As part of a preferred blogger with Booksneeze.com, I received a complementary copy of Couples Who Pray: The Most Intimate Act Between a Man and Woman to review here.

I chose this book, because though Darren and I have strong individual prayer lives, and pray nightly with our children, we rarely pray just he and I together.  It is hard for me, because it feels so personal.  I know it’s strange.  How can I have 6 children with someone and still find it hard to pray with he and I alone?  I can’t explain it, but I’m ready to fix it.

The book is written by husband and wife team, Squire Rushnell and Louise Duart, both on their second marriage and determined to remedy the mistakes that made their first marriages fail.  The text of the book is 164 pages with an additional appendixes of questionnaires taking the book to 200 pages.  It includes 3 sections:  Major benefits of Couples Praying Together; Taking the 40 Day Prayer Challenge; and Factors During Your Forty Days.  Inside these 3 sections are 10 chapters:  1.  Naked Truth:  Marriage’s Most Intimate Act 2.  Prayer and Communication 3.  The 40 Day Prayer Challenge 4.  How do you do it? 5.  The remarkable power of prayer 6.  The Devil is the real enemy of your marriage 7.  Forgiveness Power 8.  Prayer and Money 9.  Six steps to a happy marriage and 10.  Outcomes

I’ve been impressed with what I’ve read so far.  It’s  full of encouraging stories of what has happened to couples who accepted the 40 day prayer challenge.  Many of the couples are celebrities, such as Denzel Washington, and it was refreshing to read about their faith. The stories are engaging to read and motivate me to push through the uncomfortable feelings to strengthen my marriage and family.

I like that there is a companion web page to the book to help you track and journal what happens when you pray.  There is a before and after questionnaire that shows the contrast in your relationship after 40 days of prayer which can be filled out in the back of the book or online.

I recommend taking turns reading a page of the book aloud with your spouse, right before your prayer time together.  Praying with my husband is getting easier, but if I skip one day, it’s easy to skip another and another until I’ve blown it. We are gearing up to start our 40 days again.