Winter with God E-Book

T.W.S. Hunt

• Herausgeber: BroadStreet Publishing Group, LLC
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2016

Beschreibung

This 40-day devotional deals as much with God's absence as His presence, for it is about the spiritual season of winter—a time when the light of faith has dimmed and the warmth of love has cooled. Written with a mystic's heart, a scholar's mind, and a poet's pen, Winter with God is a profound meditation on the opportunities and challenges we face when our relationship with God seems dormant, endangered, or simply one-sided. Suitable for both longtime pilgrims and the newfound faithful (or faithless), this rich and compelling devotional about winter with God—a season through which every soul must pass—shows how the hardest season to experience can also be the most rewarding to endure. Discover hope for your spirit and strength for your soul.  

Leseprobe

Endorsements

T. W. S. Hunt can write, and he understands his topic. His book will give real help to believers working their way through the winter he describes.

~J. I. PACKER

Theologian and best-selling author of Knowing God

T. W. S. Hunt is the best of both worlds—a true writer and a true thinker. He is poetic in his expression, profound in his thought, and biblical in his passion. Winter with God displays moments of brilliance and creativity that mark the marvelous debut of a young, up-and-coming writer who deserves to be noticed and read.

~GARY THOMAS

Best-selling author of Authentic Faith and Sacred Marriage

T. W. S. Hunt has the three qualities I most value in a spiritual writer: honesty, depth, and verve. Winter with God crackles with surprising images, a lively play of language, and probing commitment to truth. An auspicious debut from a vibrant new voice!

~MIKE MASON

Author of The Gospel According to Job

The combination of rich, poetic writing and practical, forthright questioning makes this book unique. It will warm the hearts of those in winter.

~S. C. WILLIAMS

Author of The Shaming of the Strong

BroadStreet Publishing Group, LLC

Racine, Wisconsin, USA

BroadStreetPublishing.com

WINTER WITH GOD:Hope for the Spirit, Strength for the Soul

Copyright © 2016 T. W. S. Hunt

ISBN-13: 978-1-4245-5298-6 (hardcover)

ISBN-13: 978-1-4245-5299-3 (e-book)

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture references are taken from The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. All rights reserved. Scripture marked NLT is taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved. Scripture marked NIV is taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. Scripture quotations marked NRSV are taken from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Scripture marked KJV is taken from the King James Version of the Bible.

Stock or custom editions of BroadStreet Publishing titles may be purchased in bulk for educational, business, ministry, fundraising, or sales promotional use. For information, please e-mail [email protected].

Cover design by Chris Garborg, garborgdesign.com

Typesetting by Katherine Lloyd at www.theDESKonline.com

Printed in China

16 17 18 19 20 5 4 3 2 1

For my mother.

You gave me literacy,

I give you literature.

