Category Archives: Books

Review: My Beloved

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My Beloved by Jan Karon

Jan Karon’s last book in her beloved Mitford series was published in 2017 and was supposed to be the end of the series. But she began to play around with an old short story idea, and eventually came up with My Beloved.

The premise of the story is that Father Tim, an Episcopal priest and the main character, has been told by his wife that all she wants for Christmas is a love letter. In a moment of inspiration, he bares his heart on paper. He also buys her a book of poetry, tucks the letter inside, and wraps them.

But then the letter and book go missing. After tracing his steps and racking his brain, he still can’t find them or come up with any ideas about where they could be. He tries a few times to write another, but just can’t get it to sound like the first one did.

Meanwhile, the letter and book get accidentally passed to various Mitford characters. Sometimes the result is comic, sometimes touching.

There are a few subplots running through the book. One involves Hope, owner of the Happy Endings book store, and the financial difficulties threatening the store. Former Mayor Esther Cunningham and her husband are aging and fussing with their “bossy” daughters over what they can and can’t do.

Dooley made an appearance in the first Mitford book as a “throwaway” boy who comes under Father Tim’s influence and, over the course of the series, eventually becomes his adopted son. Though the Mitford books are generally “cozy” reads, they don’t shy away from serious issues. Dooley’s mother had been an alcoholic who gave away some of her children for drink. Though she has become sober and even become a Christian, and all her children have been found, there are still underlying issues and pains blocking healing and relationships.

This book was structured a little differently, rotating the point of view with each chapter. I loved how the dialect instantly let us know which “voice” was speaking, even though the subject’s name was the name of the chapter.

Some of my favorite quotes:

Father Tim: “God’s love for his children wasn’t just for them to have and to hold, it was to freely, spontaneously give away—and to gratefully receive from others.”

Esther: “She was already surprised, thank you. Surprised by bein’ old as dirt; surprised by losin’ her scatter rugs; an’ surprised by goin’ from a mayor everybody voted for to an old woman whose car battery died months ago from sittin’ in th’ garage with a mouse nest under th’ hood.”

Cynthia: “Every saint has a past. Every sinner has a future.”

Esther: “A recliner was a drug, an’ she was overdosin’.”

Ray: “He would consider it a freebie for old people. I’m not goin’ there.” Esther: “Freebies for old people is exactly where I’m goin’.”

Esther: “At their age, surprises were not a good idea in th’ first place. You could keel over from a surprise.”

Helene: “With war raging around the world and suffering everywhere, how extraordinary, how beautiful this life could be. There were no words, really. No words.”

Father Tim: “There was only one person in the world who would really get what just happened. Thank God he was married to her.”

Father Tim: “Even now, that tribe is splitting apart, that one small wounded fragment is scattering in all directions, nursing their wounds, reluctant to give up anything so darkly familiar as their wounds, and headed to places from which they may not find their way back.”

Father Tim: “Why invite more pain into a family raised on pain? Because pain can serve as a passageway to joy. It’s that dark tunnel that goes through a mountain and dumps us out on the other side where the light is.”

I’ve seen reviews of Christian fiction that complain over the least mention of any religious content. So I have always marveled that these books so full of gospel truth have been so popular with the general public. Oh, I wouldn’t agree with every little point. But the great majority of these books are spot on.

Reading a Mitford book is like a visit back to one’s hometown. It was good to catch up with various characters and their situations.

Updated to add: Jan was interviewed on CBS This Morning recently:

Review: The Christmas Book Flood

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Christmas Book Flood

Jolabokaflod is an Icelandic tradition that translates to “Christmas Book Flood.” It began in 1944 near the end of WWII. Iceland was occupied by the Americans, and their willingness to spend money in town and help arrange for exports of the country’s fish helped Iceland become a little more prosperous than many European nations occupied by Germany.

But many items were still in short supply due to rationing. Icelanders were already great readers and storytellers, but this particular year, books were the main gifts. A tradition began Christmas night of people reading the books they had gotten for Christmas, often while enjoying hot chocolate. Sounds like a great idea to me!

