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Conversations with God: Book 3

An uncommon dialogue

If this were an earlier age, Neale Donald Walsch would have been burned at the stake for heresy. And there are probably quite a few people out there today who would still absolutely love to do that!

Thank goodness the days when such people were given licence to solve their theological and moral quirks and hangups in that fashion are gone (at least in most of the western world, bar the lunatic or fanatical fringe). And people can gain a lot from reading Walsch’s books, because they make a lot of sense.

Is he a prophet who is really taking down the words of God in a message for 21st Century humans? As opposed to 1st Century humans (or more accurately the Roman Empire trained theologians of the 4th Century)? Or those who think we still live – or should live – in that century? Who knows? Probably only God.

At times in Walsch’s narrative, I must say, God seemed just a little preoccupied with American concerns, and his vernacular a little too American for my comfort.

But there is no doubting the wisdom and the grace, even the godliness of the message, however it is occasionally expressed. And most of the time what is expressed makes for inspiring and profound, even humbling reading.

The most interesting effect on me was that I became more and more impressed with the messages and possibilities of the Conversations with God trilogy as the months progressed after my reading, as I thought back and reflected on it.

Let’s face it, most Christians accept without question the idea that in pre-Christian days God kept sending us prophets to remind us of his message, and where we were getting it wrong. Why do we accept all the prophets of the Old Testament, some of whom had some pretty ungodly messages to deliver, and then suddenly after Jesus, that’s his final word, and he’s never been interested in talking to us again? Well, except through all the saints and the presumably mostly divinely-inspired theological interpreters and bible scholars. But never again directly.

Is it so unreasonable that God might want to give us an update, and tell us again how we’re getting it wrong this time?