Just like "Jesus Prom", this book is super approachable and easy to read. Weece is funny and engaging, and his illustrations are easy to understand and interspersed with stories from the Bible. I love where the title of this book comes from: a quote from C.S. Lewis, one of my all time favorite authors. C.S. Lewis wrote: "Friendship, I have said, is born at the moment when one man says to another, 'What! You too? I thought that no one but myself...'" I have heard this quote before, and I like how Weece spins it to show our friendship/relationship with a "God who understands" us. And that is what this book is about.
While praising the book, talk radio host Susie Larson said, "[Jon]'s humility and self-deprecating humor disarmed me. His Kingdom heart undid me.... He loves people like Jesus did and does. If you long to be comfortable in your own skin-- just the way God made you, and if you desire to be at home with the love of Jesus in a way that heals you, and if you're willing to see that same love transform the world around you, you've come to the right place. " And I think that's a pretty good summary of what the book is about and what you get in the author.
The cover art comes from a thing he did with his church, where they gave everyone a baseball-sized paint-filled balloon and told them to throw the balloons to unload their tension. They threw them at giant canvases all around the church parking lot. I love that idea. I love that image of all these people in a church body just unleashing paint that representing crap inside of them. He writes, "The took aim- throwing hurt and anger and pain and bitterness-- and it did more than create the messy graphic used on the cover of this book. It united our church family around our common struggle and around our Father's ability to replace frustration with freedom."
Weece write about different attributes of God in each chapter that remind us, like the book jacket says, that there is a "God who turned the ugliness of the cross into a spectacle of eternal beauty. An all-powerful Lord who will do the same with the pain of the world."
Personally, I enjoyed Jesus Prom slightly more, simply because I think I resonated with the content a little more. However, this book is just as engaging and excellent and I highly recommend it.
I was provided a book through BookLook Bloggers but all opinions are my own.
