Open House Volume 1: Sheridan Voysey in Conversation

by Sheridan Voysey

Every Sunday evening Sheridan Voysey welcomes a variety of authors, artists and activists to his national radio program Open House.

If the Chinese proverb is true, and a single conversation with a wise person is worth a month’s study of books, then this first collection of the ‘best’ Open House interviews could be the equivalent of a Masters course in life, with topics ranging from God, pain, success and poverty, to masculinity, materialism, politics and art.

Max Lucado will help you find your calling in life, and Philip Yancey will let you into his writing secrets. You’ll smile at Adrian Plass’s description of church life, cry with John Smith as he fears never seeing his children again, ponder the emptiness that once plagued Marina Prior’s soul, and throughout the book, hear how people with faith and tenacity are leaving an indelible mark on this world.

Laugh, cry and marvel as you read the tales, tragedies and beliefs of some of the world’s most intriguing personalities.

INCLUDES:

25 conversations, with wisdom from:

Philip Yancey
Tim Costello
Eugene Peterson
Andrew Denton
Max Lucado
Thomas Keneally
Joni Eareckson-Tada
John Eldredge
Tim Flannery
Michael Frost
John Smith
Jeffrey Sachs
Marina Prior
Adrian Plass
James Morrison
Tony Campolo
... and many more

FROM OPEN HOUSE VOLUME 1:

'I will have to be honest with you, Sheridan, and say one reason [why I’m still a Christian] is that I haven’t found a better alternative. And I’ve looked, I really have.'
—Philip Yancey

'I had all the worldly things, the trappings of status and success, but I used to lie awake at 3 o’clock in the morning just feeling empty.'
—Marina Prior

'Meaning is everything and humans will never cease pursuing the question of meaning. Nor should they. Indeed, nor can they.'
—Thomas Keneally

215 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 1, 2008

About the author

Sheridan Voysey is a writer, speaker and broadcaster on faith and spirituality. He is the author of seven books, including The Making of Us: Who We Can Become When Life Doesn't Go as Planned (March 2019), Resurrection Year: Turning Broken Dreams into New Beginnings, Resilient: Your Invitation to a Jesus-Shaped Life, and the award-winning Unseen Footprints: Encountering the Divine Along the Journey of Life.

Sheridan is a presenter of Pause for Thought on BBC Radio 2's Breakfast Show (heard by 10 million people each day), and writes for Our Daily Bread, a devotional read by 90 million people daily. He has been featured on BBC Breakfast, BBC News, Day of Discovery, 100 Huntley Street, BBC Radio 4, BBC Radio 5 Live, the ABC, Moody Radio, and in publications like The Sunday Telegraph, The Daily Mail, and Christianity. Sheridan is married to Merryn and lives in Oxford, United Kingdom, from where he travels to speak at events around the world.

http://sheridanvoysey.com
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Reviews

[Angus Mcfarlane]

This collection of interview transcripts included some fascinating people from bothh Australia and elsewhere, oat of whom will be recognized particularly to church going people. A number of interviews were certainly interesting - Katherine Paterson (terebithia author), Thomas Keneally, marina prior and James Morrison - and i enjoyed reading about their perspectives on life. Unfortunately, many of the other interviews seemed shallow to me. Some of the well known Christian authors (petersen, yancey and eldredge) seemed to say little beyond what was already in their books. Meanwhile, some of the secular subjects, Clive Hamilton and Tim Flannery for example, did not to have much to say on a personal or spiritual level, although this may not be due to the original interview content but what was allowed to be written into the book. So, a little unsatisfying, but others may well find it more stimulating than I did.
One of the perspectives that I noticed in some of the interviews was their sense of destiny, a view that somehow they were doing what they were made to do and had known roughly what this was from childhood/adolescence. From what they speak about, however, this destiny was not apparent when they were young. Therefore, the idea of a predestined role in life may have been a perspective gained inferred from reflection on how things worked out. As I coach my daughters about their academic/career choices, the inability to forecast this path is a source of anxiety for us all, but the idea that this is normal is reassuring, despite appearances to the contrary.