I'm going to do something foolhardy and write my thoughts down for this book before i go searching online to see what other people are saying.  I'm sure that a lot of people loved this book, and a lot probably hate this book, and it was an uncomfortable read for me - i kept seeing things that are usually red flags to me, and then being reassured.  I was so vigilant for false theology, and i want to write down my own feelings before i go and read other people's summations.  Because i think this book was meant to be a conversation opener, not necessarily a work of great literature.  And i think that conversation has to happen.  And it's hard to have a conversation if you're afraid to say the wrong thing, to be wrong, to be judged.  Someone has to be transparent, and someone has to share from their heart, where they are at right now.  I may come back and add to this post, but i don't really want to edit it, because this is where i'm at right now, thursday, July 3rd, 2008...

First of all, i wanted to share my own heart.  When i lost my little baby, my seventh child, over a year ago (it does not seem that long.  it seems a week, or a month ago.  i can't believe that time is taking me so far from her)... when i lost her, i did what a wise man once told me to do - i clung to what i knew to be true of God.  What i knew for sure was that He existed, and that He is good.  Otherwise He would not be God.  But i wrestled with why my baby was gone.  And there is no great comfort to know you are not alone in wrestling with this question.  At the same time, a friend (who didn't share this with me until later) also lost her baby, and was convinced that it was because of sin on her part.  She later shared this with me and my sorrow was shot through with hurt, not only that this might be a possibility, but that if my friend could believe this about herself and her baby, was she thinking this about me and my sweet beloved?  At the same time, my little sister had just lost a second baby, ten years after the first one, again a dearly loved and eagerly anticipated baby.  And while she longed to comfort me, she was still hurting, and i felt her pain must supercede mine.  I had lost only one child, she had lost two.  We both had fears for the future, and i felt like God was holding me rather precariously in His hand, whereas before i always felt so so secure with my Father. 

I didn't doubt His love, i knew this about Him, that what appears to be scary and chaos is often a place where we find Him and can rest most securely in His grace and is usually where we are growing and learning most.  But in the face of loss, and no one to share it with (like most women, i found my husband grieved differently than i did, and we were new yet again to a community, having only lived there for a year, having no close friends close by, no family in town), i felt disoriented.  I had always believed that God loved me "especially".  Not that He didn't love other people, but that He really really loved me.  And i really loved Him.  How could i not?  He had blessed me so richly, given me a husband who is a perfect example of Christ loving the church, many beautiful, healthy, intelligent and fun little children, enough to eat, a house to live in, and so many extras, and on top of that, He talked to me, He cared about me.  It wasn't just a book faith, He was real and i could feel His presence so often, or hear His voice as i went through my days, talking with Him and hearing Him speak to me.

But if He loved me, why did my baby die?  Why didn't He bring my baby back to life when i prayed?  Did i lack faith, like my Pentecostal friends would tell me?  Or was it just not that important to Him?  Or, was my baby's death part of a "higher purpose"?

This book didn't give me all the answers, but it colored in some of the pictures God has been drawing for me lately, and although i read it with trepidation at times, i felt the spirit of my Father there, telling me that He still IS "especially fond of me"...

A passage that was comforting to me was this:

"But I still don't understand why Missy had to die."

"She didn't have to, Mackenzie.  This was no plan of (God's).  (God) has never needed evil to accomplish his good purposes.  It is you humans who have embraced evil and Papa has responded with goodness.  What happened to Missy was the work of evil and no one in your world is immune from it."

"But it hurts so much.  There must be a better way."

"There is.  You just can't see it now.  Return from your independance, Mackenzie.  Give up being his judge and know Papa for who he is.  Then you will be able to embrace his love in the midst of your pain, instead of pushing him away with your self-centered perception of how you think the universe should be.  Papa has crawled inside of your world to be with you, to be with Missy."

When my little Mielle was born, conceived just a few weeks after we lost little Charis, i was so thankful.  So grateful.  And since she's been born, i don't think i have savoured babyhood, or a baby, as well and as thoroughly as i have savoured this little one.  So smitten, so in love.

But as i read, i realized that there was, in my heart, behind the gratitude for the gifts that God had given me (first, freedom from ongoing fear about never being able to conceive and/or bear a child again, for the reassurance in my heart that this time baby would be fine, for a peace and ability to be able to go on auto pilot and let Him do His work in my heart in His time and in His way and even the deliciously almost painfully sweet joy of being her mama) - behind all that, there was a sense that this baby was in some way owed to me, that i had "earned" her with my pain and fear.  That God was obliged to replace for me, what He had taken.

And that was where my thinking was wrong.  Oh, i'm sure in a lot of other ways my thinking was and is wrong, but i am trusting in my Father and in His Word to do His work, and this knowing i was wrong, but not knowing exactly where it had happened was so vexing to me.  I wanted to please Him not just in word and deed, but in my attitude, the position of my heart toward His will.  I wanted to do the "inward turn" Madame Guyon speaks of, and yet, i found myself reaching out blindly, trying to grab hold of a little piece of His garment, but afraid of His truth, what He might say that would wound me worse than i already was.

But my Mielle is not payment for time served.  I do not deserve her.  I receive her today as a gift - a blessing and unmerited favour from God, just like my other children.  She is not born to "make up for" anything else.  She is not a pawn in a game.  She is beautiful, beloved, and an utterly profligate gift from the King of Heaven to one whom he is "very fond of"...

Anyway, back to the book.  On a practical level, this is not a great book.  It is not well written or edited (what is "nominally tasting food"?  And why describe a scene to end with the words "but not really"?  Why not try again and get it right?)  The characters are just that, except for Mackenzie, characters, crudely drawn and roughly executed.  But then again, this is a book more about ideas and theology than just a story.  Still, a little more work and revision could have made the story as compelling to read as the arguments in it.

And the arguments themselves are roughly shaped, approximations of positions, almost contradictory, often lapsing into "God talk" that could use more explanation than would probably be practical in a book like this.  I think a lot of Christians will read this and be turned off by what seems to them covert "New Age" theology, Emergent philosophy, or even Universalist pamphleteering.  But behind the shorthand used to tell a story, are real pictures of God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit.  And while liberties are certainly taken, they are taken less in a formal theology type of situation than a "what do you imagine heaven to be like?"  "What do our interactions appear as before a Holy God?"... And i love that the author was brave enough to add in those bits, to give his ideas of how beauty might be, distilled to its basic essence.

Early on in the book, a character remarks that most people imagine God by taking their best self and magnifying it as far as they can imagine, which isn't that far, and calling that God.  I feel like that happened in this book as well.  What i would have liked to see would be footnotes maybe with Bible verses backing up suppositions, or defending comments, or even just verses at the end of each chapter, or maybe "suggested reading" to delve deeper into the conversation.

I also thought that there was a lack of awe or reverence, that the aspect of God as Ruler and Most High was definitely ignored.  As Jesus said at one point in the book "Chain of command?  That sounds ghastly!" 

I understand that this book wanted to be about love and relationship, but i had trouble with the "equal relationship" part of the equation - and i know i haven't done "the math" yet in that area, so maybe i shouldn't comment on that, but maybe that's where i need to wrap up my comments and let my Father sift out what i need to learn. 

In the end, I think in reading this book, anyone can and should put themselves in Mackenzie's position.  This book is meant to be a healing vehicle, an encounter with the One who is "especially fond of you".  I think it can and probably will be a vehicle for a lot of healing and growth, if the questions raised in it can be addressed in a civilized manner by lovers of God...