How many of us have tried to retell jokes and failed? How many have tried to retell Bible stories and not quite had the desired impact?

But, on the other hand, how much easier is it to read a picture book to a child, spending time looking at and discussing what is happening in the pictures. Sometimes it is even possible to tell a whole new story, using pictures from a children's book.

Today, I don't want to talk about site design or any of my usual topics. I am only interested in this site's product.

My word for this site and it's product? "Brilliant"!

Bible Story Cards is the place to go for picture cards of various bible stories. Use them at church, Sunday school, or even at home with your own kids. There are currently only a handful of stories available, but the pictures are beautiful, and are available for you to download and print, for free.

That's right. You heard correctly. These Bible story, picture cards are available to you for free! And not only that, the owner of this site does not make any song and dance of you donating to his work. In fact, I can not find anything on this site mentioning money at all.

My reccommendation? You have nothing to loose. Visit the site and download these valuable resources.

I do wonder though, if this author is working for the love of it, at his own cost, for the glory of God, so if you find this resource to be valuable to you, why not see if there is a way that you can support the site financially? If you find out that he is not interested in financial support, then why not give your gift to your/his favourite Christian charity instead.

Hayden Andrews
Reviewing: Bible Story Cards

Higher Hope Ministries - Moving beyond the past to an effective future.

Like many others, I am not a great fan of site 'title' pages. Any page that is there for no real purpose, but just forces the user to make an additional click, is of little value to anyone. It just becomes a mandatory, although pretty, additional, empty page on the way to the real content.

And that is where my negative, and personal, design comments end. This is a beautiful and refreshing looking site, which is so clear and easy to navigate. A lot of time and effort has been put into this simple design that surely draws the visitor to discover more of what this site is about.

But this may not be so easy as, although this is a clear and informative site, it may take a little time and some reading to gain an understanding of what this site is about and what it is trying to offer. The sites slogan, "Moving beyond the past to an effective future", is the most obvious hint of what might be available, but it will take a little more reading and clicking to gain a complete understanding.

The main heart of this site can be discovered by reading the page 'About HHM' (Higher Hope Ministries), where a paragraph states:

Higher Hope Ministries was born out of an intense passion I (Beth Anderson) have to reach out to hurting people. Using my own experiences of how God delivered me out of extreme and deep depression, suicidal thoughts, and tremendous spiritual warfare, I knew with every fiber of my being that with God working in and through me, I could make a difference in this world. With God giving me the &quote;green light,&quote;, I pursued this kind of ministry and it has just been awesome to see Him bless it!

The site then offers Beth's services as a speaker, and talks of the ministry's heart and desire.

Apart from the 'Professional Speaker' service, I found it difficult to discover what else might be available to a visitor of this site. Until I discovered the 'Contact Us' page, where I found links for advice and prayer from the ministry.

I am not really sure of my over-all impression of this site. It is very well designed and is a joy and interesting to read. I would certainly recommend going and having a look. As an advert for a non-Internet based service, I would say that this site is doing it's job well, but if they are trying to reach hurting people via the web, they may be loosing such visitors by not having a clear and available service.

As I have spent time examining this site, this review has become a lot more negative than I originally intended. This is only because I considered my visit to the site from the perspective of someone looking for help and advice. My natural feeling and instinct towards this site and the ministry, however, is a lot more positive and even 'recommending'.

There is only one answer: Go and visit this site yourself, and tell us what you think...

Yours as ever,

Hayden Andrews
Reviewing: Higher Hope