This author wrote The Shack. Don't know if you read it but it was somewhat confusing. Well this starts out just as confusing and lost me for a while. I started it and didn't like it and put it down for a couple months. When I picked it up the second time I was determinted to get through it. I will be honest, it took till about chapter 4 or 5 till it started getting good. But it finally did get good and then I couldn't put it down. So you have to stick with this one. It is about a man who is in a coma and meets Jesus. He is told that he can heal one person, any one person. The story goes back and forth from earth to the in-between life where the man is while in a coma. The book is funny, has lots of truth to it and also takes some liberties. "Hold on to Jesus, Anthony. You can never go wrong by holding on to Jesus. And know this, He will never stop holding on to you." Truth, Jesus never lets us go even in our darkest or worst moments. "There are lots of folks besides Christians who believe in me. 'Believer' is an activity, not a category." To believe involves doing. "Love will not condemn you for being lost, but love will not let you stay there alone, even though it will never force you to come out of your hiding place." Love never condemns and never forces. "The arrival of the unforseen reveals the depths of one's heart." When life suddenly takes a turn it tends to really show whats truly inside of us. "There is nothin' fair in a broken world full of broken people. Justice tries to be fair, but fails at every turn. There is never anything fair about grace or forgiveness. Punishment never restores fair. Confession doesn't make things fair. Life is not about granting the fair reward for the right performance." Just as things that happen in this world are not fair neither is the grace we receive. "Sometimes silence speaks loudest and presence brings the most comfort." Sometimes all we need to do is be there. "Somehow the pain, the losses, the hurt, the bad, God is able to transform these into something they could have never been, icons and monuments of grace and love. It is the deep mystery how wounds and scars can become precious, or a ravaging and terrifying cross the essential symbol of relentless affection." He always turns beauty for ashes if we allow Him. "What initally kept you safe can eventually destroy you." Sometimes we build walls for protection and that is good but if we never tear down those walls they will be what kills us in the end. "But I discovered that when you blame God for evil, there is no one left to trust, and I couldn't live that way." "Prayer, it seemed, was simply a conversation inside a relationship." It's really that simple. There is no right or wrong way, it's just a conversation. "One never knows if anything's a good idea. You just make a choice and go with the flow and see what happens. You only get one day's worth of grace, so why not spend it extravagantly."
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