Eavesdropping

It's been awhile since I read an entire book in a day or two...well, at least one that's about God and faith. I did finish the Twilight series in like a week. And I've bought tons and tons of "Christian" books, because, well, I'm a Christian and I want to have a decent walk with God, and frankly, I need a lot of help with that. Sad to say, most of them are gathering dust on my bedside table, only a few chapters read.

But I finished Susan E. Isaacs memoir, Angry Conversations with God in about a day and a half.

First of all, the title is pretty intriguing. I tend to think I'm one of the few people in Christendom who are angry at God. I also have to say I love the back turned, pouty-faced, arms crossed bride on the cover with God reaching out to her. That too, I can identify with. I'm certain He's spent many many days in the past several years waiting for me to turn around and just listen to Him.

So when I read on Twitter via Don Miller's thread (@donmilleris if you tweet) that someone named Susan E. Isaacs was coming to his Portland church, Imago Dei, to read from her new book, Angry Conversations with God, I checked it out on Amazon.

Two days later, I'm done with it. I may read it again, and I rarely re-read books.

First of all, I am proud of her publisher, Faith Words, for bringing it out. From what I've seen in the Christian book market, some of her language shouldn't have made it into print. This makes me happy, just to be clear. Not that I love and embrace "bad language", but life is hard and sometimes we use strong enough language to express it. I am grateful that her prose wasn't sanitized. Her story was very honest, too.

Susan takes us through her Dark Night of the Soul. She shares her progress through the marvelous method of letting us listen in on her Couple's Counseling sessions - with God.

As a Christian whose been in a spiritually dark place for-well, for so many years now, I've lost track -it's heartening to hear from a contemporary peer experiencing God's silence too. She knows what it feels like to have an incredible closeness to Jesus, to have the sense of His Presence so real and so overwhelming that you understand why some of the old saints used to prostrate themselves. There are no words for it...and then it's like a door slams shut and He's moved on. No forwarding address.

She did the same thing I've done (hopefully, we aren't the only two believers to have done this), moving from church to church looking for that teaching, that worship, that fellowship, that supernatural something that will bring back the fire of our first Love. Ultimately, she tries to turn her back on Him. But love affair with Christ ruins you for the world. I can't imagine a more miserable person than one who has tasted and knows that the Lord is good, and then plunges into this spiritual darkness unprepared and ill-counseled.

Her anger towards God for this, her ultimate realization that she had expected God to give her the life she specified rather than embrace the life He had given her, totally spoke to me on so many levels.

Many years ago, I moved to Colorado Springs, answering "God's Call". The fifteen years that followed broke me down (a book-length story on it's own), and I still find myself blaming God. After all, didn't I move out there for Him? Doesn't He sort of owe me??

Wow. Arrogant little piece of clay, aren't I? My Creator owing me? Wacko.

Obviously, I still have a few issues to work through with my Heavenly Husband.

Stay tuned. Oh, and you should read this book.