Roseanna M. White has set her novella, The Christmas Book Flood, in this time and place.

Tatiana Eliasdottir is her uncle’s assistant at his publishing house. Tatiana’s sister calls to ask if she can send her seven-year-old daughter for the holidays. Her sister is having difficulties in her pregnancy, and has lost several unborn babies. Her sister’s husband has injured his leg and is out of work. They felt their daughter, Elea, needed a brighter, happier setting for Christmas. Tatiana agrees to host Elea. At first the girl is disconsolate over not being home for Christmas. But getting into some of the traditions and learning she’ll be able to go to work with Tatiana, where her favorite author, Anders Johannsson, also works, begins to lift her spirits.

Author, illustrator, and editor Anders and his secretary agree to help Tatiana watch Elea when Tatiana can’t be at her desk. Tatiana has liked Anders for a while, but he is so shy and quiet and easily flustered that it’s hard to talk much with him.

Anders’ personality tends toward quietness, but he is also that way because he feels like a misfit. His brothers are all hardy, big, strapping fishermen who make fun of him for his shyness and bookish ways.

A true part of the story deals with the publishing companies teaming to form a “Book Bulletin” sent to every home.. The results were so successful–a flood of orders–that they weren’t sure they would be able to fill the orders before Christmas.

Another part deals with Tatiana and Anders getting to know one another and overcoming their misconceptions.

Woven in with the plot was some Icelandic folklore. They don’t have Saint Nicholas, but they do have the “Yule lads“–Troll brothers who take turns visiting in December and leaving gifts in shoes if they find everything to their liking.

This was a delightful novella. I knew very little about Iceland and its traditions and folklore. Then the plot was so different from many Christmas novellas. And, though there’s a slow romance, the book is not at all cheesy. The characters have things to learn and ways to grow along the way.

There were a couple of anachronisms–I don’t know if they talked about “patriarchal” expectations of women then, or “fighting the patriarchy”–at least not in those terms.

Happily, this audiobook did include the author’s notes about the inspiration and research for this book.

I listened to the audiobook, nicely read by Talon David. The only negative to listening was I had no idea what some of the Icelandic terms and names looked like. But there was usually enough explanation that I understood what was going on.

Review: Exodus for You

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Exodus for You

The book of Exodus has some of the most exciting and touching passages in the Bible, but also some chapters of details that aren’t quite so inspiring to read. Our ladies’ Bible study at church used Exodus for You: Thrilling You with the Liberating Love of God, where Tim Chester shares insights to better help us get the most from Exodus.

The narrative in Exodus begins some 400 years after Genesis ends. Jacob’s whole family had come to Egypt to escape famine, under the favor of son Joseph. But now a king had arisen who did not Joseph and didn’t regard his leadership and help during the famine crisis so many years ago. All this king knew was that there were enough Israelites to potentially rise up against Egypt. So he had them enslaved and commanded that male Israelite babies be killed.

During this time, Moses was born. You’re probably familiar with the story of his mother making a waterproof basket to put her baby in and setting it upon the Nile, where it was found by Pharaoh’s daughter, who took Moses to raise as her own.

The next several chapters detail Moses’ life, call of God to deliver Israel, and development as a leader.

Then we have the ten plagues in Egypt, the Israelites’ exodus, God’s deliverance through the Red Sea, the giving of the law, and the golden calf incident and its consequences. Some of the tenderest passages occur as Moses intercedes for God’s forgiveness for His people and then asks to see God’s glory. There are several chapters of details about the law and instructions for the tabernacle, it’s furnishings, and the priest’s garments. The book ends with the people obeying God by constructing the tabernacle and the glory of the Lord filling it.

God had promised to dwell with His people, and the tabernacle was a vivid picture of His fulfillment of that promise, which ultimately pointed to a fuller fulfillment to come in Christ.

Some of my favorite chapters in Chester’s book dealt with the symbolism of everything about the tabernacle. One of our Sunday School teachers from another church taught symbolism that the Bible doesn’t corroborate, like the four corners of the altar representing the four gospels, and the two cherubim over the mercy seat representing the Old and New Testaments. I don’t know if he got such ideas from a source or from his own musings. Chester does a much better job of showing from the rest of Scripture what each item symbolizes and points to.

