One Last Reading Suggestion

So do you remember back in the day when this used to be a book blog? You know, when I would write about books and only occasionally the family or something of potential spiritual significance and things around here were literary and intellectual (oh, I made a joke!) and oh-so-inspiriational? Then the twins hijacked things and suddenly I'm posting massively pregnant selfies and we're all making bets about how long the twins will stay in (and how big my belly can get).

But today, in the spirit of the New Year, we're going to momentarily get back on track because I want to share with you one of my favourite books of all time.

Drumroll, please.

The Hawk and the Dove by Penelope Wilcock.

Admittedly, it's not so much just one book as an entire series, and I've only read the first three books (I've heard 4-6 are excellent as well), but if I had one set of books I would encourage you to read in 2014, I think this would be it. I read them growing up and asked my parents to give them to me this year for my birthday (because nothing screams 27 and pregnant like the monastic life), and they have made my December meditative, laughter filled, and encouraging. The story line revolves around a Benedictine monastery in the fourteenth century as a group of monks learns what it truly means to love each other and be loved by God in the midst of brokenness. I'll even admit to you that I finished rereading The Hawk and the Dove trilogy a couple weeks ago, and I still haven't moved it from my night stand to my bookshelf, because I don't want to forget what my soul learned from reading it.

This last month as I've prepared for the birth of the twins with my husband halfway around the world and my two boys showing obvious evidence of stress, I've needed the reminder that "love has no defences, and you only know it's love when it hurts." I've needed the Christ who wept in Gethsemane. I've needed the Lord of the wounded and broken. And that is the Jesus that Penelope Wilcock so gently and skillfully writes about. Pick up these books this year. You can read a chapter at a time, a story at a time, really, in between the busyness of your life, and maybe Christ will come to you as well and let you touch the wounds in his hands and side like he did for me and remind you that you are not alone.