Our Best Faith-Based Picture Books
If you’ve been looking for faith-based picture books, you’ve come to the right spot! The best lessons don’t come in the form of lectures, but rather learning through play, fun, and games! These books help make learning about faith fun and colorful.
(Plus, here are our favorite board books and picture books for young children!)
All things Bright and Beautiful by Cecil Frances Alexander
I didn’t think I would like this one at first, but I started singing it to my kids rather than reading it and it quickly became a favorite. Filled with stunning illustrations, and foundational truth, All things Bright and Beautiful in book form is sure to become a favorite.
Read it, See it, Say it, Sing it by Hunter Beless
This is a storybook about how to memorize scripture. If you have wanted to memorize more scripture with your family, but don’t know where to start… this is it! This is your place to start! Hunter gives practical recommendations in rhyme form and gives you verses to start with. Hsulynn used Hunter’s family as her inspiration which is a fun extra fact!
The Inventions of God and Eva by Dave Connis
Do you have a daughter interested in STEM? This beautifully illustrated children’s book talks about how we may not be perfect, but we glorify God in reflecting the creator in him. Whether that is through art or numbers, our creativity reflects God as our creator! The robot illustration in this book may just be the cutest thing ever.
The books are listed in alphabetical order.
What Every Child Should Know about Prayer by Nancy Guthrie
Technically this one doesn’t count as a picture book because it’s more and shorter segments, but it is beautifully illustrated, and I love it, so it’s going here. This book teaches children how to pray in the most accessible sort of way! It even gives them a prayer at the end of every lesson to emulate.
The Tale of Three Trees by Angela Elwell Hunt
This book usually gets mentioned at Christmas and Easter, and that is appropriate, but it’s also a lovely book every other time of year as well. It covers the story of Jesus and what it means to live a life in response to His gift of salvation. Published in 1989 it has been around a while, and probably qualifies as a Christian kid’s classic!
Best of All by Max Lucado
This is another older kid’s book. It deals with the topic of not judging on the outward appearance. We are all made uniquely by a creator who loves us and rejoices in his own creation. This one and the next are a lot of fun for a lesson but have A LOT of words. It isn’t one that I like to just sit down and read for storytime.
You are Special by Max Lucado
This is the first Max Lucado kid’s book I read and it has much fewer words than “Best of All”. It is also about finding our worth in our creator rather than the opinions of the people around us. The Final message tells us “you are special because I made you, and I don’t make mistakes.”
God’s Very Good Idea by Trilla Newbell
I love how this book explains being “stamped in God’s image”. It specifically deals with making sure kids know that all people are loved by God, need forgiveness, and have a Savior. Every person no matter their interests, skin color, gender, or skills has value because they are mirrors reflecting different attributes of God.
The Big Wide Welcome by Trillia Newbell
Like all of us, kids struggle with favoritism. Trillia walks kids through the story in James where the church was struggling with elevating one group of people over others. She talks about categories kids can tend to put people into and how Jesus came to break the sin of favoritism. But most of all he loves each of us without favoritism.
The Forgotten King by Kenneth Badget and Shay Gregorie
This is beautifully illustrated children’s book is an allegory about the separation of people from God and how his son made a way for him to come to dwell with us. The son doesn’t die in this story, so if your child is sensitive about graphic material, this might be a great way to introduce some of these concepts. This book has beautiful rhyming text that makes it easy to read and a gorgeous linen cover!
The Story of God with Us by Kenneth Badget and Shay Gregorie
The selling point of this book is the stunning illustrations. The picture on the tabernacle on the velvety cover is very striking. Throughout the book, the illustrations match the text in contrast of light and darkness. The text weaves the story of how redemption started after the fall and culminated in Christ’s birth, death, and ascension. The final illustration is bright and lovely showing how all things will be made new!
Image Bearer by Ellie Sanazaro
This book is easy to read and ABSOLUTELY precious! It deals with MANY kinds of disabilities and the way that people can reflect the image of God even if they do it in a way that may look different from your child. Pictured are kids who use AAC devices, non-verbal children, children in wheelchairs and crutches, kids with g-tubes, kids who can’t see and use a cane, what it looks like to use a cannula, and trachs!
I’ve been grateful as a parent to have a map to these conversations in such an uplifting and positive way!
Any Time, Any Place, Any Prayer by Laura Wifler
This book is an adorable storybook about how to pray! It goes back to the garden of Eden to talk about why. itis so hard to pray. It also gives examples of people in the old testament praying, and then shows how Jesus taught us to pray! This gives every child the power to pray in any circumstance, and about any problem. I loved how personal this book made prayer for our children!
When your Dragon is too big for a Bath by C.E. White
This is another book about prayer that goes in a different direction. This talks about what. todo when it seems like God isn’t answering our prayers the way we think that he should. The story is imaginative (using a dragon as the main character) but I adored the way the author explained the workings of God in ordinary means or how He has a bigger plan that we can’t fully see!
How to Choose Faith-Based Picture Books
You may want to buy all of these faith-based picture books at once, but really that’s not achievable for a lot of us. I would start based on what your family is working on at that moment. For a long time, our kids wouldn’t pray, so I kicked it off with Nancy Guthries!
At another time we were struggling with kids in our kids class who had different abilities from me. I was not sure how to approach the topic and Image Bearer swooped in to save the day! So just do whatever suits your family at this exact moment! (Sally Clarkson’s book, Different, is also a great read for this topic!)
