{Book Review} Piercing Heaven: Prayers of the Puritans

Piercing Heaven: Prayers of the Puritans is a new book that has been published by Lexham Press. Robert Elmer is the editor that has compiled the prayers and modernized the language. 

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Piercing Heaven: Prayers of the Puritans

Before getting into the content, I want to comment on the physical book. Lexham Press has produced a beautiful, hardcover book! The gold font and intricate design makes for an aesthetically pleasing book. 

This book is sure to be a great blessing to the church! The prayers that have been chosen are soul-stirring, encouraging, Christocentric, affectionate, transparent, and lofty, all of which is typical of Purtian prayers.

The prayers come from men such as John Owen, Isaac Ambrose, Matthew Henry, William Ames, Thomas Brooks, Richard Baxter, and many other godly giants of the faith. These men are sure to help contemporary Chrsitians learn more about intimate communion with the Triune God through the blessing of prayer! 

Prayers are divided into sixteen sections, such as:

• “Help Me Through My Doubts”
• “Help Me Endure Temptation”
• “Help Me Rest in God’s Love”
• “Prepare My Heart for the Lord’s Day and the Lord’s Table”
• “Help Me Give the Gospel To Others”
• and much more.

The format of the book is very nice and easy to follow.

Strengths of Piercing Heaven: Prayers of the Puritans

• The prayers themselves are a blessing to the soul, and a great help in aiding the Christian to pray with much affection for the Lord God.
• The format is very easy to use. One could read through the book from cover to cover, or pick a topic and pray through those specific prayers. One could also look up prayers by a particular individual and easily find all of those prayers. More on that next…
• The book contains an index of authors which provides the reader with the prayers and page numbers of each prayer from that author.
• The book contains a section of short biographies for each contributing author. 
• Each prayer begins with a title and ends with the name of the author of that prayer.
• The font, illustrations, and overall presentation of the content is very pleasing. 

Drawbacks to Piercing Heaven: Prayers of the Puritans

• By and far, the greatest weakness of this book is the lack of a ribbon marker. A book such as this demands a ribbon marker! 
• Each prayer is worthy of its own page. However, multiple prayers are often crammed into one page, taking away some of the beauty of its pages. 

Conclusion

I highly recommend this book to all Christians! It is sure to be a great addition to your library. We have a treasure trove of prayers from men that were passionate about the Lord, and we would do well to learn from them and emulate them in our pursuit of the Lord! 

Disclaimer: My thanks to Lexham Press for providing me with a complimentary copy of this book in exchange for an unbiased review. The opinions expressed are my own.