Skin In The Game: Living An Epic Jesus-Centered Life, by Rick Lawrence
[Note: This book was provided free of charge by Kregel Book Tours in exchange for an honest review.]
It is altogether fitting that in a book which discusses the need to be vulnerable and open to Jesus and to let Him into all areas of one’s life that the author should be so open in discussing his own existence. In baring his soul about his own struggles with believing himself inauthentic, his own wrestling with control, and his own difficult courtship and marriage (two broken engagements and a near-divorce experience but a marriage that is still going strong), and even his own melancholy reflection at childhood photos, there is no mistake that this highly quotable book [1] is personal and searingly open. Such vulnerability is touching, even where it is uncomfortable, and helps to give credibility to the author’s critique of the safe and “risk-free” version of Christianity in the West that strives to avoid danger and openness and seeks after karma [2] rather than grace. By putting his own skin in the discussion, the author shows us a life that is lived honestly and openly as an imperfect model, while also presenting the life of Christ in a compelling way.
This book is organized around eight encounters between Jesus Christ and various people petitioning Him for help. In these encounters, most of which are familiar to the book’s intended reading audience of Christians with a willingness to accept risk and live openly and vulnerably, the author focuses on eight questions: Will you face your shame? Will you receive grace? Will you embrace your true identity? Will you own what you want? Will you confront your fears? Will you risk? Will you wait, even when all hope is lost? Will you make Jesus your first and last resort? These are not easy questions to answer. If you are a person given to melancholy reflection and watery eyes, you should probably not read this book in public unless you want to confess to those around you that you do indeed relate all to painfully well to the book and its subject matter, as was the case for me.
Yet while this book is a short one (it is only about 140 pages including introduction and footnotes), it is a powerful one in several aspects. It is powerful in the honesty of its author, whose vulnerability is deeply sympathetic. It is powerful in its interpretation of scripture and its focus on Jesus’ approach in dealing with the broken in seeking to get them to own up to the state of their hearts so that they could be healed from the inside out. It is powerful in its ability to discuss these scriptures in the light of powerful stories from music and literature, and from citations that are as diverse as C.K. Chesterton and C.S. Lewis to Regina Spektor and Amanda Palmer (formerly of the Dresden Dolls). It is a well-crafted work that packs a substantial and sometimes unexpected emotional punch. It is a book to be digested whole and reflected on in honest prayers to God and honest and open living in a world that is deeply unsafe and broken by sin. For it is those who are most broken that God calls, because they have the most passionate longing to be made whole in a way that they have perhaps never known.
[1] See, for example:
“To every follower of Jesus who is, right now, offering their skin in the game to help set captives free.” – the author’s dedication
“It is the false shame of fools to try to conceal wounds that have not healed.” – Horace
“When things go wrong between parent and child in the first two years of life, you [the child] are permanently damaged by it in ways that cannot be erased. The awareness that you are damaged, the felt knowledge that you didn’t get what you needed and that as a result, your emotional development has been warped and stunted in profound ways–this is what I refer to as basic shame.” – Joseph Burgo
“Great wines come from low-yielding vineyards planted in marginal climates on the poorest soils. Though hard on the vines, these tough conditions are good for the wine because vines that are stressed must work harder to produce fruit, which leads to fewer but more concentrated and flavorful grapes. By contrast, the vines used for bulk wines have it easy.” – Ben Gilberti, wine expert
“Waiting on God can kill our hope when the object of our waiting seems hopeless. Hoping when there is no hope does not guarantee the outcome, but the act of it does force to the surface a kind of abandon–a desperate plea for help that leaves us vulnerable to deep disappointment and grief. When we believe in the face of a hopeless cause, we are carving out a capacity in our soul to live by faith, not by sight. And faith is central to a skin-in-the-game life–one in which bold, risky giving of ourselves unlocks our ability to embrace each moment as a “living sacrifice.” We cannot learn to hope this way without learning how to wait.” – the author
[2] See, for example:
Edge Induced Cohesion 