{"id":15099,"date":"2021-02-19T18:40:04","date_gmt":"2021-02-19T23:40:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=15099"},"modified":"2021-02-19T18:40:04","modified_gmt":"2021-02-19T23:40:04","slug":"confessions-of-a-charismatic-christian-by-rick-dewhurst","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=15099","title":{"rendered":"‘Confessions of a Charismatic Christian,’ by Rick Dewhurst"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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In spite of the fact <\/strong>that I\u2019ve never given any of his novels a rave review, Rick Dewhurst keeps alerting me to his new books. This argues a level of spiritual humility which I can only admire. I like his writing style, but I don\u2019t think he\u2019s ever found his real vehicle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He has a new book out now, in a different genre entirely. It\u2019s a spiritual memoir called Confessions of a Charismatic Christian.<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It wasn\u2019t, frankly, what I expected. I was anticipating something along the lines of C. S. Lewis\u2019s Surprised By Joy.<\/em> The plan here is somewhat different. These Confessions are a series of spiritual lessons, each headed by an experience (not related chronologically) from the author\u2019s own life. Sometimes a miraculous one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I don\u2019t mean to disparage the book\u2019s plan, but I would have enjoyed reading more about the life that produced such an intriguing writer. But it\u2019s a capital mistake to judge a book by what you think it should be, rather than what the author chose to create.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I had some difficulty with the early chapters, which are the heaviest on the charismatic lessons. Rick is the pastor of a charismatic congregation in British Columbia. Although I myself spent time on the periphery of the charismatic movement back in the \u201870s, I have since joined a church that takes a skeptical attitude toward signs and wonders (though not denying their possibility). So I wasn\u2019t entirely in sympathy with a lot of that part. But as I read on, I found more and more material that was profound and edifying for everyone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I thought the writing a little discursive \u2013 the text could have been tightened up some. And the tone is sometimes unnecessarily apologetic. But Confessions of a Charismatic Christian<\/em> was an edifying book from a seasoned pastor. Worth reading.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In spite of the fact that I\u2019ve never given any of his novels a rave review, Rick Dewhurst keeps alerting me to his new books. This argues a level of spiritual humility which I can only admire. I like his writing style, but I don\u2019t think he\u2019s ever found his real vehicle. He has a … Continue reading ‘Confessions of a Charismatic Christian,’ by Rick Dewhurst<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[10,14,15],"tags":[3633,2376],"class_list":["post-15099","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nonfiction","category-religion","category-reviews","tag-confessions-of-a-charismatic-christian","tag-rick-dewhurst"],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15099","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15099"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15099\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15101,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15099\/revisions\/15101"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15099"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15099"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15099"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}