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 Evans likens the process of forgiving well to painting well; It requires practice; it requires copying! Apr 02, 2006
Conflict, from a Hollywood perspective, can be a rather savory morsel. Very few movies are worth seeing without it. These conflicts regardless of their complexity are generally resolved within 1 to 3 hours. The bad guys get their comeuppance; the credits roll; we go home.
But reality is much, much messier. There are residuals. What's done cannot be undone. Retaliation cannot be made more palatable with a soundtrack. There is no detached viewing of events. Indeed, we are often in the events in which conflicts are rarely resolved within 3 hours.
It's just this messiness that Vickie Evans's The Art of Forgiving, an amalgamation of memoir, sermon, and manual explores.
Evans begins with a reel from her own life, an attempt to make a young second marriage work. She writes, "My husband told me that he didn't think this relationship was going to work and that he wanted me to move out." This request came at a time when Evans needed to have surgery. But rather than dwell on the obvious, she uncovers a layering of hurt-mental upon emotional upon spiritual. The depth of this hurt transcended any mollification cinematic revenge could afford. It required divine help. She writes, "I had some inside connections with God that would protect me...." And He did.
The protection didn't come in the form of averting the imminent separation of the marriage. The protection came as God walked Evans through it and out of all its hurt and fear and anger and lack of self-worth. All of which had become woven into a perfectly fitting garment of unforgiveness. There was a message to be learned, a message of forgiving, and Evans has learned that message and renders it in her first book.
Thankfully The Art of Forgiving resists the allure of a step by step, how to process. That form rarely works, often falling apart under the weight of individual differences. Instead Evans gives the reader vignettes peppered with scripture. She invites a reader to see oneself, to engage humility, and to listen as God speaks. Then and only then does she follow each chapter with a distillation of key points about forgiving.
Why The ART of Forgiving? Evans likens the process of forgiving well to painting well. She invokes an image of the masters Michael Angelo, Picasso, and Van Gogh, working hard to hone their craft. And that calls forth yet another image, that of the masters copying the masters. Day in and day out many of the great European artists would place canvass on easel in the Louvre and begin copying those who came before them. Many believed that if you didn't copy, you couldn't advance. The same holds true for forgive- ness. It requires practice; it requires copying. Two examples Evans provides are Jesus and Stephen. Jesus while on the cross says, "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do." Stephen while being stoned says, "Lord, lay not this sin to their charge."
We've always had examples to copy from the Bible, and now readers of The Art of Forgiving may very well find a contemporary example in Vickie Evans.
Carlton P. Jordan Jr., 3/2006
0 of 1 found the following review helpful:
Making sure that of the second chance decision Mar 28, 2006
What I mean by second chance decision. Be careful of how we give men second chances when we know in our hearts when we get that gut feeling that something is not right. We again fall in the rap of love, and get hurt all over again. Do not let our emotionals and feeling get in the way of our true answers from our hearts. thanks a million
1 of 1 found the following review helpful:
 A MUST READ Mar 14, 2006
THE ART OF FORGIVING HAS A UNIVERSAL MESSAGE. IT SPEAKS TO EVERY AND ANY ONE ABOUT THE BASICS OF FORGIVING AND WHY IT IS SO IMPORTANT IN ALL FACETS OF LIFE. THE AUTHOR USES PERSONAL EXPERIENCES AND TESTIMONIES THAT ARE SIMPLE AND EASY TO RELATE TO.
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