Inspirational books offer gifts for heart and soul

REVIEWS BY HOWARD SHIRLEY

Jesus once asserted that the essence of faith involved the heart, the soul and the mind, in all-encompassing combination. If true faith engages the passion, the being and the intellect, then the best inspirational writing should as well. Four new books rise to offer challenges, inspiration and hope—wonderful gifts for any reader on a spiritual journey.

John Eldredge's bestseller Wild at Heart challenged men in particular to pursue an epic, active life with God that involved mind, soul and heart. He picks up this theme in The Way of the Wild Heart: A Map for the Masculine Journey. Eldredge suggests that God has created six stages in the life of a man—the Beloved Son, the Cowboy, the Warrior, the Lover, the King and the Sage—and that the passage through these stages is both natural and crucial for the male spiritual life. The Way of the Wild Heart is a guide for honoring these stages, even reclaiming those missed through calamity, carelessness or abuse, and leading other men (and boys) through this process as well. Once again Eldredge skillfully explores his theme using examples from Scripture, world cultures and modern storytelling, as well as instances in his own life and the lives of his growing sons. This book is not simply a repeat of earlier material; rather it is about application, and as such it is both compelling and challenging, stirring the soul and the heart toward change. Eldredge's insights will benefit any man—and the women who wish to understand and love them—whether he be fatherless or sonless, 18 or 89.


In matters of faith and the heart, Jim Palmer's Divine Nobodies: Shedding Religion to Find God (and the Unlikely People Who Help You) offers a welcome breath of fresh air. A former pastor who saw his own life turn upside down, Palmer took a roller coaster ride from driven evangelical pastor to discount store clerk (among other jobs), a process that might seem disastrous in our success-driven culture. But for Palmer it became an opportunity to wake up to a real and personal relationship with God. Palmer draws the reader toward a simpler faith, a life lived with Christ that sees the worth in every person and presents the possibility that a garage owner, a waitress or a checkout clerk can teach us as much about Christ as a preacher with a string of seminary degrees. For those who feel trapped by a culture that measures faith by outside appearances, Divine Nobodies will read like a blowtorch to the bars of a cage. Palmer's call to a faith that is deep, personal and based purely on the love of Christ should resonate with readers.


Palmer and Eldredge both write about getting back to the heart of Christianity. In What Paul Meant, Garry Wills writes about getting back to its theological core. Wills is no apologist for the modern Christian church, nor are the members of that church his intended audience. Wills instead is writing for the postmodern skeptic, the soul who looks at the trappings of many traditional churches and dismisses the entire Christian faith as a result. But Wills, the author of the earlier book What Jesus Meant, is not so easy to dismiss. This time he defends the apostle Paul against the cynics who accuse him of misogyny and anti-Semitism. Wills is Professor Emeritus of History at Northwestern University, and his experienced scholarship shows throughout the book. By focusing primarily on seven of Paul's letters (the only ones which modern scholarship can definitively attribute to Paul), Wills presents a picture of a man far more egalitarian in his views on women, faith and the nature of religion than his critics (and even centuries of followers) have assumed. In the end, Wills suggests, Paul never envisioned Christianity as a new religion, but rather saw Jesus as a fully Jewish Messiah who brings all people—Jews and Gentiles alike—into a single family of God, a family where, in Wills' words, "the only law is love." What Paul Meant is a fascinating read, worth examining by anyone with an open mind and an interest in Christianity and its most prolific early voice.


Challenges for the mind, soul and heart are well and good, but as Eldredge observes in his own book, there are times when rest is needed. No better spiritual rest can be found than in the new collection Firstlight: The Early Inspirational Writings of Sue Monk Kidd. Gleaned from a lifetime of writing, this volume offers beauty, inspiration and comfort in elegant prose. The author of the best-selling novel The Secret Life of Bees, Kidd has selected devotional essays she wrote for Guideposts magazine to create observations on faith, compassion, grace, love and more. As Kidd says in her introduction, "At the core of personal spiritual writing is a hunger for the wholeness, for self, for meaning. The question 'Who am I?' reverberates quietly in these pages, as does a willingness to be known. . . . Such vulnerability creates what we might call 'a soulful being together' between the reader and the author. A kind of communion born through the meeting of vulnerability and identification."

Kidd's offer of communion results in a work that is both peaceful and inspiring, that calms the spirit while offering its own gentle challenges—challenges to love more deeply and more fully, and to accept the presence God offers in every moment of every day.


Howard Shirley is the author of Acts for God: 38 Dramatic Sketches for Contemporary Services. He writes from Franklin, Tennessee.

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