IS THERE ANYBODY OUT THERE?
By Mez McConnell
Christian Focus.128 pages. £6.99
ISBN 1 84550 205 1
If you want an unusual book that really packs a spiritual punch, then this could be the one for you.
The subtitle announces, ‘A journey from despair to hope’, and so, you might say, is any testimony of God’s saving grace to an individual. Yet the story that Mez shares with his reader is full of misunderstandings, a strong dislike of Christians and days filled with doubt.
The style of the narrative is almost ‘stream of consciousness’. He writes his thoughts through the very disturbing days of his childhood and adolescence. To say that his experiences are way beyond the norm of most folk in church would be a huge understatement; child abuse, drug dependency, crime, prison; yet somehow the focus seems less on the unfortunate Mez, but much more on me, the believer sitting in the pew. How would I react to such an individual? Do I speak a foreign church language to the average person on the street? Am I showing the love of Jesus in my life, so that others would be attracted to my Saviour, or am I actually putting people off?
The author is brutally honest and frank, yet his story is an amazing miracle of God not giving up on him, rather bringing him through to a life of love and service and a desire to share his faith with others. So, actually, we’re not all that different after all.
Mary Stolarski,
Southport, literature worker with Grace Baptist Mission
