Wrestling With God

Rating:
Summary: Rick gets it
Review: Finally someone is willing to look at God outside the confines of our church walls. And at Christ as not something to be boxed, but to admit to not understanding. This book is truly mind expanding. Brilliant.

Rating:
Summary: Postmodern Jesus Follower review
Review: I find that "Wrestling with God" is a book that gets down to the nitty-gritty of religion and the damage it can do to the people who allow 'religion' to put them into a box. A box in which they cannot freely express their feelings on God. A box which in the long run will bind them into thinking they are not as good as the 'secure-safe-perfect Christian'.
They find themselves being stalemated into the 'frozen chosen', as most often alot of the church members do. They are afraid to speak up and ask questions. They cannot continue to go forward on their journey.
So, in Rick's book, he directs alot of his attention towards the church that trys to put the followers in a box, to mold them.
He is very inquistive with the followers who don't go to church and with the younger generation who have a bad taste in the mouths due to the restrictions laid upon the followers of the church.
He lend them and understanding ear, partly because he sees himself as one of them too.
A very good read.
I changed my outlook alot.

Rating:
Summary: Rick gets it
Review: I randomly came across this book on the shelf. I am so glad I decided to buy it.

This is not your average 5-step program book on how to be a better Christian. Rick speaks to those of us in the Post-Boomer era. He speaks to those of us who feel disillusioned by success and upward mobility and are left with a feeling for something deeper and more real. What I really like about the book -- I was left with more questions than answers after the read.

He explains the need for stepping into our own "deserts" -- those places of desolation and pain to find reality. He encourages us to find the Matrix, so to speak; to open our eyes and really see.

Using very relevant examples -- from movies to references from current "saints" such as Bono and Alanis Morrisette, Rick speaks into our current post-modern culture with truth. He also uses strong references from literary sources that speak to today.

This is a book about real, gritty spirituality -- not formal, feel-good religion. Highly recommend for anyone fed up with, discouraged by, or questioning today's societal norms of "get more" and "do more."

Rating:
Summary: Real and Relevant
Review: I randomly came across this book on the shelf. I am so glad I decided to buy it.

This is not your average 5-step program book on how to be a better Christian. Rick speaks to those of us in the Post-Boomer era. He speaks to those of us who feel disillusioned by success and upward mobility and are left with a feeling for something deeper and more real. What I really like about the book -- I was left with more questions than answers after the read.

He explains the need for stepping into our own "deserts" -- those places of desolation and pain to find reality. He encourages us to find the Matrix, so to speak; to open our eyes and really see.

Using very relevant examples -- from movies to references from current "saints" such as Bono and Alanis Morrisette, Rick speaks into our current post-modern culture with truth. He also uses strong references from literary sources that speak to today.

This is a book about real, gritty spirituality -- not formal, feel-good religion. Highly recommend for anyone fed up with, discouraged by, or questioning today's societal norms of "get more" and "do more."

Rating:
Summary: out of the BOX!!!
Review: If you would like to read something without all the usual platitudes, that actually gets you to thinking about your relationship with God and all the stuff that goes with it, then you gotta read this book! Its like having a conversation with one of the great thinkers of christianity at this time. Way to go Rick!

Rating:
Summary: Encountering God in a World of Gray
Review: In Wrestling With God, Rick Diamond brazenly peels back the multiple layers of our generation's disquieted attitudes toward life and our often perplexing angst against God and drags it all into the open where he dares us to wrestle with it head on.

He asks big questions about himself, about life, about us as a race--questions that demand big answers. But he never demeans us by tossing out pat solutions for our mindless consumption. His is a quest of gray, not of the safer "black and white"--but the end goal is the same...intimate communion with an intimate, personal God.

If you want to encounter the real, dangerous, God of love--apart from all the imposed constrictions of religious rules and regulations, then this is where you begin...Read Wrestling With God.

Michael D. Warden--author of the fantasy epics Gideon's Dawn and Waymaker.

Rating:
Summary: Engaging view of God
Review: This book is part of a new publishing company called "relevant books" where their mission is to bring real issues to the surface and address them with a healthy realistic Christian perspective. Many times Christians have a way of avoiding some of the most difficult parts and questions of life, putting white box with pretty bow answers on some of the most soul wrenching questions. Rick doesn't.

In this book, Rick will unpack the beauty and terror of wrestling with God. Wrestling with God is not something to be avoided, it is your relationship with God...those that don't wrestle just skim.

If you are ready authentic faith, an honest and fresh view of the Christian life, pick up this book.

My only critique is that the ending felt like a collection of scattered thoughts that he really wanted to add to the book. Overall, an excellent read!