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Summary: What about My Life as a Man
Review: Dear Heavenly Father, what do You want of me. For years I have run from you, not knowing You, not believing in You. Yet all the while you waited patiently upon Your hill, watching My wanderings...making sure I was safe even though I did not realize You were doing so. Then one day, I came to my senses, I looked up upon the hill, I saw you for the very first time. There was love beating in my heart, I conceived, a love for the Father, the Son, the Holy Ghost. And so I began climbing the hill. Up to the Lord, up to the Sacred Romance. Yet it is a long and difficult climb. Thus I ask again, what do You want of me.I read this book, Wild at Heart, and I realize so many things. Most of all, dear Heavenly Father, I realize that though I keep climbing the hill, I have lost so many things. Through my struggles and my temptations, I have let go of so much passion. Thus I stop upon the climb. Just trying to see what it means to be a man. What does it mean, oh Father, to be a man. A real Man. What does it mean to have the passions and the desires that you bless and call forth from a man's heart, oh Lord? Dear Father in Heaven, I want to be the Man you long me to be. I want to be wild at heart. I want to, like Eldredge challenges, live the adventure. Not just simple day to day hum drum. Not just petty foolary. I want what Eldredge speaks of: to see out the roads less traveled. I want to listen to your songs along the path of heavenly glory. I want to continue climbing that hill toward where You stand awaiting me. Please Lord, bless me so that my eyes can see, my ears can hear, my heart can know, the meaning to be the man you want me to be. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen!
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Summary: What about the women?
Review: So what if men have given up some of their God given masculinity and become a little "softer". All stereotypes aside, this is not a book that a modern wife will appreciate. Men as "dangerous, wild..." Give me a break. We are not in a hunter and gatherer society anymore. While I can appreciate anyone's sense of freedom and adventure, I personally know of two husbands who's lives have been "changed forever" after reading this book. One is moving his family across country and leaving all extended family and friends for an adventure that is totally his, not his wife or childrens. He has made this decision ( as head of family and household) based on his new "awareness of man". The other has quit his "boring, mundane" job for a more exciting job adventure. His wife, however is not excited that she will have to return to work if his "thrill job" doesn't present itself soon. I try not to take books like these too seriously, but I don't believe that all of these feelings are exclusive to men. I get bored with the everyday mundane dealings of life, and feel a lack of adventure too, and just think I was designed to be content having babies and preparing food! Just beware of anything that promises to change your life as soon as you read it...sometimes the life you have is not as bad as you think.
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Summary: God only creates originals
Review: I have read many books seeking to better understand my man. I always walked away feeling this is not about him, he is not the typical man. John Eldrege has focussed on the way God made and views manhood. Why am I surprised at how beautiful and original our God made each and every one of us. Trust me, if you are a women you don't want to miss this read. And if you are a man you will be liberated at how perfect your heavenly Father has made you. This book just gets better by the page and as it draws to the end you are excited to become the person God has created you to be.
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Summary: Truly a Dangerous Book!!
Review: The emotional and spiritual castration of men has sapped our strength and robbed society of the true image of God that we bear . John Eldredge maps the dangerous journey in search of your heart as only one who has been there and made the journey himself can do. Do not read this book if you are just interested in "information" or looking to "expand" your views. It is a dangerous book. You will WANT your heart back. You will want to live for that which you were created to live for. You will become a person that may cause others to be uncomfortable. You will be more alive than you every imagined you could be. I'm warning you . . .this book is dangerous. I loved every page!
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Summary: An Essential Read For Men...and Women
Review: Following closely on the heels of his magnificent *Journey of Desire*, John Eldredge has written the "men's book" of the ages. In addition, female readers will not only gain insight into masculinity but will discover much about themselves and how God - and their men - play a role in their own personal dramas. Much will be said and written about this book, but one aspect that merits particular emphasis is Eldredge's uncanny ability to discern from the play of children the immense "Story" that God has placed humanity in - a story filled with heroes and villains, damsels in distress, sacrifice, and a happily everafter. The author demonstrates to the reader how little boys and girls innately understand the power of (and need for) a "battle to be fought, an adventure to be experienced, and a Beauty to be won." Such is the life at the heart of the Christian gospel. After all, Jesus himself said regarding children, "of such is the kingdom of heaven." Another key tenant of the book is that men and women must go to God individually, and not to each other, to gain validation. Eldredge stresses that true masculinity is "bestowed" from father to son. He poignantly explains, too, how Christ can take up the "initiation" of a wounded man into the fulness of masculinity (a special highlight is his inclusion of Ezra Pound's forgotten poem "The Goodly Frere", which offers an engagingly different picture of Jesus). Along the way Eldredge summarily debunks the "precept and principle" philosophies (which includes Promise Keepers) that have unwittingly robbed the Christian faith of its vitality. No "twelve steps" here - the focus is on life, not formulas. Filled with humor and remarkable frankess, this is a heart-warming challenge to join God in a wild, gut-wrenching, but ultimately triumphant battle.
