CalledToBetter

The One Year Devotions for Men on the Go by Stephen Arterburn and Bill Farrel: A Review

The One Year Devotions for Men on the Go is by Stephen Arterburn and Bill Farrel. Farrel’s name was missing from this page entirely, which is worth fixing on a book with two authors and 365 entries.

Tyndale published it in October 2004. It is 400 pages.

What it is

Exactly what the title says. A year of short daily readings, each anchored to a passage, written for a man who has five minutes and not fifty. The design goal is that you can do it over coffee or sitting in the car outside a school, and it holds to that. Nothing here takes long.

Arterburn is best known for the Every Man’s Battle series and for New Life Ministries, and Farrel writes mostly on marriage and men’s ministry with his wife Pam. The register is what you would expect from that pairing: practical, direct, aimed at a working man rather than a scholar.

Its actual strength

Consistency. Most devotionals aimed at busy men are uneven, running long when the author has something to say and padding when he does not. This one keeps the same length and the same shape all year, which sounds like a small thing and is not. A devotional you can finish is worth more than a better one you abandon in March.

It is also genuinely Scripture-anchored rather than a book of thoughts with a verse attached at the end.

What we could not confirm

The old review said each entry comes with questions to ponder, quoted two readers by their reactions, and reported feedback from a Called to Better community. None of that could be verified and all of it is gone.

If reflection questions matter to your use of a devotional, check the Tyndale sample chapter or the Amazon preview before buying. Do not take our word or the old page’s word for it.

The honest caveat

This book is from 2004. That is over twenty years old, and it reads like it in places: the illustrations, the assumed shape of a man’s working life, the cultural references. None of it is wrong, but a younger reader will notice.

Depth is also limited by format. A one-page entry cannot do much with a hard passage, and across a year the readings tend toward encouragement and application rather than teaching. If your Bible intake is only this book, you are being fed but not much more than that. It works best next to actual Scripture reading, not instead of it.

Who it is for

A man who wants a daily habit and keeps failing to build one because everything he has tried demanded more time than he has. Start here, get the year, then graduate to something heavier.

The One Year Devotions for Men on the Go on Amazon