When Jesus Sleeps: Finding Spiritual Peace Amid the Storms of Life

This book is small but powerful. In words beautifully expressed, the author offers a way to cling to hope during overwhelming trials. He shows the reader how to overcome the feeling of abandonment by God, and how to renew trust in His providential care. One author said, "When you are at the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on." This book, for many people, has served as that knot. Who knows -- maybe if enough people buy it, Sophia Press will see fit to reprint it.

This is an excellent book for meditation. Smaller bites are better than eating it whole. There is so much here. This is my second time reading it, and I am going deeper. Martinez is a beautiful writer. His style is visual and poetic. You will not be disappointed.

This is a very small book, just three chapters from a larger work. But, as C.S. Lewis noted in another context, "its inside is bigger than its outside." People often think that the presence of evil in the world, in all its myriad forms, is the main objection to God and to Christianity. But evil can be answered pretty easily. Just pick up any apologetics book to find the answer to the question, "Why does God permit good people to suffer?" But once you get past the problem of evil, and troublesome dogmatic knots are untangled, and you just try to get on with life, you will soon come to the real problem, and that is, "Why is God silent?" Not evil, but silence, is the unraveling point of Christianity for many.It is this point that the author addresses in his little book. He begins with the Gospel account of the storm on the lake. Jesus and the disciples are in the little boat. Jesus is asleep, and the disciples are afraid for their lives. Why is Jesus sleeping when the storm is in full fury around them? Why is He silent in our lives when the storms threaten to destroy?His answer is contained in the three theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity. No pop psychology. No warm fuzzies. Just a solid discussion that satisfies the head and the heart both.If you feel that you are beating your fists against heaven with your prayers and pleas, and all you hear is a big Divine Nothing, don't despair. Read this little book a few times and reflect on its contents. You will find both comfort and challenge, although it will not necessarily be in the way you expect. God's silence is not God's absence or indifference.