Living Life Backwards

I have many faults, and one of them is the fact that I rarely read any books that are not fiction. I love a good fiction book, and as I have said before, have even gotten some help & encouragement, and even convicting on occasion from a Christian fiction book.

A few weeks ago, I ran into an article about a new book on sexual purity that sounded interesting. I checked the book out and found a free download of the book, "13 Ways To Ruin Your Life", so I downloaded it, and thought the author, Jarrod Jones, had a lot of good things to say, and has a great writing style. I may blog about that book some time also. He has another book that he wrote 2 years ago, "The Backward Life", and I found it for one cent on Amazon (why people sell books so cheap is beyond me, but I won't complain!). I got the book in the mail today, and since I didn't have much else to do, read it this afternoon and evening.

I have to say, it is the best non-fiction book I have read for a long time. He goes with the idea that God's way of doing things is backwards from what the world does, and goes on from there to show how we need to live a backwards life. One issue he spent quite a bit of time on, was self. How so often, we even form friendships and other relationships on the basis of what that person can do for us.

I found myself saying "ouch" a few times throughout the book, especially when he talked about self and how we are so concerned about making ourselves happy in all the wrong ways. He also addresses the issues of God loving us, and us loving Him, which is a topic I need a lot of help in. In one chapter, the author takes each phrase in John 3:16 and breaks it down to talk about each part. I have felt for sometime, that one of my many problems, is holding onto guilt. Man, I still feel guilty for things I did as a kid, and all the more for things I have done as an adult. That was addressed in the book also.

There is supposed to be a work book to go along with the book, but I cannot find it anywhere, so I emailed the author. Hopefully, I can get hold of a copy, as I feel it would be helpful to go through the book again using a workbook. In the meantime, Mr. Jarrod Jones has given me a lot to think about and work on.

I apologize to anyone who reads this for the spacing. I try to space between paragraphs, but no matter how many times I try, it won't do it tonight.