Month: February 2018

Book Review: Love in Three Quarter Time

Posted on by Lex De Weese in Lex's World

I’ve probably said it enough that I’m not a romance fanatic. At least not when it comes to books. I certainly hope I’ve made it clear that I’m a pretty hopeless romantic and would encourage anyone to pursue a romantic life regardless of their relationship status.

That said, I was feeling all the warm fuzzies reading Rachel McMillan’s contemporary romance novella Love In Three Quarter Time. Taking place in beautiful Vienna, Austria, you’ll be booking plane tickets after this one.

When Evelyn Watts is laid off, she is offered a once in a lifetime temporary job from her handsome Austrian work-crush. Whisked away to central-Europe, Evelyn discovers not only the beauty of traveling, but also what it means to live romantically.

Evelyn was such a relatable protagonist for any hopeless romantic introvert. I adored seeing the world from her perspective, humorous pop-culture references and all. Evelyn is opposite two intriguing characters—Rudy and Klaus—who certainly helped keep this romance plugging right along with charm and wit.

As is usual for a McMillan novel, the cities her characters inhabit are a character in and of themselves. I loved reading about placed I’ve visited in Boston and look forward to one day staying in Vienna. The richness of the setting has really made this story stick out in my mind. I can’t wait to one day take in a symphony in the birth country of Mozart or to eat a Mozart tart for that matter.

No, I do not often frequent the romance genre, but was so pleased to make this exception. The novella was a love letter to Vienna as much as it was an homage to living a romantic life whether you have a significant other or not.

This is the perfect read for a cozy-winter Saturday. Grab a blanket and some Belgian hot chocolate if you can get your hands on it. You’re in for a good time.

You can pick up your own copy of the novella for your e-reader here.

In other exciting news, Rachel McMillan is one of the fifteen authors joining us at the first ever Fiction Readers Summit in Grand Rapids, Michigan this May!

This event celebrates readers of inspirational fiction and how they push the genre forward. I would love to meet you at this event! You can find all the registration details here.

Book Review: Party of One

Posted on by Lex De Weese in Book Review, Reading

For over nearly two years now, you have all helped carry a great conversation around the Bible College Spinster series. I have loved hearing your hearts as we talk about the challenges of singles in the church and how best to love those in different seasons than our own.

Are you ready to take this conversation to your small group or book clubs?

Joy Beth Smith’s Party of One is a much needed exploration of modern singleness in the church. Her wit, wisdom, and honesty will resonate with anyone trying to lead a content and well-rounded life in the tension of longing for a significant other.

So many of the topics we’ve tackled on this site are expressed, but JB also isn’t afraid to go where I am. Her discussions on sexuality and cringe-worthy dating stories will be a comfort with any reader who has wanted to have this discussion, but never had a church community in which to do so.

Party of One had me laughing, giving poetry-slam snaps, and crying all in turn. I have not nodded along with a book in so long and it really is the desire of my heart that those struggling in their faith as a single read this book. I would also hope that any married folks or church leaders that want to care for the singles in their communities well pick up a copy.

I was reminded of my significance and encouraged by so many chapters of this book. You as a single are an important part of your circles. You are not in a waiting space and if you’re waiting for Jesus to make you not lonely, honey, you’re going to be waiting a little while. JB’s Party of One is the book I’ve been waiting for for so long. I’m thankful that Thomas Nelson recognized the importance of this topic and can’t wait for others to begin reading.

You can pick up your own copy here and don’t hesitate to tell me what you think in comments!

Love Vs. Loneliness

Posted on by Lex De Weese in Lex's World, Spirituality

When once we get intimate with Jesus we are never lonely, we never need sympathy, we can pour out all the time without being pathetic.
—Oswald Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest

Reading Joy Beth Smith’s book on singleness, Party of One, I was pleasantly surprised when she slammed on the brakes after quoting this passage from Chambers that oft gets thrown at singles. “On this point, Mr. Chambers, I humbly disagree,” she writes. I didn’t even know we were allowed to disagree with Chambers!

It is easy to assume that because one is single, one also must be lonely. And that is true. But I do not think it is true because a person is single. I know plenty of married people that woke up one morning to find themselves lonelier than they ever were on their own. It would be so easy for me in moments of great longing to believe that if I were only in a relationship, this longing within me would be gone. But I know that’s a lie.

I think we get lonely because we are broken people in a broken world and loneliness is part of that bag.

I have been so fascinated by a thought from Mike Cosper’s latest, Recapturing the Wonder. He says, “We long for wonder, and we long for communion with God.” Building off a commentary of the fall from Matthew Myer Bolton’s God Against Religion, Cosper continues, “Genesis 3 isn’t fundamentally a story about broken rules but broken communion.”

How powerfully does that change our perspective of the Biblical narrative if we understand that the first sin was mankind deciding we were better off without communion—our relationship—with God? We see throughout scripture a God uncompromisingly after restored relationship with his children—his covenant with Abraham about the nation of Israel—a people of God and for God. God introducing himself to Israel on Mt. Sinai, giving them ground rules in order to have a semblance of relationship with him and a chance to pursue holiness. The ultimate coming of Jesus giving us a taste of what that unbroken communion with God is supposed to be like. Even his last supper—a picture of what he was about to do on the cross—what we now commemorate through communion—was a gathering of people around a table to relate and bear-witness with one another.

God has been after relationship with us from the beginning. He is relentless in his pursuit of that. But in order to save his people from broken communion for eternity, Jesus had to do something drastic and amazing. He had to come as a man and die in our place. And what did that mean? Complete separation from God on the cross.

Smith builds her rebuttal to the Chambers quote, “If nothing else, my singleness has taught me that you can be lonely and exhausted and in need of sympathy— even with God. Even Jesus felt this way, and in the days and moments leading to his crucifixion, we see this played out. I can think of no greater loneliness than hanging on a cross, dying for a world that despises you, and then feeling forsaken by the Father who sent you, but— glory be!— loneliness and exhaustion did not cause Jesus to crumble.”

On this side of heaven, we cannot escape loneliness. Single, married, parent, friend, child, elder—I don’t care what relationship you are a participant in, there will be moments, sometimes seasons, of loneliness. It’s part of our humanity. But how shall we respond to such deep and nagging longings?

Having an earthly relationship with Jesus does not mean I will never be lonely. (In fact, in some of my circles, I feel a loneliness because of my relationship with Jesus.)

Instead, I have come to learn that when I come to Jesus with my relational longings, he does not always meet the need relationally.  When I have come to Jesus longing for human relationship, I have found that I am more in need of an invitation. Time in prayer and meditation in the word has become a sweet invitation to behold who he is and what he’s done in love. Loneliness is often an invitation into trust promise of the perfect communion to come.

The voice that rings from the Bible is the voice of the one we long to hear from, long to know, long to find our rest in.
—Mike Cosper, Recapturing the Wonder