God of Surprises

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That wherever there is love, joy, and peace, that is where God is, regardless of your background and beliefs. A fantastic little book about prayer, our inner lives, and how we grow (taking steps forward and backward) in interacting with God.

This book is very practical yet so often exposes a deep thought in a completely new light and utter simplicity. I read it through once, pondering over paragraphs, pages, perspectives and ideas, rolling them around in my heart and mind and applying them to my everyday life. That’s a long way removed from my own evangelical charismatic background, so I’m impressed how well Hughes is able to present his message to the church as a whole, even though quite a lot of it is based on the teachings of Ignatius of Loyola. The Final Chapter applies the insights of the book to a very real situation- the threat of nuclear war.We may fight against finding him there because it means we are not our own since everything we are or have comes from God and has to be given back to him. The 2022 edition of this evergreen classic comes with a new foreword written by Margaret Silf and is presented in paperback with a contemporary cover design and French flaps. As I have not read the original I cannot comment on it's updatedness but I am informed that any new material is minimal. To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. You can change your choices at any time by visiting Cookie preferences, as described in the Cookie notice.

The author presents von Hügel’s analysis of the three main stages of human development-infancy, adolescence and adulthood-describing the predominant needs and activities which characterize each stage. Gerard Hughes covers a lot of ground in a deceptively short-looking book, so there’s plenty to get you thinking, and it will be worth going back to and rereading. Even if you take God out of it, as I did, it provides amazing insight and structure into how to know yourself better, to stop trying to take all your worries and deal with them yourself, and ultimately giving you tools to be able the understand how to live a more fulfilling life.I'm sure some of the more conservative Catholics would say he is way off, but, well, he's a priest too and views like his will do a lot more to help people and the Church. At the end of the chapter, he presents some biblical texts which could be useful for imaginative contemplation. In the Seventh Chapter, the author gives some exercises that will help us recognize the action of God in our lives and give him praise, thanks and glory for it. Not to satisfy some super judge, nor to comply with the strictures of any religion, but rather because God loves us all and wants everyone to know it and rejoice in that knowledge.

Also has many helpful practical suggestions on how to take ideas about prayer and make them applicable. It is a book for all versions of Christianity ,and although written by a Jesuit Priest , it does not infringe into other Branches of Christian Belief.Although not recommended by the author I did read straight through it without doing the exercises at the end of each chapter. Hughes' premise, that `Our treasure lies in our inner life', may cause eye-rolling suspicion of New Ageism to some readers. The author, a Jesuit, clearly and effectively expounds the basic methodology of the Spiritual Excercises of St. Creative and consolatory feelings are those that lead us to discovering more of our hidden treasure, whereas destructive and desolatory feelings lead us away from it.

This book has only one purpose: to suggest ways of finding the treasure in what we may consider a most unlikely field - ourselves. False images we may have of God, constructs of our upbringing, experiences or ideas can disturb and stifle us.Hughes openly challenges many of the most commonly-observed pillars of organized religion but productively offers solutions for churches progressing with the times to serve modern humanity. Hughes found human beings complicated "with layers upon layers of consciousness", most of which we never break through. God is a ‘God of Surprises’ because He is not remote or distant, dwelling only in tabernacles and temples of stone, but near to us.