When Words and Worlds Collide

 

This is a powerful testament to God's hand on a family of Chinese Vietnamese refugees.  The wind in the title can be none other than the breath of the Almighty.   Jesus' mercies are new every morning and it is so intimately portrayed in this touching memoir.  The author has remarkable ability to speak humor and deep lessons in the recounting of his difficult journey and settling in a foreign land.  Loved this book.  Wish there were more like it.

 

Oh, how I can relate to the title.  I, too, once questioned the sanity of God.  This book takes some grit to read the first half.  It is a humanly depressing account of "absent" God in a land of desperate need where a missionary family just wanted to obey Jesus.   Obedience came at a great personal lost.  I think if you haven't questioned God's goodness before, the author's words might cause your safe little perceptions a jolt.   In the second half of the book the author visits with the persecuted church, and his faith is indeed resurrected as only God can do.  Through the darkest of places, Jesus can teach us to speak in confidence that He deals wondrously with each of us. 

 

 

Joel 2:25-27 sums it up.

 

"So I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten....

²⁶ You shall eat in plenty and be satisfied,

And praise the name of the Lord your God,

Who has dealt wondrously with you;

And My people shall never be put to shame.

²⁷ Then you shall know that I am in the midst of Israel:

I am the Lord your God

And there is no other.

My people shall never be put to shame."

 

 

As in the conclusion of The Insanity of God, Jesus reveals himself where you least expect him to be.  Jesus is the very real sustainer and protector of these two Iranian Christian girls who spend many harrowing days in Evin Prison in Tehran for distributing the Word of Life.  Loving the unlovely, sharing the Peace of Christ with their fellow prisoners make this book a glowing account of how God places Christians exactly where he wants for a season to minister.  Prison walls mean nothing to Christ.  After all, Jesus has already released the captives.  These girls knew they were freer in prison than in public and used their time in prison to proclaim the Hope of the World to the hopeless.  To western Christians the book begs a question...Is Jesus worth loss of reputation, loss of freedom, loss of homeland, loss of choice, loss of health, loss of family, loss of privacy, loss of nourishment?  May we have the same courage as these lovely girls and answer in the assertive.