Chester draws several parallels between the tabernacle and the garden of Eden, which was new thought for me. The cherubim guarding the entrance to Eden after Adam and Eve sinned and the cherubim oven into the curtain between the Holy and Most Holy place were pretty obvious parallels. I am still pondering some of the others (some are listed here).

I had never before heard of Chester’s description of God’s judgment and restoration through the Red Sea incident and others.as “uncreating” and “recreating.” I’m not quite sure I agree with that depiction–I have to think about it some more.

Some of my favorite quotes from Exodus for You:

God “remembered his covenant with Abraham”. What is going to drive this story is the promise to Abraham. “Remembering” is a covenantal term. It means deciding to act in order to fulfil a covenant. It’s not that the promise to Abraham had somehow slipped God’s mind. It’s not that he got distracted by other things. “Remembering” means 20
God is about to take the next step in the fulfilment of his promises (pp. 19-20).

One of the many ways in which God works good from suffering is that he uses it to make us cling to him in faith, to clarify our identity as his children and to increase our longing for the new creation (p. 21).

Moses will discover who God is through God’s saving acts. God is self-defining, and he is about to provide a definition of his name–and that definition is the exodus. In the exodus we will see the holiness of God in his judgment on Egypt. We will see the power of God in his triumph over Pharaoh and the gods of Egypt. We will see the grace of God in the redemption of Isarel. And we will see the rule of God in his words on Mt. Sinai (p. 41). 

God intends not only to make himself known to Israel but also through Israel. The law is given to shape Israel’s life so that they display the character of God. It is missional in intent (p. 141).

“You shall not make for yourself an image” (v. 4). This is to reduce God to something of our own making–not to replace him, but to make him manageable, to understand him according to our notions rather than according to his revelation in his word. Have you ever judged God or reduced him? (p. 176).

For the most part, I greatly benefited from what Chester shared in this book. 

If you’d like an overview of Exodus, the Bible Project shares it in two videos–Part 1 is here, part 2 is here. 

Review: A Royal Christmas

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Melody Carlson must be the queen of Christmas novellas–she’s written dozens of them.

In A Royal Christmas, Adelaide Smith is a law student working her way through college as a barista. Her mother passed away three years earlier, and she’s still grieving.

One day she gets an official-looking letter saying that her DNA in a registry has indicated she is the daughter of King Maximillian Konig of Montovia, a small European country near Lichtenstein.

At first, Adelaide believes the letter is a scam. But upon further investigation, she begins to think it might be legitimate. Her mother had never said a word about her father.

She calls the phone number provided in the letter and is told her father is dying. He would very much like to meet her while he can. He will pay all her expenses to travel to Montovia.

So Adelaide travels to Montovia for the month of December. She’s met by a member of Parliament named Anton, who has been assigned to be her guide and help her with anything she needs.

Adelaide meets with the king and is soon drawn to him. She learns the particulars of her parents’ relationship. She discovers her father would like for her to rule in his place when he passes on. Though Adelaide comes to love Montovia, she’s not even a citizen. What would she know about being a queen?

Not everyone would be happy about her staying on, especially not her father’s wife, who has been grooming her son from a previous marriage to take over for the king.

Amidst learning the privileges and problems of royal life, evidence of some kind of intrigue arises.

This book had Princess Diaries vibes at first. Though there are some similarities, the plot is different. Some parts were predictable. But it was a nice, short Christmas read.

The audiobook was free from Audible’s Plus Catalog, and the ebook was $1.99 at the time I purchased it (and still was as of yesterday).

Review: Amy Snow

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Amy Snow

I found Amy Snow by Tracy Rees on my long list of reading recommendations with a link back to where I saw it. But the blogger who recommended it stopped blogging and took all her content down. So I don’t remember what inclined me to add it to my list. But I decided to give it a try.

