Two Moms and a Vision: FamilyResourceLibrary
In this country we have a plethora of resources, online information, web sites to encourage our growth as Christians, parents and as families. There is no limit to the accessibility of books in our context. In fact, sometimes the sheer volume of what is available makes choosing difficult.
This is not true globally.
Enter two moms with a vision and an amazingly creative offering was begun called
FamilyResourceLibrary.
Because this is such an important venture we decided at bible.org to devote this blog to informing others AND to offer an opportunity for the readers of Engage to participate.
Lisa Miller and Jill Williams were asked to write an info blurb about this. Read the following to find out what it is and how you might be a part.
The Vision of Family Resource Library is to give hope to families worldwide by serving them with Biblically based family resources.
Our Core Values are:
• God desires relationship with each of His children
• By design, family is a gift from God to be cherished
• This takes courage and faith: there is hope for the family
• Through partnerships this hope can be spread worldwide
• This needs to focus on areas with limited resources
Our Mission:
To connect our resources to people who will make them useful, especially where such
resources are limited and to continue to expand the Family Resource Library
Website:
FamilyResourceLibrary.org
Beginnings: Inspired by a quote heard by Lisa in an English class she was teaching in Prague to moms on maternity leave: “I don’t want to raise my children the way I was raised, but I don’t know how else to do it.” —Lenka
It made me, Lisa, think – how can I help? We, in the US, have so many parenting resources, how can we get them to people without resources? The idea came to serve these moms with book summaries (we call them BookBridges) of Biblically Based parenting books.
I also thought about how many moms want to be involved with missions, but can’t
because of the stage of life they are in.
Here is a way to be involved in missions from your own living room.
So, BookBridges were introduced – a 800-1000 word summary of your favorite
parenting book with a little personal reflection to go with it. Our tag line is “Bringing
the heart of the book to the hearts of the world” – that is what our BookBridges do.
Presently:
We have 31 parenting BookBridges in 4 languages (fewer have been translated into
Slovene). We have had around 30 people help us write, edit and translate these
BookBridges. The BookBridges can be found on FamilyResourceLibrary.org here and on
Bible.org here.
Future:
Our top 4 goals for the immediate future are:
Market in the countries (Czech Republic, Romania, Slovenia) where we have the
BookBridges already translated
Have marriage BookBridges written
Add another language
Expand on our BookBridge Formats (podcasts, eBooks, app for phones/devices)
Questions? Do you want to partner with us by writing or editing BookBridges? Develop an app for us? Manage our website? Help us in marketing? Connect us with people living in our partner countries?
Contact us at:
[email protected]
Gail Seidel
Gail Seidel served as Mentor Advisor for Spiritual Formation in the Department of Spiritual Formation and Leadership at Dallas Theological Seminary (DTS) and as an Adjunct Professor in the D Min in Spiritual Formation in the D Min Department at Dallas Theological Seminary. She has a BA in English from the University of Texas, a Masters in Christian Education from Dallas Seminary and a D Min in Spiritual Formation from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. She is a contributor to the textbook, Foundations of Spiritual Formation, Kregel Academic. She served as co-director for Christian Women in Partnership Russia with Entrust, an international church leadership-training mission. She and her husband Andy live in Fredericksburg, Texas. They have 2 married children and 6 wonderful grandchildren--Kami, Kourtney, Katie, Mallory, Grayson, and Avery.
