Rick Lee James just became an associate certified chaplain and recommends Leif Enger's novel I Cheerfully Refuse, which follows a Christian couple who refuse apocalypse and work cheerfully against despair. James contrasts the biblical apocalypse, Christ's hopeful reign, with cultural collapse narratives, urging listeners to be beacons of light in a broken world.
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Welcome back to Voices in My Head. As always, I am your host, Rick Lee James. It is a cold, cold Wednesday morning here in Ohio. I thought spring had arrived and I wish it would just stay, but seems like we keep dropping back into freezing temperatures. Here I am, just finished my 6-mile run early in the morning. It's, uh, 5:30 AM right now and It's cold, 31 degrees. Anyway, um, back at work this week. I, I had a week off, man, I needed it. I don't think I even realized how desperately tired and near burnout I was. Was so great to spend some time with my wife and with my son and pretty much nobody else. It was just a time to refresh, to celebrate my 15th wedding anniversary, to celebrate being a dad and a husband. And, uh, yeah, so So I want to say at the beginning of this, because I know they listen, um, hope my parents have a wonderful trip to visit my sister in Korea. They are probably in the air right now. I know they left Tuesday, but just sending out my love to them. Uh, I want to also say, this is, uh, I don't even know if I have a typical podcast format anymore. I love it when I have guests, but I don't have a guest this week. Um, but I wanted to share something. I, I finally have been able to, after, uh, receiving news this week that officially I am now certified as a chaplain. Uh, 5 years working towards certification. I knew the board had recommended me for it, but the board officially voted on it and now it is done. So I will go to a ceremony, um, coming up in June in New Orleans, thankfully. But it is already done. I am officially an associate certified chaplain through the APC, and I'm grateful for that. So that was some good news. That being said, having some downtime last week and beginning to discover things for fun again, and not just things I had to work on and train and study, um, I finished a wonderful novel. I don't read a lot of novels. I read a lot of books, but novels are not always my thing. And this book is, is by an author named Leif Enger. I'm just learning about him. That's L-E-I-F, and I believe the last name is spelled E-N-G-E-R. Er. Um, I'm going to look it up actually while I'm talking. Yeah, E-N-G-E-R. I guess he's written several books. I first heard about him on a podcast that I was listening to that was talking about literature and new literature that is not only just very good writing but also written, uh, from a perspective that is from a Christian worldview, even though it's not explicitly a Christian novel. And so as I understand it, Leif, um, is a person who is a follower of Jesus, but his writing is not evangelistic, and his writing is not even Christian, as much as his writing approaches what it looks like to live in the world as— the best way I can say it— as someone who is a part of the kingdom of God. It's not a churchy novel. There are a lot of references to God and beliefs and things, and not always in the best light. But the best way I can think to describe this to you, and I hope this will be a an accurate description. Imagine a post-apocalyptic world, or maybe even a world that is moving into sort of what we might call an apocalyptic era, which I know I have problems with using that word in a bad light because it comes from the Book of Revelation, and the word apocalypse is actually how the word revelation is translated. And the thing that is being revealed in the Book of Revelation is Jesus. And his coming reign, and how all things will be made new, and the gates of heaven will be open and all 12 will never be shut, and nothing wicked will ever enter in, and there will be peace, and God's love will reign supremely, and he will be the light. And so it's the most hopeful book probably of the Bible, and it always gets called, uh, you know, we talk about the apocalypse is this terrible thing coming. So I have some problems with the language because in my view the apocalypse is the beautiful day of the reign Jesus, where peace and love and the hope of Christ fills all creation and heaven and earth is made new. However, that's not what most of us mean when we talk about living through an apocalypse. We think of like zombies and war and people who are just awful and economies crashing and oceans polluting and, you know, violence. So that's the kind of apocalypse where they're definitely in a society where society has broken down. Um, the The economy is not stable. There are marauders who are doing violent things. There are people taking each other captive. It's not a world that seems hopeful. But the main character of the book, much because of the influence of his wife who runs a bookstore in the beginning of the novel, um, has this kind of hope that is unquenchable. And it is just one of the most beautifully written— it almost does to say like approach that kind of world? What difference would it make that a Christian would be living in, let's say, the apocalypse? And how would we live through? And I wanted to recommend it. It's, it's a good read. It's an easy read as far as it's, it's not taxing of your mind, but it makes you think a lot too. And one line that stood out to me that I think encapsulates the novel, when the main character is talking about his wife, thinking back, says, when I was asked about the promised war and how we ought to get ready, she pulled the car over and looked in my eyes. Her kindness was like water over smooth stones. She said— and she's referring to a pastor they had just heard— she said, Pastor Leake was a decent man who often mistook his worldview for the world, a common churchman's error. And this is the part I just love. She said the church was a broken compass, that our job always and forever was to refuse apocalypse in all its form and work cheerfully against it. I love that line, that our job always and forever is to refuse apocalypse in all of its forms and to work cheerfully against it. That, that we will not participate in apocalyptic type things and the way it's used in the darkness and the greed and the violence and the wars and everything else. So there are a lot of things that happen in this novel, but we see this hopeful character living in the world as a person who refuses, who refuses to live in the apocalypse even though he's living through the apocalypse. The people he encounters, the difficulties that happen, the griefs, the tragedies, and the way that this character lives through the world, I just think it's such a beautiful model for Christians in the world and how we should not ever give ourselves over to despair. So I know this is very brief and it does not encapsulate the fullness of what this novel is, but if you're looking for a really good hopeful book that you would ever think, I'm going to read a book about the coming apocalypse and the breakdown of society and the economy in the world and walk away feeling hopeful about it, I just really wanted to recommend this novel, I Cheerfully Refused, I Cheerfully Refuse, by Leif Enger, E-N-G-E-R. I think you will be very pleased with it. I actually had the audiobook as well, so I would read and listen and walk and listen, and it was just a beautiful experience for me. It was life-giving, and I feel it nourishing my soul. I think I'm going to go back to it again and again. I think it's going to be one of those books that I, that I will return to, like Jabbercrow. Jabbercrow is probably my other favorite novel. I don't have lots and lots of novels that I've read, but those are some that I, that I just really appreciate. So I cheerfully refuse, and I hope that you will cheerfully refuse to live in the apocalypse as well. There's a lot of things to make us feel like a loss of hope, a loss of despair. Especially in our country right now. Things are just so chaotic, but we need to cheerfully refuse to live in that world in the way that others will. We always need to be beacons of hope who will not allow the apocalypse to rule the way that we live in the world. Amen. Well, Jesus is Lord, and that is the Christian worldview. Hope you all have a wonderful week, a wonderful day. I've got to get to work. God bless you. Take care.
