God Turned Toward Us

The challenge of the Christian life is learning to talk Christian. There may be religions that arise from within, or accompany your birth, faiths that occur to you after secluded mediation, or as fruit of long walks in the woods, human experience, good and bad, or what you’ve learned from your wounds.

Christianity isn’t one of them.

Somebody has got to tell us, give us the words that open the door to the faith called Christian. Each of us is due the delight of discovery that in submitting to God’s talk to us-in allowing ourselves to be addressed by the God we’re unable to love without first being loved, welcomed, and found-we have been apprehended. While we were trying so hard to think about God, God was already thinking about us.

God Turned Toward Us: The ABCs of Christian Faith is organized by the words the church teaches us to use to talk about ordinary life apprehended by a God who is Jesus Christ-short, meditative reflections upon key concepts that guide Christians, new or longstanding. These reflections, which are accessible to all Christians, are also particularly inspiring for pastors, church leaders, and seminarians who want to communicate the faith in entertaining ways to others and who want to find fresh meaning in traditional Christian concepts. A Notes section will refer the reader to the sources that influenced each meditation.