I've had this one sitting on my massive stack of to-review books for a couple of months now. It's a shame, too, because I really enjoyed it. It took me a long time to get into reading it, but once I started, it only took me two days to finish.
The very first line in the book is "Everything in this book has been written with a specific group of people in mind: friends and fellow Christians who have abandoned the chruch for various reasons."
This is the first time I'm in a book's Acknowledgments!
I have vague recollections of reading his blog about six years ago when I worked as a nighttime receptionist at a nursing home. Nearly every site was blocked but his. Even though I was still mega-Pentecostal, I was drawn to The Internet Monk. When I requested this book, I had no idea this was the same person.
I also had no idea that Michael died just two short years after my initial discovery of his blog. I wish I could have had the chance to interview him about this book.
So, anyway. The actual review:
The subtitle of the book is "Jesus-Shaped Spirituality." Spencer sums this idea up as, "I'm looking for a spiritual experience that looks like, feels like, sounds like, lives like, loves like, and acts like Jesus of Nazareth. It's that simple."
The rest of the book is about finding out what these things mean.
As someone completely fed up with American Christianity, I found this book to be absolutely fantastic and one of those "Are you reading my mind, you big creep?" kind of books. He describes what Jesus is like according to the Gospels, how to follow him, how not to follow him, and also has a few musings about why Christians tend to prefer Paul over Jesus.
If you aren't someone who hasn't ever had the "I GOTTA GET OUT OF HERE" feeling about the Church, then you probably aren't going to appreciate this book nearly as much as those of us who have made the exodus have.
Am I still rating things with stars or whatever? I don't even know. It's been awhile. Whatever I'm rating with, I'm giving this the maximum amount of points possible. I just wish he was still around to write more books.
Legal stuff: I was given this book to review it from Waterbrook. They didn't force me to say wonderful things. I said the wonderful things on my own.
The very first line in the book is "Everything in this book has been written with a specific group of people in mind: friends and fellow Christians who have abandoned the chruch for various reasons."
This is the first time I'm in a book's Acknowledgments!
I have vague recollections of reading his blog about six years ago when I worked as a nighttime receptionist at a nursing home. Nearly every site was blocked but his. Even though I was still mega-Pentecostal, I was drawn to The Internet Monk. When I requested this book, I had no idea this was the same person.
I also had no idea that Michael died just two short years after my initial discovery of his blog. I wish I could have had the chance to interview him about this book.
So, anyway. The actual review:
The subtitle of the book is "Jesus-Shaped Spirituality." Spencer sums this idea up as, "I'm looking for a spiritual experience that looks like, feels like, sounds like, lives like, loves like, and acts like Jesus of Nazareth. It's that simple."
The rest of the book is about finding out what these things mean.
As someone completely fed up with American Christianity, I found this book to be absolutely fantastic and one of those "Are you reading my mind, you big creep?" kind of books. He describes what Jesus is like according to the Gospels, how to follow him, how not to follow him, and also has a few musings about why Christians tend to prefer Paul over Jesus.
If you aren't someone who hasn't ever had the "I GOTTA GET OUT OF HERE" feeling about the Church, then you probably aren't going to appreciate this book nearly as much as those of us who have made the exodus have.
Am I still rating things with stars or whatever? I don't even know. It's been awhile. Whatever I'm rating with, I'm giving this the maximum amount of points possible. I just wish he was still around to write more books.
Legal stuff: I was given this book to review it from Waterbrook. They didn't force me to say wonderful things. I said the wonderful things on my own.
