Gospel of Mark books for youth/students review by Becky Lawrence, youth and childrens worker at St Mark’s Milton Keynes.

 

I really recommend these books by Hope Together and Biblica – they cover the gospel of Mark – an eye witness account.  These are beautifully designed, modern and bring the gospel to life as seen through Mark’s eyes.  The book is written in New International readers version format with stunning photos to break up the text.  I used these back at Easter as a gift for all my youth group so they could discover for themselves the life changing story of Jesus from Mark’s perspective.  They were recieved well by my young people, and it was good to give them something they could use at home to further their faith journey.  One of them commented on the cover saying i’d spelled our church ‘St Mark’s’ wrong because i’d forgotten the ‘St’! – but it led into a great chance to explain what the book was and that I hadn’t written it!

The first page has this as an opener:

“There is more

What would you say if Mark, the writer of this book, could show you that life is not just waht you can see and hear around you but there is more, so much more? He discovered this 2,000 years ago and he wrote down his eyewitness account so that you could see for yourself.  it is about a man called Jesus, a seemingly normal man, who became a sensation, a leader, a healer, a revolutionary; a man who was labelled a criminal by the leaders of the day.  the drastic end of this story twists to reveal something so enormous that it shocked and surprised then, as it does now.  a truth, from before time began, a hope, far grreater than we could dream and a purpose to life so much greater than Mark or you or I could have imagined! 

Read it and decide for yourself – Who is Jesus?”

 

You could use these books as a giveaway like I did, or you could use them in a small group context to read through the book together a few pages each session and discuss together what you think.  You could use the following types of questions to unpack what you’ve read together,

What that you’ve read surprised you?

Which parts did you find hard to understand?

If you’d been Mark, the one recording these events that we’ve read – what impact would it have had on you?

How has what we’ve read revealed new things about Jesus or God’s character?

How can we apply what we’ve read to our lives today?

If answers are not so forthcoming, have some of your own answers up your sleeve to share to get the ball rolling, or perhaps pick on particular young people to share first (older ones or those who you know will be able to answer).  You can also unpack the ‘what? why? how?’ of what you’ve read to help them more about the context, understand why Jesus or other characters did what they did and perhaps what truths God may want us to learn from it.

You can buy these books from Hope Together for the bargain price of £1 each plus p&p which makes them super affordable to give away as gifts

https://www.hopetogether.org.uk/Groups/349093/Marks_Gospel.aspx