The grief journey is a paradox. On the one hand, grief is painful and complicated, with the power to crush your very being. On the other, the grief journey can be deeply moving in a redemptive and even transformative way. How can two contradictory outcomes peacefully coexist after a heartbreaking loss? Which side will prevail? And where is God on this journey? How do you process your feelings about God? The sense of abandonment. The constant confusion. How do you find and then face the emotions that tempt you to cry out in desperation…“But God! You promised…?"
Against the backdrop of the sudden loss of his daughter, author John Roberts invites you to walk with him as you work through the complicated emotions that make this journey so difficult. Using both John’s story and the Bible as guides, you will learn to reassess and reshape your story of pain, grief, and God.
What a fantastic resource for the griever. For somebody who is not a trained therapist, psychologist, or "grief professional," this contribution is actually quite stunning.
First of all, Roberts is an excellent communicator as a writer. His book is easy to read and pleasant to journey through. He mixes humor appropriately in a book that would be tough to do so with. The presentation is easy to follow and the journey is coherent and sensible. It is compassionate and gracious; the book manages to "see" its reader.
Second, the book is full of fantastic insights and nuggets that come straight from his experience as a griever. The book offers no "fixes" and no ridiculous resolutions. It respects the grief journey and is written by someone who is perfectly aware that they are still on that journey. Roberts has not "arrived" and does not suggest that this is the destination.
Finally, the book is appropriately vulnerable. Roberts spaces out his journey and gives you bits and pieces about what happened at all the appropriate moments. While I can’t say whether the book could be triggering for those who have experienced similar tragedy to what he has, I never felt overwhelmed with it all.
Just a gem of a read. I feel like it may be especially helpful for those trained "thinkers" that have not been as equipped with the "feeler" part of themselves.
I found this book to be a great guide in how to process and go on a grief journey. His vulnerability and openness was super helpful. It is fine to be a grief counselor, and I am grateful for all of them. But this book, written from a griever’s perspective, helped me to gain perspective on my own journey. His insights helped me to process and analyze my own challenges and give me a way forward.
Finally a raw, honest, book on grief from someone who has been on and continues on the long neverending road of grief. This book is filled with truth from God without trying to put a nice "Christianese" bow on what it's like to lose someone close to you. I cannot recommend this book enough.
The author is from my faith tradition (the reason I read the book aside from grief with the sudden death of my brother, and slower deaths of my father and grandmother; all 3 loved one in under a 24 month span) who wrote with a broken heart. I was touched because who hasn’t lost someone close and quickly. Part of me wanted this to be an unforgettable book to recommend and but the honest part inside me says it’s a forgettable with no new territory to explore in this book’s themes. My mystery reader who lost her son suddenly came to a similar conclusion. Again though, lovingly written for sure!