Glorious Dark

J. Swoboda A.

Description

On Thursday as they ate the Passover meal with Jesus, the disciples believed that the kingdom was coming and they were on the front end of a revolution. Then came the tragedy of Friday and, somehow even worse, the silence of Saturday. They ran. They doubted. They despaired. Yet, within the grave, God's power was still flowing like a mighty river beneath the ice of winter. And then there was Sunday morning. Real, raw, and achingly honest, A Glorious Dark meets readers in the ambiguity, doubt, and uncertainty we feel when our beliefs about the world don't match up to reality. Tackling tough questions like Why is faith so hard? Why do I doubt? Why does God allow me to suffer? and Is God really with me in the midst of my pain? A. J. Swoboda puts into sharp focus a faith that is greater than our personal comfort or fulfilment. He invites readers to develop a faith that embraces the tension between what we believe and what we experience, showing that the very tension we seek to eliminate is where God meets us.

Sujets

• Philosophie et théologie

Informations

• Publié par: Baker Publishing Group
• Date de parution: 27 janvier 2015
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781441222428
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

© 2014 by A. J. Swoboda
Published by Baker Books
a division of Baker Publishing Group
P.O. Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287
www.bakerbooks.com
Ebook edition created 2015
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—for example, electronic, photocopy, recording—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress in Washington, DC.
ISBN 978-1-4412-2242-8
Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations are from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com
Scripture quotations labeled ESV are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved. ESV Text Edition: 2007
Published in association with literary agent David Van Diest of D. C. Jacobson and Associates, www.dcjacobson.com , 3689 Carman Drive, Suite 300, Lake Oswego, OR 97035.
“Life, like the moon, has a shadow side. Yet too often Western Christian churches focus only on the sunny side of life. Why? Because it takes far more courage to walk into the darkness. Lucky for us, A. J. Swoboda has the guts to pierce the darkness and search for God there. A Glorious Dark touches a nerve by bravely wrestling with all the things that go bump in the night. But more importantly, it leads us into the presence of the One who once told a shadow-soaked prophet, ‘I form the light and the dark.’”
— Jonathan Merritt , author of Jesus Is Better Than You Imagined ; senior columnist for Religion News Service
“A. J. writes with the passion of a genuine seeker and with the reflective insight of a true mystic. Here he turns his attention to the meaning of Jesus’s death and resurrection. We find ourselves drawn into the momentous events of cross and resurrection yet again.”
— Alan Hirsch , author, activist, dreamer; www . alanhirsch . org
“Once upon a time, there was a man who saw the breadth of God’s strange redemption in just three days of Holy Week. That man is A. J. Swoboda and this is his book. It is funny, honest, literary, outward looking, inward looking, and upward looking. ‘Stars are only seen when it’s dark,’ Swoboda writes. Indeed, and it is rare to find both stars and their darkness so beautifully charted in ink. A glorious read.”
— Paul Pastor , associate editor for Christianity Today’s Leadership Journal and PARSE
“ A Glorious Dark is a brilliant display of the cross of Christ. My heart and mind were awakened by A. J. Swoboda creatively redeeming everything from personal experience to insightful apologetics, from Star Wars to Jean-Paul Sartre. He challenged me to confront long-held myths that dead-ended my faith. For any serious student of life, A Glorious Dark is a must read!”
— Wayne Cordeiro , author and pastor at New Hope Christian Fellowship, Honolulu, Hawaii
“Attention is owed to any writer who can excavate the deep theological meaning of Scooby - Doo and apply it articulately to Christian faith—and that writer is A. J. Swoboda! With spark, passion, and an engaging accessibility, Swoboda successfully makes the case for a holistic Christian life that holds in tension the poles of light and dark, triumph and loss. Highly recommended.”
— Tom Krattenmaker , USA Today contributing columnist; author of The Evangelicals You Don ’ t Know
“Just as the real story of Golgatha is of three crosses, not one, so theologian A. J. Swoboda shows in fiery wisdom and icy wit how the real story of Holy Week is of three days, not one. This is a book I will get out and reread every Holy Week for the rest of my life—to keep the gospel ‘good news’ that stays good and stays news.”
— Leonard Sweet , bestselling author; professor at Drew University and George Fox University; chief contributor to Sermons.com
“Is our Christian faith painful, awkward, or hopeful? That’s like asking if water is a solid, liquid, or gas. The answer is emphatically Yes ! A. J. Swoboda reminds us that although we want to pick and choose, God knows we need the full spectrum of death, descent, and resurrection to abide with Christ. When A Glorious Dark arrived, I intended to only take a quick peek at the introduction, but I immediately got hooked and abandoned all other responsibilities for the day. Gloriously enlightening—the kind of book you want to reread as soon as you finish and then share with a friend.”