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Summary: Be a Man.
Review: I was enthralled and challenged by John Eldredge's previous two works. After reading WILD AT HEART, I have been challenged even more. What makes a man? This is a question that all men struggle with at least once in our lives. Some wrestle with the question until they die. At one time, men knew how to be men, but in the modern materialistic society in which we now live, men no longer know what they are. There are many "self-help" books to help you through your struggles and you can buy pills to make you feel manly, but none of these things really help. They all deal with the struggle by avoiding it. John Eldredge examines the struggle without avoiding it. Men were created to fight a war, live an adventure, and win Beauty. Through his exploration of this issue Eldredge has re-claimed masculinity from the chaos of modernity and given men a useful guide to help them find their true selves. Learn what its like to truly be a man.
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Summary: No more pretending
Review: John Eldredge first captured my interest (along with Brent Curtis) with The Sacred Romance. He enthralled me with the challenging Journey of Desire. Now he has confronted me with his Wild at Heart. Very few men will be able to read this book without recognizing "the poser". We live our lives responding to the beck and call of the world, all the while knowing that we are selling out on our truest self. Eldredge is bold in his challenge for men to quit posing, and encouraging as he calls each of us to live as the men we were created to be. To know our truest self, we must know the Creator and trust that He created us to live a life full of adventure and mystery, rather than lives of tedium and boredom. Eldredge does not hold back in his assessment of the malaise that encapsulates so many men. His take on masculinity flies in the face of many of society's politically correct definitions of manhood, but my gut tells me that most men will know that Eldredge is right. This is a challenging book that will cause most men to squirm in recognition of how much we have given away. The book is ultimately uplifting in its call to authenticity. I have read a number of "men's books" and this one is one of the best.
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Summary: Nothing better on manhood!
Review: Eldredge is a superb writer, as his first two books attest to. This is his best so far. There's is nothing better in print when it comes to understanding what it means to be a man. Be ready to be challenged, surprised, prodded, and messed with. He has shattered my paradigm of what it means to be a man. He will shatter yours too. The best line is something to the effect that most people have an image of Jesus as Mr. Rogers with a beard. Thanks (John) for reminding us men of who were really are and how God designed us.
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Summary: Thoroughly Unimpressed
Review: I read this book for a Men's Retreat based upon the concept presented in "Wild at Heart": rediscovering our masculinity and finding healing for our "father-wound." What I found instead was a jumble of pop-psychology and shallow theology. The greater portion of the theological content of the book came from a single verse: "The LORD is a warrior; the LORD is his name" (Exodus 15:3). The better part of the book is based upon the assumption that each man recieved some deep injury in adolescence from a male role-model (usually the father). This "wound" injured the masculine ("wild") spirit of us all and resulted in a life entirely focused on trying to gain the approval of the father (that is, to heal the "wound" by accomplishing what the wound made him feel could not be accomplished). Having thus established this psychological foundation, John Eldredge attempts to draw God into the picture by proposing that God (as the perfect Father) is the one who can heal the father-wound once and for all. This paternal psychology is all very lovely and noble, but it really has no place posing as theology. I, for one, found no point of identification with the idea of the father-wound because my father was a supportive, loving, humble and godly man. Many at the retreat felt this way also. While this book may have its benefits for those with strained father-son relationships, I would not recommend it to anyone else. For those seeking a closer relationship with God I would recommend The Pursuit of God by A.W. Tozer (quoted by Eldredge in this very book).
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Summary: Wild Theology, Civilized Application
Review: Wild at Heart has a great premise: The church needs more men. For the most part, I agree with this book, but some of the theological stances of the author are simply not Biblical, from the idea that "God takes chances..He is a wild man!" to "The human heart is not inherently wicked". Albeit, these are paraphrases from the book, but the ideas remain. Nevertheless, I still recommend this book with those theological caveats, as most of what Mr. Eldredge says is worth a thought by the modern Christian man.
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