The book is set in Victorian England. Eight-year-old Aurelia Vennaway is bored with an aristocratic ladies’ gathering in her home and escapes to play out in the snow. She finds an abandoned baby, alive but naked and blue. She wraps the baby up in her coat and brings it in, to her mother’s horror. Only two things save the baby from being sent to an orphanage or poor house: the other ladies and the visiting rector all comment on how fortunate the baby was to be found on Vennaway property, where it could be so well cared for. To uphold their reputation, the Vennaways agree the child can stay. But they consign it to the servants’ quarters to be cared for there.

Aurelia, however, becomes quite attached to the little one, names her Amy, after her favorite doll, and Snow, to commemorate where she was found. She comes down to take Amy out to play, despite her mother’s wishes.

Bright, vivacious Aurelia doesn’t like the strictures her parents try to place on her and almost always gets her way. When she becomes of marriageable age, however, her father puts his foot down that he will choose the husband he deems best for her, and Aurelia has no choice in the matter.

Then Aurelia becomes ill. The doctor finds that she has a weak heart and is not expected to live long. A pregnancy could kill her. Yet her parents still plan to marry her off.

She insists on one last trip with a friend and ends up being gone much longer than expected, almost a year. When she comes home, the man her parents wanted her to marry has found someone else, and no one else wants to marry someone so ill. Aurelia wants Amy moved up to her rooms to be her companion and nurse.

When Aurelia dies a few years later, she leaves Amy a sentimental piece of jewelry and ten pounds. Everyone is relieved: if she had left Amy a great deal of money, the Vennaways would likely have contested the will.

But the next day, a friend brings Amy a box from Aurelia with some money and a letter. Aurelia has a secret she wants to share with Amy, but she can’t tell her outright–she especially can’t write it down lest her parents discover it. So she developed a treasure hunt with clues, like she used to do when Amy was a child. This first letter contains Amy’s next step, which hopefully she can decipher but no one else who sees the letter could.

So Amy sets off alone for parts unknown, finding another letter from Aurelia, more clues, and more revelations.

The external plot is the treasure hunt and Aurelia’s secret (which I figured out just before Amy did). But part of the story, maybe the main part, is Amy’s coming into her own–her transformation from an unwanted orphan and servant to a young woman making her way into society.

I found all of that very intriguing, but I thought the story moved very slowly. The Vennaways seemed a touch too villainous to be believable.

The story is not from a Christian viewpoint, so the people were not going to act like Christians. But I found that the views of many of them about immorality and femininity were anachronistic for the era. It made sense for one old, powerful, rich, and scandalous woman, but not for so many. There was one brief paragraph bordering on vulgarity when some “gentlemen” were not acting gentlemanly. But I feel sure we could figure out their character without the scene going so far.

There were a couple of quotes I liked near the end:

After falling in love, actually being in love—marriage—those things require thought and sensitivity and patience. [He] was impatient, and that impatience was one burden too many for you at a difficult time, so you fled. You may be forgiven! Only his impatience came from loving you and caring about you, I think. Perhaps, then, he may also be forgiven?

I realize how sweet solitude is when it is not enforced, how contented it is possible to be in one’s own company when it is not the only possibility one has.

Though there was much about the book that I liked, the problem areas would keep me from reading this author again.

Review: The Man Behind the Patch: Ron Hamilton

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Ron Hamilton and his alter ego, Patch the Pirate, are household names in some places but unknown in others. I wrote something of a tribute to him a couple of years ago after he passed away. His wife wife, Shelly, wrote a biography of him, published last year, titled The Man Behind the Patch: Ron Hamilton.

I first knew of Ron in college. He and Shelly were newly married and GAs (graduate assistants) during my freshman year. They were always active in music both on campus and at the church they attended, which I visited occasionally.

I remember when Rob debuted some new songs he had written at college. “It Is Finished” was inspired by a teacher pointing out that when Christ said “It is finished” from the cross, it was a victory cry. The other two were “Come to the Cross” and “The Blood of Jesus.” I had not known that these songs were part of his requirements to graduate in his major. It’s interesting that these songs continued to be well-known and well-loved all through his career.