— Nancy Sleeth , author of Almost Amish ; cofounder of Blessed Earth
“A. J. Swoboda has written a beautiful book. It felt like reading the Psalms. He touches on the full bandwidth of the human experience with compassion, honesty, insight, and humor. And this book ruminates with love for God. Not the sentimental love of evangelical culture, but a deep clinging to Jesus through all the complexities of faith and discipleship. This book will resonate deeply and inspire faith to walk boldly into the glorious dark.”
— Jon Tyson , pastor at Trinity Grace Church, New York; author of Sacred Roots : Why the Church Still Matters
“How can one person be so funny and so deep all at once? A. J. is like Seinfeld and Søren Kierkegaard rolled into one. If you want dry diatribes or funny fluff, look elsewhere. But if you want to dive deep into the raging river of Christ’s death, burial, and resurrection—and learn, while swimming, why God is like Chewbacca, faith is either a Polaroid or an Etch-a-Sketch, and Jesus is not like Hulk Hogan in a burger joint—then look no further. This book is hilarious and holy in all the right ways!”
— Joshua Ryan Butler , author of The Skeletons in God ’ s Closet ; pastor at Imago Dei Community, Portland, Oregon
For Dad I love getting lost with you.
Contents
Cover i
Title Page ii
Copyright Page iii
Endorsements iv
Dedication v
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction 1
PART 1 FRIDAY 7
1. The Monster at the End of This Book 9
2. Leaving Room for Imagination 21
3. The Gospel according to Lewis and Clark 39
4. Numb 54
5. Coretta 67
6. Did God Become an Atheist? 78
PART 2 SATURDAY 95
7. Awkward Saturday 97
8. Picking and Choosing 111
9. Rest 125
10. Sitting in the Tomb 140
PART 3 SUNDAY 151
11. Whore 153
12. Surprise 169
13. Hymnals and the Need for Ignorance 184
14. A Different Kind of Hero 195
15. First Breakfast 209
Notes 221
Bibliography 226
Back Ads 229
Back Cover 231
Acknowledgments
All writing is done in storms.
At least that’s what my heroes have said. Writing a book, Faulkner advised, is like “building a chicken coop in a high wind. You grab any board or shingle flying by or loose on the ground and nail it down fast.” Virginia Woolf similarly captures the same idea. A writer, she says, learns how to “arrange whatever pieces come your way.” These words capture perfectly what writing has been like for me—storm chasing.
Many acknowledgments are due to those who not only helped me survive the storm, but also actually made it a rather enjoyable process.
Quinn and Elliot, my wife and kiddo, were a safe storm cellar through this process, offering me moments of peace and solace. I love you both with all the marrow in my bones. Likewise, I’m indebted to Mom, Dad, Mike, and Metta for your willingness to have me and buy way too many copies of my books to give away to unsuspecting friends and neighbors who probably just gave them to Goodwill.
To Theophilus—the wonderful church I’m honored to pastor. As graciously as possible, you gave me time and space to complete this manuscript as well as offering me hour upon hour of coffee appointments to work my ideas out.
Anna Austin deserves a huge shout out. She helped me make a video that was so good it caught the eye of someone who was silly enough to publish this thing. Anna, thank you. You are a grace to us all.
Of course, along the way, a few brave souls jumped headfirst into the murky waters of the unfinished manuscript, offering both critical and encouraging feedback at key points in the writing process. Without the keen eyes of Laurel Boruck, Russell Joyce, Daniel Levy, Cameron Marvin, Taylor Smith, Ben Verble, and my patient wife, Quinn, this book wouldn’t be what it is today. A heartfelt thanks to each of you.
To the wonderful team at Baker—you’ve been a joy to work alongside. Robert Hosack was particularly generous to enthusiastically work with me, and for that, I am eternally grateful. And finally, the blind reviewers and editorial team saw so perceptively every mistake imaginable. Great work. Also, David and Sarah Van Diest are wonderful agents. Any writer should work with them.
Finally, it’s customary to acknowledge God in any Christian book. On that basis of custom, I refuse to offer any perfunctory praise or thankfulness. Rather, I thank God because my every breath is from God. Jesus is the deepest, bottomless well of grace any human could ask for. If writing is a storm, then there probably were times along the way it seemed as though Jesus was sleeping in the back, unaware of my toils. But now, finished, I know you were with me every step of the way. And I know you always will be.
Introduction
When I was a kid, a free-flowing river meandered its way through my backyard. My family loved rivers. We always lived near one. Growing up in dark, drippy, soulful Oregon winters, I’d watch the death of January conquer, year after year, the once free-flowing and wild Willamette River. By mid-month, during the muffled silence of cold, a deep, bone-chilling freeze would halt every living thing upon the face of our backyard. The Willamette fell victim with the rest. The river looked dead—frozen dead.
But the frozen river wasn’t really dead. My old man would tell me that underneath that cold, da