Clear Winter Nights by Trevin Wax
Clear Winter Nights is a provocative story that drawn
together themes of doubt, faith, the truthfulness of Christianity and family
relationships. Seen through the lens of
Chris Walker’s, the book’s main protagonist, the story develops through the
characters including his fiancée Ashley, his Grampa Gil and a few other
characters. This novel or story is
rather unusual in that it carries with it more signs of what it means to
struggle with the Christian faith and opposing viewpoints than developing a riveting
storyline. Chris is in the midst of
college in which his faith is being tested through the stimulating teaching of
a professor who doesn’t seem to inhabit the kind of evangelical Christianity
Christ is involved with. Chris ends up
confiding in his grandpa about these struggles and finds not only a sparring
partner theologically and spiritually, but a man who has weathered the storms
himself.
After digging up some old history about his grandpa, Chris
is amazed at how many challenging times his gramps had as a pastor. The point that we don’t really know a person
until we dig deeply and ask the tough questions is goes a long way in the
story. In the end, we find out that his
Grandpa had been a faithful servant of Christ through divisive times and had
entertained some of the same doubts that Chris was going through in the
present. His grandfather says a penetrating
word to him at one point, “Chris, make sure you don’t use scholarship as a way
of masking your doubts, of defending yourself against the Bible, or distancing
yourself from God’s claim on your life” (50).
Basing Christianity as an ethical system ultimately fails because it’s
much more than ethics, but ‘about dead people coming to life…God seeking man”
(50). Often, scholarship is used as a
vehicle to mask the penetrating questions of faith, in turn, we end up having
more confidence in the academic tools and methods more than we do the revealed
truth we are given.
Overall, I enjoyed this book as a fictional account of some
very real and contemporary situations that people face concerning larger
questions of life and faith. I don’t think
this book was an amazingly developed story but a rather in depth struggle many
people face going through college, looking for a trusted guide to help
them.
Thanks to Waterbrook/Multnomah Blogging for Books program
for the copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
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