My God and I: A Spiritual Memoir » (43137 William B Eerdmans)

In this moving spiritual memoir, finished shortly before his death in December 2002, Lewis Smedes, beloved teacher and best-selling author, takes readers through his own lifelong walk with God. In My God and I Smedes gives voice to both the struggles and the joys of his life, revealing his deepest questions to a God who would never let him go and expressing his eager anticipation of the day when, as God promises, all things will be made new. "It has been 'God and I' the whole way," Smedes writes. "Not so much because he has always been pleasant company. Not because I could always feel his presence when I got up in the morning or when I was afraid to sleep at night. It was because he did not trust me to travel alone." Yet My God and I is more than Smedes's personal account of his travels with God -- the theological odyssey that was his life. Like all his writings, this book also models and instructs. Through his honest confessions on the nature of Christian faith, Smedes offers gentle insights not just about God but also about human life and how it can and should be lived. And for those interested in the particulars of Smedes's professional life, these pages include many anecdotes by one whose career was linked closely with shifting currents in modern theology and with some of America's premier educational institutions. Above all, My God and I will provide a source of spiritual comfort to those who, like Smedes, continue to strive after the presence of God. It will also be a cherished good-bye for the many people who have been touched by the wisdom, wit, and charm of Lewis Smedes.

Publishers Weekly

Shortly after completing the manuscript for this book last fall, Smedes fell from a ladder and died; he was 81. Professor emeritus of theology and ethics at Fuller Seminary and author of more than a dozen books, he is perhaps best known for his 1984 title Forgive and Forget, still in print with nearly a million copies sold. Here he turns from ethics to intensely personal reflection. Sparing neither himself nor those whose theology he finds inadequate, he connects the highlights of his life to his developing theological understanding and quest for personal faith. Smedes describes what turned out to be his last book as "neither a collection of essays about God nor a story of my life, but an account of my doubts and my pains, my faith and my hope as I walked with my elusive God down the winding trail from there to here." That trail, beginning on his grandfather's peat farm in the Netherlands, included poverty, bereavement and shame; but as he walked it, it was increasingly marked by love, self-acceptance and gratitude: "Personally I liked the last miles of the journey better than the first. But, since I could not have the ending without first having the beginning, I thank God for getting me going and bringing me home." Humbly recounted and gracefully written, this slim volume is a pleasure to read and a poignant valediction from a man who lived long and loved wisdom. (May) Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.