Review of The Power of Prophetic Blessing by John Hagee

The title intrigues me, the subject of Blessing is one that I am reading about and studying elsewhere, and the first few pages seemed to foretell an interesting read.  In the first two parts of the book, Hagee charts out the course of blessings, states we are born to be blessed (referring to the blessing Abraham received as narrated in the book of Genesis), shows  the power of blessings, and cites Jesus as the source of several New Testament blessings. Part three includes some ‘hands-on’ practical information about how to release, receive and proclaim a blessing.

Throughout the book there are highlighted statements which invite the reader to ‘think on this’.

But, this was a difficult book for me to read. I suppose I have heard of Pastor Hagee in passing, but this is the first of his books that I have read, and am not overly familiar with his ministry. Beyond the fact that theologically I do not agree with his take on Israel, I felt that some of his references to Zion were out of context and included more as a matter of publicity than for what they added to the content of the book.

Another distraction for me was what seemed to be confusion in genre. At times, the tone of the book was that of popular press: chatty and familiar, a conversation among friends with a lot of personal anecdotes about answered prayer in his family(not to mention subtle plugs for his other books and not so subtle plugs for CUfI); and then there would be a switch to a more scholarly style, writing for students and theologians, with lots of references that the average reader will never take the time to check.  

There is some helpful and comforting information in this book, and it will appeal to many people on different levels, but it’s not the type of book I can wholeheartedly recommend.

Rating ‘3’ of ‘5’.

I received a copy of this book in exchange for publishing an unbiased review.  The publisher has also given me another copy to give away. Comment on this blog post before Sept 1, 2012, and I’ll randomly select a reader to receive a copy of the book.