★★★★★ 5
Excellent
Format: Paperback, Format: Paperback
Wonderful book that just got better as it went on, with the last three chapters being my favorites! In today's distracted, entertainment-tainted culture, it may seem impossible but is imperative for us to cultivate quiet in our lives. Most of us know this, yet we still shun such moments of hush even when a way shows itself open to us. As Sarah wrote, we hold our phones as a shield, protecting ourselves from "the chill nakedness of our discontent and shame, our fear and desire". In her insightful book, Sarah asks us, "Have you stood like a watchman on the walls of your heart through the witching hour of dusk when the horizons of productivity and familiarity give way to some vast realm just beyond your understanding, a realm that is both your terror and your deep desire?"
Yet, as Sarah so rightly points out, we do not only meet ourselves in that vast, spacious place of quiet; we meet God, "that great word speaking us back into life" and "the light burning at the back of our eyes so that we look upon the world in the brightness of his companionship".
Sarah's book is a treasure of her own personal stories and struggles, and the insights birthed from the living of them. One of my favorite chapters was the Wise Woman's Cottage, an excellent analogy for the gift of imagination, one of the gifts of quiet Sarah explores in her book's concluding chapters. The way she weaves the story of C. S. Lewis into her contemplations brought tears to my eyes.
Yet, the chapter that drew those tears out of my eyes was the following one in which Sarah shared a true story akin (at least in my mind) to that of Lucy's in Prince Caspian, a story that calls us to courage and obedience in heeding God's voice, even when the message comes only to us. "When I listen for God's voice, I find he doesn't just speak generally; he speaks particularly, to me. Quiet restores us to the wondrous autonomy of finding that God truly does come to speak to those who love him as Father and Friend. Of course, we listen, and that kind of listening can change the course of our lives...There is only one Voice whose words will always tell us true". Such wondrous words, though, can call on our courage to obey when those on the outside of God's inner promptings lack His perspective on the matter. Sarah's personal story in this chapter burned my eyes with sympathy and - when I read the encouragement she received -joy.
The last chapter of this potent book was one I would not have guessed to move me as it did. The reminder that quiet "offers the space in which we may give voice to" our anguish and wrestling "so that they do not destroy us" because, "in God's hands...our lament becomes the companion leading us to the source of our lost joy". Oh, how true. Oh, how beautiful: that quiet offers us the gift of lament, which is itself a grace as "it bears at heart the belief in the reality of joy" (a truth Sarah's sister, Joy Clarkson, explored in her insightful book Aggressively Happy, in which I was reminded that sadness speaks truth to us just as joy does; we are sad because of a loss we *should* be enjoying, something we were meant to have or experience, which will one day be redeemed). In offering our laments up to God, we can then hear his words of comfort, truth, hope and assurance just as Job did, but quiet is necessary for such a divine exchange to be experienced.
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Reviewed in the United States on November 12, 2024
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