There’s a novel I read during a time I tried making sense of God.
The main character, Katy, dialogues an internal battle:
“I tried once more . . . to force myself to begin to love God,” says Katy Mortimer, whose honesty further unfolds when she says, “I want to do it; I know I ought to do it: but I cannot.” *
Maybe you’ve felt this too?
I was drawn to her frankness in this novel about a young woman who questions the world around her—those who suffered, those who appeared pious, those who spoke harshly, those who exuded joy.
At midpoint reading a novel—which was written in the 1800s by Elizabeth Prentiss, and is, in fact, overly old-fashioned—it became clear to a weary, striving, younger me how stories illuminate the internal workings of the hidden heart, for I was moved to think, Yeah, I feel this way too.
I’ve written about my own internal dialogue in a recent article describing how I once thought I could muster devotion to God and wondered if I truly loved him. But God loves us first.
This same author who wrote about Katy Mortimer also wrote a hymn that appears in traditional hymnals called, “More Love to Thee, O Christ.” In the lyrics, the author pleads for God to increase her love for Christ Jesus.
Love comes from God, dispersed by the Holy Spirit, as her hymn portrays, and I picture Elizabeth Prentiss, perhaps herself once a version of Katy Mortimer—striving, doubting, discouraged by false starts, encumbered by her humanness. Then she encounters Jesus. Not the version of Jesus she’d imagined, but the Jesus who is both human and God, both gentle and blazingly righteous, both friend and Lord.
She begins to love God and begs to love God more, for love comes from God. **
The novel, the hymn, they are small outpourings of her discovery that God loves us first and seeks us out when we “cannot” yet love God, as Katy Mortimer displays in her frank dialogue.
Writing blog posts feels like me unearthing, earnestly seeking, asking God to supply me with more love for Christ. To rehearse what God has done and who he is, as revealed in Scripture.
My love for Christ increases when I read, when I listen to music—Caroline Cobb’s lyrics and sweet voice illuminating reason to love Christ, reminding me it’s not found in the striving.
I do strive to write clear and beautiful sentences in these blog posts where maybe you’ll think, Yeah, I feel this way too, whether you’ve known Jesus for a long time, for a little while, or not quite yet.
In these short pieces, I hope to be mindful of your time and thoughts. Words like “beauty,” “faith,” and “Jesus” evoke different responses in readers.
Throughout church history, much has been written about Jesus. To plot words on a page about God holds weight. For me, it feels almost improbable. I read a lot before writing, and that includes reading God’s Word daily, along with reading good novels, online articles, and nonfiction books.
I’m currently listening to the audiobook, David Copperfield, because a favorite current-day author, Leif Enger, recommended it. I like old classics, especially Charles Dickens's work, but mostly just prefer novels that challenge my way of thinking or cause me to notice something I didn’t before.
Leif Enger’s recent novel about a man rushing across Lake Superior in a sailboat while pursued by an enemy provoked much thought, but I wished Enger’s opinions about church and organized religion weren’t so negative. I listened to a podcast, The Russell Moore Show, in which Enger shares more about his beliefs. *** The podcast host, Russell Moore, adds in some bonus thoughts, rounding out the discussion, communicating what I too think and believe about church and evangelism—themes on which I sometimes write.
I’m also reading two newly published nonfiction books, The Joy of the Trinity by Tara-Leigh Cobble, and a book called Can I Say That? by Brenna Blain, a young author who dialogues her own difficult coming-of-age story. Perhaps she’s a modern-day Katy Mortimer/Elizabeth Prentiss.
What do you like to read? Maybe you’re in Genesis or Ephesians. Maybe you’re at midpoint reading a novel. How is it shaping your thoughts and your view of God?
*(From Stepping Heavenward, by Elizabeth Prentiss, p 39, edition by Barbour Publishing, 1998)
**(1 John 4:7)
***(Moore, Russell, The Russell Moore Show, "Novelist Leif Enger Cheerfully Refuses Despair," July 10, 2024)
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