Customer Reviews

Wake up Laughing: Offbeat Devotions for the Unconventional Woman

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This is one of the cutest...not sickkyyy sweet...not like that, but she really can put words on paper that seem like she "was at my house!!" Thanks for writing both books...the waking up and going to sleep..katkanny

I really enjoyed each little devotional. This is a real Christian woman, with real problems, just like the rest of us. She uses humor, but there is also a very important lesson to be learned from each one. It is nice, because you can pick it up and read one devotion while waiting for an appointment, etc., since they are each about 3 pages long. I found myself laughing and being touched at the same time by the Holy Spirit. Great book!

Thank God for Rachel St. John-Gilbert! This devotional couldn't be more down to earth. It's like a favorite pair of shoes. I'm so glad that there is at least one Christian writer who isn't totally pious and trying to guilt trip me. My favorite is Chapter 13... Living Large. Every woman needs a bit of Rachel in her life!

I HAD to write this review because I'm still laughing from reading this GREAT book! Rachael has not only "hit the proverbial nail on the head", but she has slammed out one hilarious story after another. I couldn't put this book down and recommend it to anyone, especially if you're a mother and need a good belly laugh. KUDOS to you Rachael and keep up the great writing. Looking forward to your next book!

This is a very funny book for the Christian woman. The only trouble was that I read is straight through, rather than reading just one devotion a day.

Reading Rachel St. John-Gilbert's book, Wake Up Laughing, is like chatting with a good friend. You hear all about her husband and her children. You get to know what she was like as a child. You meet her parents, sister, friends, and neighbors. You're even treated to stories about Barney and Michael Caine.

Sixty lighthearted devotionals make up this work subtitled "Off-beat Devotions for the Unconventional Woman." St. John-Gilbert brings scripture to life as she shares her ordinary everydayness with the reader. She uses her struggles as a wife and mother in situations women can identify with and it brings out the "every woman" quality in her observations.

Whether you read the book straight through or use self control and limit yourself to reading one a day to start your morning, you'll enjoy humor, poignancy, and thought-provoking insight, often within a single short chapter. There is something for every one.

For the animal lover, St. John-Gilbert tells about meeting a penguin at a dinner party and the impression he made on her and the other dinner guests. Another chapter talks about a swayback mule that was in the Kentucky Derby--not to win, just to make himself feel better. For the animal non-lover, she tells about sweeping armies of baby spiders out of her van and trying to keep her enterprising baby daughter from eating bugs.

For those who have moved to a new area and had to start over, she tells about not fitting in at a new women's Bible study she began attending. She kept going and found some kindred spirits she could fit in with at another one of the meetings. One chapter tells how she went about getting to know her new neighbors, expecting they would be similar to her former neighbors, but discovered how different they were from her expectations and from herself, but how terrific they were in their own rights.

Wives can identify with her chapters on her husband, going from thinking how glad she was she married him, to waking up one day certain she was stuck with the wrong man. Mothers will commiserate on how hard it is to put a sleeping baby down without waking her and laugh about her over-zealous two-year-old crafting all over the paper, the toddler table, the kitchen table, and her hands.

Dieters will savor her chapters on how unsatisfying low-fat foods can be, and how disappointing it is that low-carb foods include very few desserts. Shoppers will recall the last time they got the shopping cart with the wayward wheel, and, like St. John-Gilbert, may also find their wallets full of Preferred Customer cards.

Every chapter ends with a Bible verse that ties spiritual truth to everyday life. In all of her mundane and not-so-mundane adventures, St. John-Gilbert makes scripture come alive as she applies it to each situation. Purse-sized, this is a little book with a big impact, designed to be carried around in case you need a quick pick-me-up.

This is a daily devotional but the kind of book that you have to have great self-control to read only one devotion per day. They are so funny and so practical that you just want more and more. I am amazed at the author's ability to, first of all, find humor in the daily grind of life and then to further that by applying it to God's purpose in our lives. This woman is a genious! Please hurry up and send out the sequel!


The only trouble with Rachel St. John-Gilbert's new release, Wake Up Laughing, is that it will keep you up laughing long into the night! Her humorous reflections cause prolonged, hysterical
laughter-kind of like having hilarity hiccups: Once you start chuckling at her work, it's nearly impossible to stop. What's not to like or laugh at about this tiny tome of high-class humor? St. John-Gilbert is a real writer, whose verbiage is pithy and pert, sophisticated and saucey. She employs a refreshingly intelligent vocabulary with polish and pizzazz. And her humor? Well, it's offbeat and off the wall! And you will need more than a wall to hold you up as you double up in side-splitting laughter while reading about her Seinfeldish antics with a Christ-centered twist. You may start out giggling, but you will go away pondering, then applying sound Biblical principles to situations you are experiencing in your own life. And thanks to St.John-Gilbert, you can do so with a smile. Everyone needs to laugh more, but not just for the sake of it. Rachel knows the secret-that God is the ultimate Laugh-Giver. The laughter that He gives, even paradoxically in the midst of difficult circumstances, is really the laughter of joy. It truly warms my heart to know that Rachel St. John-Gilbert, the Queen of Quirk, loves the King of Kings. Because of her intimate relationship with Him, she teaches us an invaluable truth: Laughter is next to godliness. Who wouldn't wake up laughing with encouragement like that?
-Lynn D. Morrissey, author of Love Letters to God: Deeper Intimacy through Written Prayer