I remember when Ron was diagnosed with cancer in his eye. When they did surgery, he wouldn’t know until he woke up whether they had to remove the eye or not. They did. Sometime after his recovery, he gathered together all the notes and verses people had sent him and wrote what became his signature song, “Rejoice in the Lord.”

As Ron wore his eye patch, kids in his church began calling him “Patch the Pirate.” He had written music for adults but then decided to write some for kids as well. He put together a story line with interesting character voices for a children’s recording. Kids loved it, and parents soon begged for more because they were tired of listening to the same album over and over. Thus a children’s ministry was born. A Patch the Pirate adventure has been released every year since then, over forty all together.

He continued to write music for adults and choirs, cantatas, books of music arrangements for his songs. He wrote the words, various people wrote the music, and Shelly arranged them.

One of the trials of their life was when their oldest son developed a mental illness over several years, ending with the taking of his own life. Shelly told his story in Always, Only Good: A Journey of Faith Trough Mental Illness.

Another severe trial came when Ron was diagnosed with early onset dementia. He passed away at his home in 2023.

Shelly tells Ron’s story in three sections, Becoming Patch the Pirate, Life with Patch the Pirate, and Patch’s Long Journey Home. She begins with his early childhood in Indiana, to attending college, meeting and dating Shelly, their marriage and children. Then Ron’s eye surgery and budding career. They took over and managed the music company her dad began, Majesty Music.

Many of the middle chapters are something of a travelogue, along with which recordings came out when, sprinkled with anecdotes. The whole family traveled to churches doing “Patch” concerts until the family grew too big. Ron traveled alone for a while, eventually cutting back to traveling just a bit while becoming the music pastor of a local church.

Shelly was warned that biographies of men by their wives often become hagiography, idealizing the husband. Shelly attempts to show all sides of Ron. He wasn’t perfect–no one is. He was a prankster, and some of his pranks backfired badly.

A couple of other interesting facts I had not known: Ron had a deviated septum, which gave his voice a slight nasal quality. He didn’t know if surgery would change his voice for better or worse, so he decided to leave well enough alone.

Also, he considered doing doctoral work in music at another school and was accepted, but he was told his music would need to be more academic. He considered the offer, but decided to decline. He wanted to “put the cookies on the lowest shelf”–make them accessible to everyone. Shelly wrote later that Ron “chose to compose biblical texts that united with simple, memorable melodies for everyday life and everyday struggles (p. 368).

Ron wrote about 700 songs. Some for children were fun, like “I Love Broccoli” and “The Poochie Lip Disease.” Others focused on character. All of his songs for children and adults were biblically based. I shared some of my favorites in my earlier post about him.

By all accounts, Ron was a humble man. When Shelly once mentioned how many lives he had touched, he said, “I’d like to think God did it.”

This book was nostalgic for me in many ways. I didn’t know Ron and Shelly personally, though I had met them each a couple of times. But since I was in school a few years behind them and lived in the same town for over fourteen years, I was acquainted with their ministry. Then my kids grew up on “Patch the Pirate” tapes, especially in the car and at bedtime. We listened to many of Ron’s albums for adults over the years and sang some of his music in choir. Finally, I followed Shelly’s public Facebook page the last years of Ron’s illness.

I think this book would be especially interesting to anyone familiar with Ron or Patch. But even for those who don’t know him, this is an inspiring account of a humble servant of God using his talents for His glory.

Review: A Thousand Voices

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A Thousand Voices

A Thousand Voices is the fifth and final novel in Lisa Wingate’s Tending Roses series.

Dell Jordan was a side character in the first couple of books but is the main character in this one. She was Grandma Rose’s neighbor as a child, living with an ailing grandmother. Her father had not been around since her birth. Her mother had been in and out with drug addictions but died a few years before. After she and Grandma Rose became friends, she became an unofficial part of the family until Rose’s granddaughter and her husband, Karen and James, officially adopted Dell.

When Dell was discovered to be something of a musical prodigy, Karen enrolled her in a performing arts magnet school. Dell had trouble adjusting, but eventually found her way.

