Read with Me, Bible: An NIV Story Bible for Children

I received this book for my. Hold and loved it so I ordered one to give to a friend. I ordered one in Very Good condition but received one with a different cover in bad condition. Missing pages, cover has gunk and scratches, and the last hundred or so pages seem to have gotten wet with coffee or dirty water and then dried. Overall bummer that I won’t be able to give this as a gift.

I was excited to read this to my kids , I had this one as a baby and we were about to start reading it and realized page 1-30 was ripped out

I like this Bible because it's a shortened version of the real Bible, not a distorted version. The pictures are fun, and Jesus' cape sometimes appears to be flapping like the ultimate Superhero cape. (In fact, one of my boys once mistook a Thor action figure for Jesus. "It's Jesus," he said, puzzled. "Screamin'.") Violence is depicted in as tame a way as possible, for example: Cain lies behind a rock with his legs sticking out; the cross of Christ is seen from a distance. The only up-close violence is the scourging of Christ. The last image is of Jesus' return, and He is surrounded by children. One is tugging on his Superhero cape. My only beefs with this book are 1. King Joash is shown as a child when he was actually an adult at the time of the story told. 2. All the angels are blond white guys. (Our sons are blond white guys, too. We just explain to them that no one's sure what all the angels look like.) We used our first "Read With Me Bible" until it fell apart. Then we bought another, used, from ThriftBooks and are extremely happy with the quality. Our boys are ages 6 and under.

My kids and I LOVE this bible. My daughter got it as a gift - we liked it so much we bought one for my niece for her b-day. My daughter will just sit and "read" it on her own (she can't read more than her name yet!). It really has her excited about reading more of the bible. As a parent, it is has been a great teacher for all of us.

My 4-year-old LOVED this book. We read it each night just before she went to sleep. We finished it in 3 days. She loved the pictures and the stories were great.

This is a fabulous introduction to the Bible for little kids, with not too many words on each page, but lively pictures that are full of emotion. My kids and I laughed with joy at the pictures! I lent mine to my kids' Sunday School teacher and didn't have the heart to ask for it back -- now I'm buying another copy to give to a friend (my kids have outgrown it anyway by now). My kids love Bible Stories and I attribute it to this book. Perfect for toddlers up to first or second grade.

I'm very picky when it comes to children's bibles. The stories need to be told correctly in language the kiddos can follow, the illustrations can't be too cheesy, and I like to have some of the less familiar bible stories. This one is the best I've found so far, and my 3.5 yr old son loves it! The illustrations really catch his attention (even though they strike me as silly sometimes!), and I love the variety of stories it offers. It's definitely for preschool-elementary kids, not toddlers, and I still have to substitute some of the language that's "stronger" (ex: description of the plagues in Egypt or talk of "killing")... although my husband doesn't ;-) But my son's excitement to read more of the Bible makes up for those shortcomings!

Recommended Age: 3-5 (the back of the book recommends 4-8). I have to disagree with the statements that this book's descriptions diminish the intent of the stories. Reading some of the stories of the bible to a child at that age is tedious enough. To bog the storylines down with detail at that age bores the child. They don't exactly have the patience of a "saint". I agree that this is a good preschool version though. By eight years old I was using an adult Bible and memorizing passages. I imagine my son will probably be pretty bright at that point also. I seriously doubt he will be using this Bible except as a cross reference. As for the book itself the illustrations are rather entertaining and in some cases comedic. They are very colorful and eye-catching for a 3-5 year old. As stated before, the storylines are easy to follow and don't dwell to deeply which caters to night time reading when a child is most receptive to stories. Another plus is that it intelligently smoothes the corners on some of the more violent or touchy subjects within the text of a standard Bible. If you want the whole story including the graphic nature of Christ's death you should just buy a regular Bible and attempt a translation for you child. Personally, I don't feel a child the age of three necessarily needs a detailed description of what a scourging with a metal tipped whip is or the knowledge that spikes were driven into His hands. Allow children to be children and innocent for a few years. The brutality of human violence and stupidity will become painfully evident as they get older anyway. All in all I thought this was an excellent, entertaining, educational first Bible for teaching my son the Word of God. Hope those that read this post will find it to their liking also.