Rating: 
Summary: Find freedom and joy in our ultimate desire.
Review: We are often taught that having desires are bad, and that we should suppress them. However, God created humans to desire. Desire is what motivates us and drives our behavior. Desires are also the greatest source of suffering. It is okay to have "needs" or inner desires, but it is how we choose to satisfy those desires that make it right or wrong. Our suffering is usually the result of our deepest inner desires being hurt, wounded or neglected. We will do whatever it takes to ease the pain of suffering, by trying to escape it, minimize it, or dull it somehow, either by indulging in some form of pleasure or by shutting down our hearts. This is how we fall into the traps of addictions.God comes along and thwarts our attempts to satisfy our desires or our attempts to build our own paradise. He thwarts us in order to save us. Our problem is that we don't know what it is exactly that we really want. John Eldredge shows us how God is the Desire of Ages--He is everything we ever needed. God wants an intimate relationship with us. He wants to satisfy our desires. God promises to restore our hearts. Even though God subjected the world to futility, He seeks to restore us and fulfill us with meaning and purpose by giving us eternal life. That eternal life is through the death and resurrection of Jesus. God promises to restore us spiritually as well as eternally. This book is really deep. I underlined a lot of his content. It has helped me on my Christian walk to have a deeper relationship with God.
Rating:
Summary: A great journey
Review: While meeting with a friend at Barnes and Noble, I shared with him a recent experience I had that caused me considerable disappointment and grief. After listening to my story, he disappeared for a few minutes, and when he returned he set a book on the table and told me I had to read it. The book was The Journey of Desire by John Elderidge. I took my friend's word for it and read the book. He was right! I did need to read the book. I do not recall ever reading a book that seemed to speak directly to me as this one did. If prior to his writing this book, I had sat down with Elderidge and shared specific details of my life with him, I do not think he could have written a book that speaks to me more than The Journey of Desire does. In The Journey of Desire, Elderidge delves into the mystery of redemptive life in a fallen world. He speaks to the disappointment and disillusionment that Christians experience as we try to live the life we desire and have known only in our dreams. He writes, "We all know the dilemma of desire, how awful it feels to open our hearts to joy only to have grief come in. They go together. We know that. What we don't know is what to do with it, how to live in this world with desire so deep in us and disappointment lurking behind every corner."(23)
Elderidge teaches the reader to examine his or her heart and to discern whether there is still hunger and thirst for the heart's desires or whether grief and disappointment have caused apathy and complacence. The book works to resurrect the God-inspired heart's desires that we all possess. Elderidge reminds us that the greatest enemy to holiness is not passion but apathy. He wants to help us direct our passions toward God and away from the many temptations in the world that serve to anesthetize and pervert our desires rather than fulfill them. One of the biggest lessons that Elderidge expounds upon is that no matter how hard we try to find life in the things of this world we cannot. We cannot create or design the perfect life that satisfies all of our heart's desires. Elderidge writes that we must receive that abundant life from God. The journey of desire is also the battle of desire. The battle is to guard our hearts, to keep our passions alive and pure, and to focus our desires on the Creator. Elderidge counsels us to remember that we are eternal people. Jesus went away to prepare a place for us. It is not here, and we must refrain from trying to create our place here rather than being eternally-minded. The book teaches that some Christians may have retreated from seeking, asking and knocking for the fulfillment of desires; instead, they are suppressing, numbing and distorting desires in a futile attempt to live without pain, grief or disappointment. The path Elderidge suggests we take is one of trust. Elderidge encourages us to trust God enough to faithfully ask him to clarify, intensify, and satisfy our heart's desires. Elderidge emphasizes the true nature of our eternal relationship with Jesus. He writes that it is a love affair; it is a romance that will find its fulfillment only when we find our fulfillment in paradise. Because I believe that much of what is true for me is true to some extent for most if not all Christians, I can sincerely say to you that I believe you need to read this book.
Rating:
Summary: A great journey
Review: While meeting with a friend at Barnes and Noble, I shared with him a recent experience I had that caused me considerable disappointment and grief. After listening to my story, he disappeared for a few minutes, and when he returned he set a book on the table and told me I had to read it. The book was The Journey of Desire by John Elderidge. I took my friend's word for it and read the book. He was right! I did need to read the book. I do not recall ever reading a book that seemed to speak directly to me as this one did. If prior to his writing this book, I had sat down with Elderidge and shared specific details of my life with him, I do not think he could have written a book that speaks to me more than The Journey of Desire does. In The Journey of Desire, Elderidge delves into the mystery of redemptive life in a fallen world. He speaks to the disappointment and disillusionment that Christians experience as we try to live the life we desire and have known only in our dreams. He writes, "We all know the dilemma of desire, how awful it feels to open our hearts to joy only to have grief come in. They go together. We know that. What we don't know is what to do with it, how to live in this world with desire so deep in us and disappointment lurking behind every corner."(23)
Elderidge teaches the reader to examine his or her heart and to discern whether there is still hunger and thirst for the heart's desires or whether grief and disappointment have caused apathy and complacence. The book works to resurrect the God-inspired heart's desires that we all possess. Elderidge reminds us that the greatest enemy to holiness is not passion but apathy. He wants to help us direct our passions toward God and away from the many temptations in the world that serve to anesthetize and pervert our desires rather than fulfill them. One of the biggest lessons that Elderidge expounds upon is that no matter how hard we try to find life in the things of this world we cannot. We cannot create or design the perfect life that satisfies all of our heart's desires. Elderidge writes that we must receive that abundant life from God. The journey of desire is also the battle of desire. The battle is to guard our hearts, to keep our passions alive and pure, and to focus our desires on the Creator. Elderidge counsels us to remember that we are eternal people. Jesus went away to prepare a place for us. It is not here, and we must refrain from trying to create our place here rather than being eternally-minded. The book teaches that some Christians may have retreated from seeking, asking and knocking for the fulfillment of desires; instead, they are suppressing, numbing and distorting desires in a futile attempt to live without pain, grief or disappointment. The path Elderidge suggests we take is one of trust. Elderidge encourages us to trust God enough to faithfully ask him to clarify, intensify, and satisfy our heart's desires. Elderidge emphasizes the true nature of our eternal relationship with Jesus. He writes that it is a love affair; it is a romance that will find its fulfillment only when we find our fulfillment in paradise. Because I believe that much of what is true for me is true to some extent for most if not all Christians, I can sincerely say to you that I believe you need to read this book.
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