Strength for the Journey: Biblical Wisdom for Daily Living
By Peter J. Gomes
303 pp. San Francisco:
HarperSanFrancisco
$24.95 (hc).
At one point in Mark Helprin's classic novel, A Soldier of the Great War, the protagonist pauses on his hike through the hilly outskirts of Rome and reflects on past journeys. "The scale might change, but the patterns were the same," Helprin (New York: Avon Books, 1992), p. 20 . he realizes. Major or minor, his diverse journeys all swung between highs and lows. One moment it was despair. The next, elation.
Sound familiar? Most people's life-journeys involve a trek through a wavy landscape of hills and valleys, tears and triumphs. You sink down, but then you rise up. Often stronger. And while the magnitude of the downs/ups may be different for everyone, the nature of the terrain is universal. For most folks, life isn't lived on the flatlands.