Contents

SPIRITUAL WINTER

1  FAITH ALONE?

2  HOW LONG?

3  BLESSED

4  A MORE ABUNDANT LIFE

5  HOW DO WE PRAY?

6  A PRAYER OF BEREAVEMENT

7  IF GOD IS DEAD

8  THE COLD CHURCH

9  TWINKLE, TWINKLE, LITTLE STAR

10  MEA CULPA

11  PILATE’S PRAYER

12  WHY DO WE PRAY?

13  ARE WE FORGIVEN?

14  HOLINESS PRAYER

15  DEFINING THE RELATIONSHIP

16  GOD AND GOLD

17  WITH ALL YOUR MIND

18  ASK AND YE SHALL NOT RECEIVE

19  THE LIFE AND DEATH ZONE

20  QUESTION AND ANSWER

21  PATIENT TRUST

22  WE DON’T NEED MIRACLES

23  IS GOD YOUR REAL FATHER?

24  ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL

25  THE SLEEPING GOD

26  BE STILL AND FEEL NOTHING

27  FROM TIME TO ETERNITY

28  SUPERNATURAL SELECTION

29  MORE LOVE

30  HOW MUCH SHOULD I GIVE? A PRAYER

31  THE S WORD

32  A SHEKEL FOR YOUR THOUGHTS

33  THE WRONG QUESTION

34  HELP ME TO LOVE: A PRAYER

35  THE FORGETTABLE GOD

36  IS GOD YOUR FRIEND?

37  SUFFERING SERVANTS

38  TO BOLDLY LOVE: A PRAYER

39  THE END OF THE WORLD

40  DON’T BELIEVE IN GOD

CONCLUSION

WINTER WITH GOD: A READING LIST

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

NOTES

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

One must have a mind of winter …

[To see] nothing that is not there

and the nothing that is.

Wallace Stevens, The Snow Man

Spiritual Winter

You always expect to be sad … each year when the

leaves fell from the trees and their branches were bare

against the wind and the cold, wintry light. But you

knew there would always be the spring, as you knew

the river would flow again after it was frozen.

Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast1

Shakespeare’s Richard III doesn’t say that now is the winter of our contentment. Quite the opposite, winter is the season of our “discontent.”2 Winter is the graveyard of the entire year: all of spring, summer, and autumn are buried deep within it. And long after Christmas carols have ceased to be sung, many of us are still singing, “I really can’t stay (But, baby, it’s cold outside).”3

Winter is something we learn to live with and live through. We have to because it lasts a quarter of the calendar year or much longer if, like me, you live in Canada! Still, the season has its charms. As Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “For the attentive eye, each moment of the year has its beauty.”4 In Canada, sunny winter skies unveil themselves in champagne brightness, the air is crisp and fine like cut crystal, and ice turns waterways into highways. Also, the skiing is superb! But more than any other season, winter is one we watch from behind a window. It’s the season we long for least, and the one we’re least sad to see go.

So too, with our spiritual winters—our days of discontent: when God’s divine light rises late and sets early. In such times, nothing seems to grow. Where warmth once abounded, things come to feel frigid. And the landscape of our lives—whether it’s felt within or without—appears colorless, formless, and lifeless.

Whereas we can predict a meteorological winter’s beginning and end, there’s no methodology for when we winter with God. For us, seasons with God feel like what time is to God. As Peter wrote, “A day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day” (2 Peter 3:8 NIV). There’s simply no telling when winter with God will end. We only know that it will end in this life or the next.

The spiritual work of winter is to survive the cold by keeping warm one’s love for God. We mustn’t try to avoid this spiritual season—praying, as in Scripture, “that it may not happen in winter” (Mark 13:18). Because it’s in winter that we learn to love God out of season, or rather, in spite of the season. It’s then that we stop asking from God and instead ask for God. And in the bleak midwinter, we begin to fathom what it means to love God with all of one’s being.

This slim volume of spiritual meditations is wintry in its outlook. It points to the ways in which grace descends upon life, like a soft, quiet snowfall. It wants to walk beside you in the cold and show you the fresh footsteps of Jesus. And it aims to fan dying embers into living flames, to stoke the fires of refinement in order to ignite a life of discipleship. For in this chilly and darkened season, God has given us the gift of fire. Jesus is the spark, and we are the kindling. To keep warm, we must burn with love, and to see far, we must burn very brightly.

This book recommends that we throw everything into the flames—starting with ourselves—so that everything will be illuminated and transformed by the Refiner’s fire. But rest assured, we shall neither be scorched nor singed. As the prophet Isaiah promised, “When you walk through the fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you” (Isaiah 43:2). The light of the fire is only meant to see us through the winter and the warmth of its blaze to keep us till the spring.

Winter with God is best explored chronologically over the span of days and weeks. This slow and considered approach—reading one chapter at a time—will gradually expose you to the forces of spiritual reformation. Like weathering on a rock, it will reshape you in new and unexpected ways. Into what exactly, or whom, neither the author nor the reader can know. I only hope this book will help you through your spiritual winter. I pray that you will evermore live in God, and God will even more live in you.