There is much in our culture that keeps us from staying on a path of religious faith and enlightenment: Creature comforts entice us away from the rigors of a materially simple and charitable life. Debates over pressing issues have lost whatever civil tone they once had. Our nation is simultaneously awash with multimillionaires and homeless children. Now, in particular, minister and psychotherapist Erik Kolbell believes we need a second chance.
In this hopeful book, this insightful writer and caregiver looks back through Scripture and finds that it reveals a God of second chances. The Bible is rich with words like re-conciliation, re-demption, re-vival, and re-surrection, and Kolbell eloquently explores one “re” word in every chapter, each pointing to a well-recognized biblical theme that speaks in its own way to how, when our spirits are weary, God gives us a second chance to deepen our lives of faith. Drawing from a wealth of biblical and contemporary illustrations, Kolbell offers comforting guidance to all spiritual seekers who yearn to find their way back to the sufficiency of God’s love and gain the wisdom to know what to respond in return. Includes questions for discussion or reflection.
“Who among us hasn’t wished for a second chance, whether it be for a conversation that took a wrong turn or a day filled with better decisions. In this wonderful book, Erik Kolbell shows us how second chances are possible, and how much more rewarding life can be when lived with forgiveness toward one another and toward ourselves.”
—Jane Pauley
“This is an important book because it addresses one of the paralyzing conditions of human nature: guilt. People stop going to church because they obsess about their sins. Marriages crumble because partners become so burdened by mistakes that they can neither forgive nor beg forgiveness. People lose the ability to pick up the pieces of their lives and move on. The God of Second Chances is a timely reminder that God has already forgiven us, that God has cleared away the detritus of our lives, and every new start is an integral part of God’s plan.”
—Rev. Bob Edgar, General Secretary, National Council of Churches of Christ in the USA