As this story begins, Dell graduated two years earlier, spent one year touring Europe with an orchestra, and a second year working in a Ukrainian mission orphanage. Her parents and teachers want her to apply to Julliard. But the appeal of music has faded with the pressures of performance and expectations.

She loves her new family, but she still feels “different,” with her brown eyes and hair and “cinnamon” skin amidst everyone else’s fair skin, blue eyes, and blond hair. She grieves over her birth father’s desertion, her birth mother’s neglect, and the derogatory comments from her uncle.

All she knows about her father is his name on her birth certificate and the fact that he was part Choctaw. When she learns about agencies in Oklahoma that help find Choctaw ancestors, she drives there from Kansas City to see if she can find any information about her father. She doesn’t tell her adoptive parents, feeling they wouldn’t understand and might be hurt.

After a series of mishaps in her travels, including losing most of her money, she arrives at a campground and sleeps in her car. A large group of tents and motor homes in the next campsite hold an extended Choctaw family, there for the annual Choctaw festival. They invite Dell into their gathering, where she becomes friends with several of them and feels a sense of belonging that she has never experienced before. A couple of them help her in her search.

A few quotes that stood out to me:

It’s a powerful thing to realize you were put in this world on purpose. It changes the way you feel about everything afterward (p. 2, Kindle version).

The past, even if you don’t talk about it, still exists, and no matter how hard you try to turn your back, no matter how dangerous it is to look at, part of you cries out to understand it.

Part of growing up is learning that people can’t give what they don’t have. The rest you have to find in yourself (p. 310).

The plot moves rather slowly until the last couple of chapters. There are some scenes that don’t seem to advance the plot at all, like a lengthy encounter with a skunk at the campground.

I was frustrated with Dell’s lying to her parents concerning her whereabouts, especially since she also lied to them in the previous book about her problems at school.

I wondered if Lisa intended for the series to lead to Dell’s journey from the beginning, or if Dell’s story emerged along the way. Apparently, the latter scenario was the case. Lisa said in the discussion questions at the end that the first book in the series was written with no thought of a sequel. But readers’ questions as well as her own musings about the characters grew into subsequent books. She also says there, “Dell was, in many ways, the catalyst for change in Grandma Rose’s family, and in turn she was changed by Grandma Rose’s family.”

I also wondered if Dell was originally thought of as Native American. She has always been described as having cinnamon-colored skin, but in a previous book, her uncle uses a different racial epithet about her. I wasn’t sure if that was just to show his ignorance, or if Lisa switched gears about what race Dell was part of.

I was dismayed by minced oaths (like “Geez”), language that was not profanity but also was not polite, and especially a bawdy description of an old woman whose robe had come undone. On the one hand, the people involved didn’t profess to be Christians. On the other hand, that was conveyed well enough without those elements. Because of this, the sheen of Wingate’s appeal has been a little tarnished for me.

It was interesting to read of Choctaw history. If this is an accurate representation, it seems that, among modern Choctaw, some are really into their heritage while others are not.

I thought the last couple of chapters were the best in the book. My heart went out to Dell in her struggles.

I know some don’t like neatly-wrapped-up-in-a-bow endings. But this book had more loose threads than I like. I would have enjoyed an epilogue, if not one more chapter.

Review: Drenched in Light

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Drenched in Light

Drenched in Light is the fourth novel in Lisa Wingate’s Tending Roses series.

Julia Costell trained all her life as a ballerina, but crashed soon after being accepted into the Kansas City ballet troupe. The emphasis on body line and thinness and the stress of competition led to an eating disorder, which led to a ruptured esophagus and near death.

Now she’s 27, living at home with worried helicopter parents, and working as a guidance counselor at the same performing arts magnet school she attended.

Julia feels lost and without purpose. But then one day a student named Dell Jordan is sent to her office with a troubling essay she had written for English.

Dell was the impoverished neighbor of Grandma Rose in the first book in this series. She started out as a side character, but now has moved to the forefront. The previous book, The Language of Sycamores, ended with Dell being adopted by Karen and James, Karen being Grandma Rose’s granddaughter. Dell is something of a musical prodigy–she has an a beautiful voice and an aptitude for piano even though she had no training.

