| Looking for signs of the resurrection |
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Dear Outlook Readers,
With Easter straight ahead … then spring days and Earth Month (April) just beyond, I’m looking for signs of the resurrection. Christians are, as we say, an “Easter people.” We witness to God’s power to breathe life into dry bones, reinvigorating broken things — relationships, lives, or even our precious planet.
Just today, I came across the heartfelt picture book, Saving Delicia, in which a child – inspired by an older neighbor – restores to life a species of tree in danger of extinction. It reminded me of my time pastoring with children; this time of year, we searched together for signs of new life and fresh growth.
While this story is aimed at littles, its message illuminates this month’s featured books for adults. Joy Marie Clarkson’s You Are a Tree examines the “unforgiving” metaphors that reduce humanity to computers (e.g. we process, re-charge, and unplug). Clarkson explores biblical metaphors for human flourishing, beginning with humans as like trees planted by streams of water, and journeying through love, grief, safety and other themes, offering more life-giving metaphors along the way.
Clarkson desires to nourish our “life, thought, and prayer,” making You Are a Tree an excellent companion as we witness to God’s power to resurrect. Blessings to you this Holy Week, Easter and beyond.
Happy Reading,
Amy Pagliarella
Outlook Book Review Editor |
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BOOK OF THE MONTH Uncertain: The Wisdom and Wonder of Being Unsure
Maggie Jackson
Prometheus, 344 pages
Published November 7, 2023
I once served as a volunteer leader in an organization experiencing huge growth and change. Nerves frayed, tempers flared and factions formed as we tried to discern the next steps; it was rough.
Thanks to "Ted Lasso," I decided to be “curious, not judgmental.” I entered each conversation assuming I didn’t know the answer, confident that curious questioning would lead the group to the best solutions. It worked. Well, not perfectly, but better. I discovered that I love this liminal space of wondering and questioning; in Uncertain, I now have a worthy guide.
Author and journalist Maggie Jackson brings scientific concepts to a mass audience, inviting us to live into the discomfort of uncertainty, because that’s where we learn, grow and flourish. She believes that the “starting point to expanding our knowledge” is the unexpected — through stories (from medicine, business, family life and more), she helps us understand the psychology behind our problem-solving.
Our first instinct is often to start with what we know, often moving us too quickly to a sub-optimal solution. “Creating a full picture of the situation demands that you hold in mind and gradually refine hidden and even conflicting possibilities into nuanced understanding…” Jackson writes. In a crisis, “adaptive experts” will generate alternative theories and test them, whether in the operating room or in wartime intelligence.
How can Jackson’s book guide us in our faith and work? Church leaders know we’re in a new world, yet we often revert to old patterns. Jackson’s celebration of uncertainty can free us from defensiveness and “the way things have always been done,” inviting us to take on a posture of wondering and questioning. This just might lead us into creative solutions and a new future.
Perhaps a generous uncertainty could even allow us see God at work in new ways. If I allow myself to be less sure, more open, can I simply wonder where God might show up next? The possibilities of Uncertain are wide open.
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“That trees are planted reminds us that trees have roots. Rootedness is one of the ways we intuitively describe the kind of stability that leads to flourishing and the kind of instability that leaves us dry, parched, and desperate … Roots offer literal security, grounding, openness to nourishment.” |
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Book Giveaway! Congratulations to last month’s winner Billy Kluttz. Thanks to our generous partners at Brazos Press, they received Cornelius Plantinga's Gratitude: Why Giving Thanks Is the Key to Our Well-Being.
This month, one fortunate reader will receive a copy of this month’s quoted book You Are a Tree by Joy Marie Clarkson, kindly donated by the folks at Bethany House.
If you're reading this note, then you're all set! Know someone else who should be reading Page Turners? Send them this link and they'll get entered for a chance to win, too. The contest closes on April 19.
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