Chosen and Cherished: Biblical Wisdom for Your Marriage

This book gives excellent advice to married women, but it would also make a great gift for an engaged woman, or even one just looking for a husband. Hahn gives great advice on how to be a good wife and what to look for in a potential mate. It would also be great for mothers to give their daughters.

Kimberly Hahn has a clear and direct writing style that is relaxed and easy to understand. She does a great job of mixing personal experience with scriptural and church teaching. The message she conveys is so appropriate for marriages today and will inspire those who are married or thinking of marriage.

We started a Bible study using 'Chosen and Cherished'. Everyone loved the first session, we are looking forward to the next one. It's an excellent study for future brides as well as married women. It highlights Proverbs 31. If you are looking for an effective Bible study for women that is easy to facilitate, this is it. If you can get the book for the participants, it has an outline that lists all scriptural references for each DVD session as well as questions for small group or individual reflection in the back.

Proverbs 31: 10-12, the basis for this work, quotes the mother of Lemuel, King of Massa, giving her son guidance on choosing an appropriate bride. Chosen and Cherished, based on these sections from Proverbs, grew out of bible study Kimberly Hahn has offered for years to Franciscan University students. The verses describe the worthy wife as more valuable than pearls, an unfailing prize, and one who brings good rather than evil to her husband. Each of the six parts takes its title from a verse in Proverbs 31 and is broken into two chapters that feature Hahn's experiences as wife and mother, additional Scripture passages, and Church teachings. This structure provides an opportunity for Hahn to address such issues as premarital sex, adultery, divorce, contraception, and abortion. She also offers practical advice and stories to illustrate the principles at hand. In the chapter What Really Counts, Hahn contrasts "behavior fit for a prostitute a century ago (that) now parades across the TV screen" with qualities she observes in her mother and other older women who exemplify "godly womanliness." A section on pursuing purity in A Woman of Worth lists guidelines to help unmarried persons avoid near occasions of sin. The chapter on the sanctity of marriage discusses the role of parents in supporting the marriages of their adult children. It contains a series of bullet points under the headings quality time, physical touch and closeness, gift giving, and words of affirmation. Overall, this is a balanced resource, tackling issues head on while affirming and reaffirming the immense rewards for couples who, with faith, hope, love, and prayer, live their commitment to the vocation of marriage.

Kimberly Hahn has developed a beautiful study for women of all ages that helps us see how God created us and in what way we can live our life to the fullest as wives and mothers. She helps young women prepare for marriage, she helps women bring more to their marriage than they perhaps thought about, given the culture we live in, and she helps mothers raise their children to cherish their purity and to become good spouses themselves. She speaks with clarity and with experience and is someone that we can trust, knowing that she lives what she teaches. The DVD series allows us to have her into our homes and share her knowledge of Scripture as it relates to women, marriage, and family. Kimberly touches our hearts, whatever our age may be. She is a treasure to Christianity!