“Book Review: Unexpected Gifts” by @tjhoiland
Chris Heuertz’s new book Unexpected Gifts is about community, and since Bo White (@bomwhite) and I read it around the same time, he asked if I’d like to review it together. The first half of the review, presented in interview form, appeared on his blog yesterday. The second half is below.
Bo, I’m sure you came into this book already having an understanding of what community means and what it looks like. How did this book challenge that understanding?
Most books avoid topics like betrayal and transition and I found these contributions to be the highlight for me. I read a ton and so there’s always some article, blog, or book mulling around in my head, but I cannot recall too many times that betrayal is actually taken on or the importance of transitions. When my parents divorced, my family (the first community I entered) was devastated in many respects and the transition from a family of four to four individual, but related families has taken quite some time.I believe that the idea of transition is often overlooked and that’s unfortunate. How many sermons have you heard on the ascension of Christ? In my experience, I can count them on one hand, but that is one serious transition. As a father of two, transitions impact my children as well. The challenge that this book brought to light is that transitions and betrayal are more common than we’d like to admit, but our avoidance of those topics is all too common to our detriment…
About Post Author
