The Healing Path: How the Hurts in Your Past Can Lead You to a More Abundant Life

This is a very interesting book--after I read it I wanted to read all of Allender's other publications. He is a great author and this book was very hard for me to put down once I started! A great book for any Christian who has ever faced challenges in their life.

This was a good spiritual book but the best has got to be An Encounter With A Prophet

I highly recommend this book. Dr. Allender clearly communicates what it means to embrace life, including the disappointments and trials. There are no quick fix-it answers offered. In the opening chapter, Dr. Allender states "Healing in this life is not the resolution of our past; it is the use of our past to draw us into deeper relationship with God and His purposes for our lives. We need a new understanding of how to deal with past hurts, one that acknowledges the damage to the human spirit while charting a path toward the abundant life God promises." The very notion of not trying to resolve, or fix the past is revolutionary. Instead, the author invites us to embrace our life, to recognize the value of our "story" and to be willing to enter into the lives of others. He does not sugar coat this process, on the contrary, he states "The healing path plunges us into the depths of our doubt, where a new faith can be born. This faith...frees us to remember a past not only with loss, but with redemption." The great part is that Dr. Allender spends as much time on the redemption, hope and true community as he does honestly examining the pain that life often includes, then encourages the reader to consider what it means to live with the realization of hope. This book is a thoughtful, compassionate rendering and would benefit for anyone who has been dealt pain in their life, no matter what the pain is. Chapter topics include: betrayal and the loss of faith, the loss of hope, the loss of love, the wager of faith, the dream of hope and creating a community of sojourners.