The Heart of the Story: Tracing God's Big Idea through Every Story in the Bible

Randy Frazee is the senior minister at Oak Hills Church, one of the largest churches in America, leading alongside author and pastor Max Lucado. A frontrunner and innovator in spiritual formation and biblical community, Randy is the architect of The Story church engagement campaign. He is also the author of What Happens After You Die, The Heart of the Story, The Connecting Church 2.0, and The Christian Life Profile Assessment. He and his wife, Rozanne, live in San Antonio, Texas.

Frazee summarizes and comments on the Bible, showing how the stories fit together and connect to life today. Frazee's main premise is that God's perspective of the things that happen in life is often very different from man's perspective. God’s thoughts are not our thoughts (Isaiah 55:8-9). Frazee says that our goal should be to align ourselves more with God’s story.

For those who grew up in church, the book offers nothing new or insightful. At first, it seems to have the potential to benefit people less familiar with the Bible, but it doesn’t sustain that momentum. It lacks organization and it fails to follow through on key matters with specific biblical references, parables, or spiritual lessons. The Heart of the Story is essentially a CliffsNotes version of the Bible, but scattered through the book are errors in direct quotations, story interpretations, and personal applications. In an attempt to be more interesting, some comments compromise the book’s accuracy to the details of the Bible text. Therefore, I hesitate to recommend this book to someone who is unfamiliar with Scripture. – Grace C. Yates, www.ChrstianBookPreviews.com