Crazy Love, Revised and Updated: Overwhelmed by a Relentless God by Francis Chan ~ BookishRealm

Series: N/A
# of Pages: 187
Publication: May 1st, 2008
Source: Library
Genre: Non-Fiction
Goodreads | Amazon

It's crazy, if you think about it. The God of the universe—the Creator of nitrogen and pine needles, galaxies and E-minor—loves us with a radical, unconditional, self-sacrificing love. And what is our typical response? We go to church, sing songs, and try not to cuss. Whether you've verbalized it yet or not, we all know something's wrong. Does something deep inside your heart long to break free from the status quo? Are you hungry for an authentic faith that addresses the problems of our world with tangible, even radical, solutions? God is calling you to a passionate love relationship with Himself. Because the answer to religious complacency isn't working harder at a list of do's and don'ts-it's falling in love with God. And once you encounter His love, as Francis describes it, you will never be the same. Because when you're wildly in love with someone, it changes everything.

A lot of people are unaware that I am on a journey of discovering more about myself in a spiritual way. I went through a lot in 2019 and it really made me reevaluate the relationship that I have with God. I've always grown up as a Christian. My great-grandmother was the most devout Christian that I knew and to be honest she is the reason why I have such a strong foundation in Christianity. A lot of the things that I've been through in the past year made me question whether I've ever fully committed or trusted God with the process of my life or whether I've been halfway in and seemingly out of touch with my faith and my ability to trust and believe. It wasn't until a recent conversation with a close friend that I realized that I've been more out of touch with my faith than I realized. In our discussion I decided to commit myself to working towards building a better relationship with God and one of the ways that I wanted to do this was to pick up more non-fiction Christian works. I'm horrible at reading non-fiction so you can only imagine how much I felt like I was going to struggle with this. I searched my libraries database and found the book Crazy Love and for some reason I really connected to the book especially when I discovered that the blurb said it was for those that were hungry for a passionate relationship with God and authentic faith. It literally called to me.

"We need to stop giving people excuses not to believe in God. You've probably heard the expression 'I believe in God, just not organized religion'. I don't think people would say that if the church truly lived like we are called to live."

Crazy Love is separated into chapters that focus on different areas of building your faith and relationship with God. There were three sections in particular that are extremely important to my life: the awe of God, loving neighbors as Jesus loves us, and lukewarm Christians. Chan does a marvelous job describing the awe of God or in better terms just how amazing He is. When we think about the vastness of the universe and how God has created a planet just for us to enjoy it makes you realize how truly amazing He is. I think I appreciated the world that God has created for us, but sometimes I get so caught up in the depressing, unfortunate things of the world that I don't stop to think about everything that He's created and how He's created everything to work for our benefit. For example, how awesome is it that trees are not only present on the earth for their beauty, but they are literally the objects that allow us to successfully breath. Every little thing, every little detail should never fail to amaze us.

"True faith means holding nothing back. It means putting every hope in God's fidelity to His Promises."

One of the most important aspects of my job is customer service. I work in a library and part of my job is to be kind and welcoming to every patron that walks in the door. I must admit that sometimes that can be hard and frustrating, but I think that when Chan talks about loving our neighbors, he reminds us the importance of being empathetic. It's easy to pass judgment on people or get frustrated with them; however, it's impossible to know everyone's circumstance. By practicing patience and remembering to be empathetic we effectively learn how to love our neighbors the way that Jesus loves us. And that leads to one of the most important sections of the book: lukewarm Christians. I think that a lot of individuals have heard the verse that states: "I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot! So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth" (Revelation 3:15-16). Chan states that as Christians we must be all in when it comes to having a relationship with God and that we can't afford to be lukewarm. It hit me hard because while I have always believed in God and have been saved my relationship with Him has been anything but all in. While I think that Chan takes a more harsh perspective of lukewarm Christians, I do agree that a relationship with God requires us to be all the way in. This is definitely something that I've struggled with as a Christian, but it is something that I plan to improve upon in 2020.

"Lukewarm people don't really want to be saved from their sin; they want only to be saved from the penalty of their sin."

If you've never heard of this book and you're interested in exploring more about your faith and relationship with God I would definitely recommend checking this book out. I definitely enjoyed it and it's a book that I could even see myself re-reading before the year is over.