review of Derwin Gray's "The Good Life"

Ask 100 people what the ‘good life’ is, and there’s a good chance that you’ll get 100 different answers.  Pastor Derwin L. Gray (yes, that Derwin Gray, for those of you who recognize the name from NFL), gives us his take on it in his new book The Good Life: What Jesus Teaches about Finding True Happiness (B&H Publishing, 2020).

And it might surprise you to find that the Good Life doesn’t come from fame as a football player, or riches from a multiyear contract. In fact, as Gray points out, the Good Life comes from things that are completely opposite of fame and fortune.

Take a minute right now to turn in your Bible to Matthew 5: 1-12. Go ahead, this can wait.  Spoiler alert, this is what is commonly called the Beatitudes, or the “Blessed Be’s”. You know, “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth”, and several other things that often don’t seem to make sense.  And then Gray tells us that if we suffer all these things in the beatitudes, that we will be happy, and it makes less sense. But there is one little part that explains his thought process, and it’s easy to miss—mostly because it’s fairly obvious. The word used here is often translated as ‘blessed’, but it also has the senses of ‘being in a state of happiness’. (Trust me, he has done his homework on this one.)

And so he walks us through the Beatitudes, and shows us what the ‘good life’ looks like from Jesus’ viewpoint.  It’s pretty counter-intuitive, but after a bit it starts to sink in, and I learned that true happiness (the good life) doesn’t come from people or riches, or fame, but rather from the posture of being in God's will and living life in a way that brings me closer to him.

Each chapter with a prayer, some reflection questions, and a few things to remember.

He ends the book by inviting the reader to copy his “happiness manifesto”, sign it, put it somewhere where it will be seen often, and then to live it. And then to help it all sink in (some of learn more slowly than others) he asks us to participate in a 30 day ‘happiness challenge’: each day for 30 days read Matt 5:1-12, read it slowly and carefully, and bask in the life style that provided Jesus so much happiness. You might find that happiness means something totally different than what you’ve been looking for.

I received a copy of this book from the publisher as a member of their blogger program. I was asked to provide an honest review

4/5