Book Review: God's Love in a Nutshell

​God’s love in a Nutshell is a brightly illustrated book about Chitter, an adorable junior squirrel, who is doing their best to understand God’s love. The story begins with Chitter asking Chatter (the equally adorable grown-up squirrel), ‘Can I keep God’s love in my nutchell?’. The answer is obviously no because, ‘God’s love is too big to fit in your nutshell’. This sends Chitter on a quest to figure out how to keep God’s love close all the time. It’s such a cute story opening with an important and relevant question, but there was one line in this adorable book (can you tell I liked the squirrels?) that made me pause... 

But before I get to that, let me back up a little and tell you all the things I love about this book first, because there is a lot of good stuff. 
​I love the way this picture book honours children’s imagination in the search to understand more about God. Hilary Robinson’s text, which is primarily dialogue between Chitter and Chatter, clearly demonstrates respect, playfulness and care in the tone towards childhood questions about God. This is great! 
I love the illustrations. Think squirrels with furniture and the occasional piece of clothing. SO cute! Mandy Stanley has done a wonderful job imagining all the settings and relational vibes this book needed. ​

I love the ‘This book belongs to….’ line on the very first page (complete with a little snail). I don’t see these in a lot of books these days, but it adds something to the personalisation of a children’s book that can be quite special. 
I also love the way the book helps children (and squirrels), big or small, understand the extent of God’s love. While the first half of the book describes why we can’t keep God’s love in a nutshell, backpack or wheelbarrow, the second half shows us how far God’s love goes. From rainy days to cold days, worried to asleep, ‘God’s love is everywhere, and for always!’ Beautiful! ​

But here’s my little quibble: right in the middle of the book, the reason given for why we can always keep God’s love with us is that ‘our hearts beat with God’s love’. Now quibbles aside, I can see how this is partly true (we only exist because of God’ love). However, if that’s the entire reason why God’s love can be counted on, I feel it’s missing a big chunk of the gospel and certainly skipped the point of Romans 8:38 (the verse the book is based on, according to the last page). If God’s love is dependent on my beating heart, what happens when my heart gives up? Or when it is weak? What about when I’m scared, and my heart is racing? God’s love isn’t and cannot be summed up as dependent on something inside me - whether that’s the things I do, or how my body functions. God’s love is about him and his work. Jesus is the ultimate proof of God’s love!
Now I know a 32 page picture book cannot capture the entirety of God’s plan of salvation, and neither should it (that’s what the Bible is for). Neither am I writing this lovely book off because of one line, there’s still so much truth in it. But I suppose what Chitter’s story does demonstrate is that it’s really hard to sum God’s love up in a nutshell. That’s what makes writing Christian children’s books so tricky. It’s also what makes our job as adult readers of kids books so important. We’re the ones who take a book like this, read it with our little ones and then start the conversations. 
Just like Chatter does with Chitter, we encourage the questions, treat childhood imaginations with respect and then use every opportunity - even beautiful picture books like this - to point them to Jesus. 

All the details you need: 
Title: God’s Love in a Nutshell
Written by: Hilary Robinson
Illustrated by: Mandy Stanley
Publisher: Kregel Children’s
Available from Koorong (Australia), or Amazon.