Her adoptive parents thought the performing arts school would be the best for Dell. But the students there are from well-to-do and high-level families. Some of the administration, as well, as the students, don’t see Dell as the “right kind of student.” Though she excels in music, she’s behind in her other subjects. Furthermore, though she knows her new parents love her, she feels a need to keep everything “perfect” before them. So they don’t know she’s struggling.

Julia sees something of herself in Dell–their circumstances are different, but they both deal with pressure and expectations. So she offers to tutor Dell privately.

Meanwhile, Julia becomes aware of other problems within the student body. But the principal and school board members want to keep up the school’s reputation, so they want problems handled discreetly or swept under the rug. Julia is advised to “play the game.” Yet she sees the kids are hurting. If she pushes the issues, she might lose her job.

There’s a fun side story with Julia’s sister’s upcoming wedding and the wedding dress restorer Julia finds to repair their mother’s wedding dress.

Also, some of the characters from the previous books make appearances here.

I thought the book started a little slowly at first, but gained traction in the last third or so, becoming very exciting towards the end. I enjoyed Julia’s and Dell’s journeys.

I was dismayed by instances of taking God’s name in vain, using “Good God!” and such as expressions.

But otherwise, I thought this was a great story. I listened to the audiobook nicely read by Erin Spencer but also checked out the e-book from the library for the author’s notes.

Review: Raising the Perfectly Imperfect Child

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Boris Vujicic

Imagine what your reaction would be if you gave birth to a child born without arms or legs. You would likely grieve and then wonder how in the world you would raise him to live any kind of normal life.

Boris and Dushka Vujicic experienced those reactions when their son, Nick, was born. “We were burdened not by Nick but by our doubts and our fear that we were not capable of giving him all he needed to succeed (p. 163).

Nick grew up to become an internally known evangelist and motivational speaker, telling his story in Life Without Limits. But there were many hurdles and trials before that happened.

Boris shares their experience in Raising the Perfectly Imperfect Child: Facing Challenges with Strength, Courage, and Hope. The book is part memoir, part encouragement to other parents.

After the Vujicics got over their initial shock at Nick’s condition, they found that, in many ways, he was a baby like any other. He needed love, cuddling, food, and diaper changing. The rest they had to figure out along the way. There weren’t many resources available to help.

Their faith was shaken. As Christians, they wondered why God would allow such a seemingly cruel thing to happen.

With our limited vision, Dushka and I could foresee only struggle and anguish for Nick and for us. We were so wrong, of course. Our son and our experiences with him have enriched our lives beyond measure and taught us many lessons at the heart of this book. Nick gave us a new definition of the ideal child and a deeper appreciation for the complexity of our Father’s divine vision.

Nick taught us to find new meaning in the psalm that says we are “wonderfully made.” We came to see Nick as God’s beautiful creation, lovingly formed in His image. We lacked the wisdom, initially, to understand that. We saw Nick as disabled rather than enabled. We could not grasp that his missing arms and legs were part of God’s unique plan for our son.

Chapters cover accepting and loving your child, giving yourself permission to grieve, allowing friends and family to help, advocating for your child’s medical care, meeting the needs of siblings, education, preparing your child for adulthood, keeping marriage bonds strong, and building a spiritual foundation. Boris encourages taking cues from your unique child as to what he needs and the best way to help him.

It would be easy with a child like Nick to swoop in and do everything for him. But his parents raised him to do as much for himself as possible. 

My favorite aspect of his book is that Boris writes humbly and practically. Nowhere does he hint that readers should do everything just like he and his wife did. He just shares insights gleaned along the way.

Some of the quotes that stood out to me:

Nick is proof that none of us are limited by our circumstances and that all of us can create meaningful, fulfilling, and joyful lives if we choose to focus on our gifts rather than on what we may lack. All of us are imperfect. All of us are perfect (p. 10).

All children have strengths and weaknesses, and they can surprise you in so many ways. Our duty is to nurture, encourage, and motivate them, and help them build upon their strengths (p. 11).

