A brief and passionate call for Christians to make everyday connections with God.
A reverend offers a meditation on the core values of Christianity.
This latest work from Vu (Living for a Higher Purpose, 2017, etc.) seeks to reconnect the author’s target readership of practicing Christians with what he sees as the seven key demonstrations of God in their lives: peace, mercy, love, hope, joy, generosity, and faithfulness. In warm and inviting prose, the author examines each of these guiding principles and supplies examples drawn from his own experiences and from Scripture. Love is illustrated, for instance, by the story of a man named Matt. He visited his elderly veteran father regularly in a nursing home, even after his parent’s dementia worsened to the point where Matt sometimes left in tears. Hope is represented by the New Testament figure of Mary Magdalene, and joy by the Virgin Mary’s cousin Elizabeth. Vu focuses on Elizabeth’s reaction to the virgin’s pregnancy news. According to the author, invoking God’s presence through moments like these acts as a life raft that gives the faithful the courage to go on. He provides many examples of people searching for that raft, including Simeon and Anna (here inaccurately termed “prophets”), who waited steadfastly for the coming of the Messiah. “Anyone who demonstrates any sign of love knows God and comes from God,” Vu asserts in one of the many sentiments scattered throughout the book that will likely annoy atheists and even many moderate Christians. (The worst of these pronouncements is the old fundamentalist slur that without God to hold people “accountable,” they would instantly begin harming their neighbors.) But the author’s core audience will find his message of hope uplifting and his denunciation of the world’s cynicism comforting. His seven principles, he claims, are “a real indication of the presence of God.” And his extension of this link to things like service to community and acts of kindness should make those Christian readers feel very much included in the mercy he describes.
A brief and passionate call for Christians to make everyday connections with God.Pub Date: Nov. 19, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-4575-6738-4
Page Count: 132
Publisher: Dog Ear Publishing
Review Posted Online: Jan. 3, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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