Beauty on the Backroads

Stories of grace for life's unexpected turns

preston yancey

No ordinary memoir: Review of Tables in the Wilderness by Preston Yancey

Generally, when I read a book, I want it make me feel better. To escape or offer a solution to a problem. But lately, the books I’ve been reading haven’t lived up to that need.

They haven’t made me feel better but they have made me feel.

tables in wildernessAnd that’s where I am with Tables in the Wilderness: A Memoir of God Found, Lost and Found Again by Preston Yancey. (Disclaimer: I received a free copy of the book through the Booklook Bloggers program.)

I love Yancey’s writing. His blog is one that I read whenever he posts something new. And it’s always challenging, often poetic, and downright refreshing. The book is all of that, too, in its own way. I will admit to stumbling a little in the beginning because Yancey’s writing is different than most. It’s good, just not easy. As he talks about his spiritual journey from a know-it-all Southern Baptist entering college to a questioning Anglican on the other side of college, the stories and observations roll out, sometimes chronologically, sometimes not. The first time I read Annie Dillard and Anne Lamott, I felt this sort of disconnectedness in the flow but realized as I was reading that it was all connected and related after all. This book has a similar feel.

But it’s a journey worth taking, and I found myself silently screaming “yes” to passages that reflected my own journey.

I’m telling you to notice, because at a certain point I stopped. At a certain point, I stopped  noticing that God was moving all around me, and I believe it was this lack of attention on my part, this willingness to treat common the awe of the Almighty, that would eventually arrive me to a place where God withdrew. (39)

For me, reading this book was like drinking a glass of wine. On first taste, I am startled by the taste and I almost forget that I like it. Then I drink a little more and taste the flavors buried in the glass. And by the time I finish a glass, I am satisfied by the experience and not at all sorry.

Tables in the Wilderness is a book for pilgrims and seekers, for those who don’t have faith figured out, who wonder if anyone else feels the same way. For those who question the tradition in which they were raised, who have more questions than answers. It’s one man’s spiritual journey but it contains valuable truths for those of us on our own journeys. You might not like everything he has to say, but his story is worth the telling.

 

What women want from the church: Sisters

I came to church in search of sisters, although I didn’t know it then.

Having grown up with family but not in the church, I was often jealous, in my early saved days, of people whose homes were, and always had been, Christian. Not only were they blood relatives but spiritual ones.

I yearned for connection. I loved my biological family. But I needed a spiritual one as well.

—-

We were four peas in a pod, my best friends in high school. We met in a gym class our freshman year, and in the years that followed we were inseparable. We watched Disney movies at sleepovers while our classmates partied on the weekends. We ate lunch together and welcomed the outcasts to our table. We arranged our schedules so we would share some classes throughout the day. We passed notes in the hallway and defended each other.

It was my first experience with sisterhood.

Read the rest on Preston Yancey’s blog here, part of a series, What Women Want from the Church, posting on Thursdays.