Perhaps the greatest gifts we can give our children toward their success in adulthood are a foundation of unconditional love, a sense that they have a purpose in this world, a value system to guide them, and a spiritual base as a perpetual source of hope (p. 157).

Our imperfections have a purpose. We often can’t discover that purpose without first accepting that it exists and then searching to find it (p. 187).

God makes no promises that our lives will be pain free; He promises only that He will always be with us if we believe. We realized that we had to trust in His wisdom and good purposes, in His Word rather than in our feelings, and in His grace, which is sufficient for any trial (p. 191).

I might not be the target audience for this book since my children are grown now, and none of them had physical disabilities. But I enjoyed reading it and learned from it all the same. 

(I often link up with some of these bloggers.)

Review: Bloom In Your Winter Season

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Bloom In Your Winter Season

Bloom In Your Winter Season was written by Deborah Malone “with twenty-three contributing writers” for older women as a reminder that God can both minister to them and use them in their later years.

They don’t really define what constitutes a “winter season.” One of the authors is in her fifties, which I would say is more autumnal than wintry. Still, we’re all facing that time of life and getting closer every day, so we can tuck the lessons away for future reference if we don’t need them immediately.

The book is divided up into six chapters, each featuring a couple, or sometimes three, women in the Bible: Miriam and Anna; Mary and Martha; Mary and Elizabeth; Lois and Eunice; Lydia, Joanna, and Susanna; and Naomi and the widow with two coins. (I’m surprised there wasn’t a chapter on Sarah, maybe couple with Rebekah.) All of the women focused on are not “older,” but there are things about their lives we can learn from whatever season we’re in.

Each chapter is designed to be read over five days. The first four days’ reading contains short essays written by different women, each ending with application questions and a prayer. Day 5 is a Bible study on the focus women written by Deborah with passages to read, questions to answer, and blank lines to jot down notes .

The overall theme of the book is that God can still use you whatever age you are, and that’s brought out in most of the chapters. Some of the writers discuss specific situations like adjusting to the empty nest, widowhood, aging, sharing faith with our grandchildren, and living in a nursing home (one woman wrote over 70 books while in a nursing home!) But other chapters are more general.

One problem with five writers contributing to each chapter is that there’s a bit of overlap. But perhaps repetition reinforces the details. On the other hand, the chapter on Naomi only mentioned her once in passing in the essays.

The chapter that stood out the most to me was the one on Lydia, Joanna, and Susanna–I think partly because we don’t usually hear much about these women, especially the last two. They are mentioned in Luke 8:1-3 with “some women who had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities” who traveled with Jesus and the disciples and “who provided for them out of their means.” Joanna is mentioned again at the cross with other women in Luke 24. Writer Sherye Green points out that these women served Jesus out of “pure, unbridled gratitude” (p. 123).

I only knew of a couple of the authors here before reading this book. There are a few with whom I might not agree in every point, judging from their biography information. But I didn’t find anything objectionable in this volume.

Some of the quotes that stood out to me:

Anna worshiped in the waiting (p. 29).

Is there a mother or grandmother in your life who prays, encourages, and supports the younger generation in the faith? Godly women invest in a heavenly treasury of prayers and a heritage of faith for their loved ones. Praying mamas deposit a foundation of wisdom and understanding into their children’s lives, building up their character and committing their future to God (p. 91).

I used to pray for my daughter’s strength and personality–stating what I wanted God to place in her. I failed to realize that the parenting challenge is knowing God already has a plan and purpose for our little people. Our prayer should ask God to show us their developing talents so that we cultivate His gifts in them (p. 96).

When my focus was on me, I felt my broken heart intensely. I began noticing those around me with their own trials and doing small things I could to help ease their burdens: visiting a young friend dying of breast cancer, training as a hospice volunteer, taking food to new widows, and generally loving on people. It was different from the lay ministry my husband and I shared as a team, but just as important in God’s economy (p. 143).

The essays are designed to read one a day. I usually read two or three, because they were so short. If I ever read this book again, though, I think I’ll stick to one a day and ponder it more before moving on. 

Still, the book did its job in encouraging me that God has something for me to do and has promised to be with me in every season.