Arranged topically, each sections gives selections that are accessible for newcomers to MacDonald, most between 10-20 pages. I was excited to find selections from MacDonald's widely-read Unspoken Sermons, but it's selections from Sir Gibbie, The Princess and the Goblin, Lilith, and At the Back of the North Wind that are lesser-known that made me stop and think -- and pray.
MacDonald will doubtless be a challenge to our culture's sentimentalized versions of Christian faith, because every word he writes is deliberately chosen as a witness to Jesus Christ, the Good News of God in a world that believes all things spiritual are divorced from everyday affairs. As Wright has written in her introduction to this collection: "For MacDonald the ordinary events of each day -- the 'holy present,' as he called it -- are messages to us direct from God. He was convinced that the kingdom of heaven can be a reality in the here and now, and that it requires daily acts of obedient discipleship to bring it about" (page xi).
There are so many glimpses of that evangelical witness here, that it's hard for me to select just one or two that represent that vision. This refreshing collection is one to which I will return again and again.
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I received a free copy of this book from Plough Publishing in exchange for my honest review here.