Published by Moody Publishers on March 3, 2026
Genres: Non-Fiction, Christian Life
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To journal is to trace the lines of grace and find, He is with me after all.
Sometimes we feel misplaced. Tender. Threadbare. And in those hollow spaces, we can wonder, Where is God? For over a decade, Allison Byxbe experienced sorrow upon sorrow. As the grief buried her, Allison was desperate for a way to reconnect to God’s presence. Journaling through Scripture became her lifeline to God.
Journaling as a Spiritual Practice outlines Allison’s transformative journey from grief and depression to healing and wholeness. The Bible is filled with rich language and pictures that reveal our triune God—living water, bread, a door, a gentle whisper. Journaling through Scripture’s metaphors became her lifeline—a way to process the grief, to make sense of the impossible, and to encounter and then fully live in the presence of God once again.
This book guides readers through the spiritual practice of journaling. Each chapter weaves in Allison’s journey, includes journaling examples and prompts, and shows you how to journal. Readers will immediately begin applying what they learn.
Are you looking for a fresh way to hear and experience God? Be mended by His mercy? Find shelter beneath His wing? Immerse yourself in Scripture through journaling, and you will find your way back into His presence.
Author Allison Byxbe explores the emotional and spiritual benefits of writing in a journal, sharing stories and examples from her life to illustrate how journaling helps her draw closer to Jesus in the midst of life’s challenges. Whether a woman loves to write or feels daunted at the idea of keeping a journal, this book can speak to her. Byxbe shows that the value of journaling lies in expressing your thoughts and laying your soul bare before God, regardless of the quality of the writing.
Byxbe has a passion for using metaphors to unlock deeper parts of herself and her relationship with God. She encourages her readers to consider how figurative language and stories can help them process their struggles through a different lens, offering a deeper emotional experience that goes beyond plain, concrete words. She explores different aspects of this throughout the book, and she reflects on Scripture passages throughout, showing how the Bible uses metaphors in meaningful and enlightening ways. Every chapter concludes with a few journaling prompts. Some of them are general; others guide the reader in using metaphors, such as when viewing a struggle as a planted seed that God can grow good things from.
Towards the end, Byxbe offers some practical advice for how to journal and maintain a journaling habit. Personally, I think Journaling as a Spiritual Practice would have benefited from more practical advice, and less emphasis on writing with metaphors. I found some of the stuff about metaphors too esoteric for me. I am a very literal thinker, and even though I understand and use metaphors in daily life, this is not how my brain works when it comes to journaling. Straightforward, narrative-style writing is what I find most beneficial and healing. I use figurative language in my writing, just like I do when speaking, but it doesn’t feel natural to me to make a metaphor the centerpiece. I wish that this book had offered various journaling approaches for people to experiment with, since most people will have varying levels of success with different methods.
Also, a great deal of the book leans towards memoir, as the author shares heartfelt personal reflections about her journey as the mother of a child with serious disabilities. Her vulnerability will encourage other special needs moms, and I appreciate her testimony to how journaling has helped sustain her faith. However, if someone is looking for a general guide to journaling for spiritual formation, they should know that this book’s focus is much narrower than the title implies, both with the style of journaling and the thematic focus.
Journaling as a Spiritual Practice: Tracing the Lines of Grace to God’s Presence is a unique, encouraging guide for women who want to try out a unique method of spiritually focused journaling. The author’s heartfelt personal stories, thought-provoking writing prompts, and Bible-based focus will encourage Christian women who are dealing with similar emotional struggles, and this book is suitable for both individual use and group reading in support networks. However, I found this book less personally applicable than I had expected, and I hope that people who don’t connect with the focus on metaphors will still pursue some other form of spiritual journaling.