Friday, July 29, 2011

The God I Never Knew by Robert Morris – A Review

For Robert Morris, the God he never knew, but fortunately has come to know very well, is the Holy Spirit. And Mr. Morris isn’t selfish when it comes to this relationship… he wants each of us to be able to experience that same joy that he has found with this relatively recent friendship.
Depending on the denomination or even the congregation to which you belong, those two words, Holy Spirit, might excite you, intrigue you, or possibly even terrify you. And that’s because He is probably the least well understand of the three persons who make up the Trinity.
Morris tells how he was warned, when he went away to seminary, to stay away from those people who talk about the Holy Spirit. And therein lays the problem. The majority of Christians either try to quietly skip over His name when it appears in the Gospel reading, or, in the name of the Holy Spirit, they act in such a way that makes the rest of us want to skip over His name and run from him.
And so to counteract this plethora of misinformation, Morris has written this book. It’s filled with anecdotes about his experience with the Holy Spirit, and shows how he has been able to move from acknowledging the Spirit as a mere acquaintance to warmly embracing Him as a friend. And as he relives that journey, Morris invites his readers to join him on the trip.
We learn a lot about the Spirit, His attributes, His power, and how He is there for us. But Morris doesn’t just scribble out his impressions, he carefully points us to the Scriptures, those passages of The Word of God, that tell us about this remarkable personage.
I certainly agree with the thrust of the subtitle of this book: “How Real Relationship with the Holy Spirit Can Change Your Life” but I was left looking for the “How’ The personal stories are there, the Scripture references are there, the reasons to have the relationship are there, but I think Morris could have done a better job offering tips on how to develop the relationship. Yes it will be individualized and personal for each of us, but this is more like an outline of the speech that will be given later.
Lots of good information, just not presented in a way that will help me remember this book as a memorable one. 3½ of 5 stars

I received a copy of this book free from the publisher in exchange for an unbiased review.

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