Book: "Plan B" (Pete Wilson)

TITLE: Plan B: What Do You Do When God Doesn't Show Up the Way You Thought He Would?
AUTHOR: Pete Wilson
PUBLISHER: Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2009, (245pp).

I must say that I am pleasantly surprised by the way Pete Wilson handles the problem of suffering and disappointment in life. Wilson does not come across as a pontificating know-it-all. Neither does he take the cowardly stance of hiding his head under the sand of 'I-Don't-Know.' Wilson knows that a typical person's Plan A frequently fails. For anyone who puts their trust and hopes in a successful Plan A, they will be lost when they are forced to adopt Plan B.

Wilson's style is more like a hand-holding style. He does not dismiss the magnitude of the problems. He recognizes that Plan B is almost the defacto plan that many people face. Having recognized that, he leads the reader toward a positive embrace of Plan Bs, especially when our hopes are dashed with a failed primary plan. More importantly, he gently leads the reader beyond focusing on plans, toward focusing on Christ, the Author and Finisher of our faith. This alone is worth the price of the book. Harnessing the wisdom of Augustine, St John of the Cross, to the modern preachers such as Francis Chan, Henri Nouwen and Peter Scazzero, Wilson gives the reader a buffet of spiritual encouragement in one volume.

This book begins gently with the recognition of tough issues of life. It nudges the reader with a hand-holding atmosphere, and climaxes with an unabashed declaration that hope resides in the cross, in the resurrected Christ.  This book is Pete Wilson's first attempt. It is not a scholarly treatise. Neither is it a plain devotional for Christians. It is a down-to-earth invitation to the reader to journey with the author, to address an often avoided question in life: "What do we do when God doesn't show up the way we thought He would?"

Wilson answers this question brilliantly. In fact, this is a book for all Christians, not just those who are struggling. My favourite quotation in the book is this:

"No, my greatest fear for my life and for yours is that we'll just get busy and distracted and settle for a mediocre, unexamined life. It's that we'll just settle into life as usual and never become the persons God intended for us to be." (193)

Wow. In this light, perhaps our Plan Bs, are actually God's Plan As, after all. Wonderful.

Ratings: 4 stars of 5.

A Thomas-Nelson BookSneeze reviewer.

conrade