word will satisfy us for all eternity. Using Scripture and her own personal story of surrender, Gretchen offers spiritually hungry women tangible tools to not only know Jesus more but to live a life that thoroughly enjoys Him, seeks Him, and follows Him into freedom.

Ten Words to Live By by Jen Wilkin
If you love Jen Wilkin’s Bible studies, listen up! In this book, Jeninvites readers to rediscover the Ten Commandments—10 words often misunderstood, forgotten, or ignored—and helps believers delight in the life-giving wisdom they hold for all whom Christ has set free.

Woven by Angie Smith
In her unique and remarkably readable way, Angie Smith—best-selling author of Seamless—will help you tie together all the loose, disconnected threads you find in the Bible, weaving them into a beautifully crafted storyline. After reading Woven, when it comes to reading Scripture, you’ll go from confused to confident and lost to knowledgeable.

Forgiving What You Can’t Forget by Lysa TerKeurst
Lysa TerKeurst has wrestled through the journey of feeling stuck in a cycle of unresolved pain, playing offenses over and over in your mind. And she’s discovered that, to find life-giving freedom, you have to let go of bound-up resentment and resistance to forgiving people who aren’t willing to make things right. With deep empathy, therapeutic insight, and rich Bible teaching coming out of over 1,000 hours of theological study, Lysa will help you walk through a step-by-step process to free yourself from the hurt of your past.

LIFE by Lisa Harper
Do you ever wonder if the Gospel is truly “good news” for your actual, everyday, often difficult, sometimes painful, and typically crazy real life? Well, it is. But sometimes we all need a reminder that God’s faithfulness really does follow us into the face of all that harried, hard, and even humorous stuff of life.
In her new devotional LIFE, Lisa Harper gives you exactly that: a gut-level exploration of pertinent and redemptive moments in Scripture that prove God’s grace is more than sufficient for both the massive and the minuscule things of life.
What books or studies are on your list for this summer?