April 02, 2009

Bloggy Book Review

First off – to clarify the prayer request from yesterday by “growth” I think they mean (but don’t want to say) tumor. They’re going to try surgery to remove it, but that itself is dangerous. I’ll be sure to give an update as soon as we have more information.

I’m skipping Weigh-in Wednesday. I felt skinny on the way to work, then got on the scales and didn’t like what I saw. I’m up 3 pounds from last week.

On to a goal I have a chance of actually reaching. I set a generic goal of “read more books” at the first of the year. Hard to define “more”, but I knew I wasn’t reading much so anything would be an improvement.

I've since modified the goal - I want to read 52 books this year, or the equivilant of one a week. I'm on pace to meet this goal right now.

One of the reasons I love not having cable TV is that instead of settling for a mediocre TV show on an obscure channel, I turn the TV off and read a wonderful story.

I’ve even been keeping track of the books I’ve read in the margins of my blog – they range from Chick-lit fluff to serious Christian non-fiction.

Right now I’m on a more serious book kick – and it all started with Graham Greene’s The Tenth Man. It’s a story about a group of prisoners in World War II, held captive by the Nazis. One night the German guards tell the men that in the morning 3 of them will die – only its up to the prisoners to pick which three.

They decide casting lots is the best way to choose. One of the three unlucky men is a wealthy lawyer. He offers his entire forture to the man who’ll take his place. After some consideration, a poor man takes him up on his offer. He has a mother and a sister to look after, and they could do well with that fortune.

I would highly recommend this book. I haven’t given anything major away, as most of the book deals with the fallout of the wealthy man’s choice. Once I finished that book, I found it hard to pick up a fluff. So since then I’ve been reading a weightier material.

Yesterday’s novel (I started and finished it the same day, but remember I was riding in a car for 2 hours) was The Pearl by John Steinbeck. For a piece of secular literature, I was amazed by the lesson God taught me.

Instead of praying for her son’s illness to be healed, the matriarch of this story prays for a pearl big enough to cover his medical care. This was a good read, so I won’t ruin the ending to prove my point. Steinbeck isn’t a hard read, and at only 117 pages it’s certainly not too long.

Why didn’t she pray specifically for what she wanted, instead of praying for a way that she could fix the problem? Because we’re afraid to give God total control. I can fix my problems if God would only give me _____ to help out.

But God doesn’t want to “help out”. He wants me to cast my cares on Him. And let Him fix them. Or not. He wants me to trust Him, and when we insist on fixing things ourselves, that’s not trust.

3 comments:

  1. I remember reading The Pearl in college, but unfortunately I didn't appreciate it as much as I probably would now. Hmmm...maybe I need to pick it back up. ;)

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  2. Well, as a former literature major, I adored this post, which is very well written. I have the same feelings about most fiction, which I think is why I can't seem to get into some of the chick-lit and "Christian" fiction--that I was spoiled by reading the best of the best in college. Most stuff pales in comparison, and I surely cannot write fiction at all. I have found a few that I liked well enough to buy but maybe only a handful. Love the library.

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