Bøger af Charles E Poole

Gathered in this small book are hopeful reflections on that quiet question: "How do we go on when we cannot go on?" Which is what the words huddled here are: tries at the truth, earnest efforts, certain to fail.

For as long as there have been families, families have needed a place to rest. Families are struggling to keep up with the demands of life, figure out the complexities of life, and live through the difficulties of life. Families are trying to keep pace with overburdened schedules and overcommitted calendars. If a book can become, for a few moments, "a place," then, hopefully, the words inside this book can clear out a restful, quiet place where weary families can go for a little while.

When life is complex, hearts are broken, and dreams go unfulfilled, we do not need words that are misty-eyed with shallow sentimentality, starry-eyed with na?ve optimism, or dry-eyed with cold logic. Rather, we need words that are clear-eyed with realism and wide-eyed with hope. These are the kinds of words that fill the pages of Charles E. Poole's bestselling title Is Life Fair? Good Words for Hard Times. They are not perfect words or final words. Rather they are hopeful, good words for the weary ones who must stumble around on the rugged terrain of hard times. This second edition contains a new introduction by Poole to further provide words of hope for some of life's toughest struggles, darkest tragedies, and deepest mysteries.

Taking its title from a line of a poem written by Alfred Tennyson, Beyond the Broken Lights is a thoughtful and inviting look at our questions and the need for clarity in the depths of the mystery of God. Like Tennyson, we cannot find satisfactory explanations, complete resolutions, or simple take-it-or-leave-it answers. Instead, our systems of theological position, conventional wisdom, and standard orthodoxy have their day and then cease to be. They can be described as "broken lights." Poole examines these broken lights, and tells us that since there are no other lights - no perfect, seamless, unbroken lights that human words can shine on sacred truth - it is the broken lights that become precious to us. These are the lights by which we live. Poole warns, however, that we must not clutch them too tightly lest we cut ourselves on them, or wave them, lest we injure someone; because, after all, they are broken lights. Beyond these broken lights is God, somewhere past the place where words run out. The words that wait their turn inside this book seek to recover something that was before the broken lights, and they long to glimpse something that is beyond the broken lights.

Early in the scriptural record, Adam and Eve find themselves cast out through the gates at the Garden of Eden. In the Book of Revelation, Christians are promised entry through the gates into the New Jerusalem. Chuck Poole's many readers know him to be one who speaks to the truth of grace-filled living through the struggles of this world. As with Beyond the Broken Lights and Don't Cry Past Tuesday, Between the Gates will both challenge and comfort as you consider this journey we travel "between the gates."