When
the reality of your pain doesn’t line up with what you’ve been taught in
church, then what?
While
there are some things in this book with which I might take issue, that doesn’t
keep me from experiencing awe and wonder that this book was ever written in the
first place.
You
see, many people – most people, if you really think about it – who have
experienced the depths of depravity, depression, and disillusionment that
author Matt Bays shares between the covers of this book . . . they just don’t
make it back.
Sin,
and man’s inhumanity to man, and just walking about in a broken world has not
merely hollowed them out . . . it has gutted them, and left them writhing in
pain and misery. And that becomes their
life.
By
God’s grace . . . by God’s redemption of every aspect of Matt Bay’s life . . .
Matt has not only “survived.” He has
taken the next step. He has chosen to
live, not to merely exist. He has chosen
to risk opening himself up to more pain, if it should happen along. He has chosen to love someone who might wind
up abandoning or abusing him again. He
has chosen to reach out to others, when most would be found curled in the fetal
position.
The
story is not pretty. It’s not a nice and
neat parable, with a homiletical application to finish it off. But it’s a story that needs to be told, and a
story that needs to be heard.
Because
God is still in the redemption business.
And business is good. Business is
booming.
Imagine
a life where gratitude overpowers anger, hope overcomes despair, and hunger for
God replaces indifference to him.
That’s
what redemption looks like.
5
stars for a life-changing glimpse of The God Who Is There
FINDING GOD IN THE RUINS
Matt Bays
ISBN 978-0-7814-1383-1
Religion / Christian Life / General
David C. Cook
256 pages
$16.99 U.S.
