Story: Recapture the Mystery

by Steven James and Dina Nayeri

Book Overview

Using thirty short, image-based chapters, this book makes the gospel real for a postmodern world and allows readers to meet Christ again or for the very first time. This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0800731131
• ISBN13: 9780800731137
• Release Date: February 2006
• Publisher: Fleming H. Revell Company
• Length: 208 Pages
• Weight: 0.45 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 6.1" x 8.4"

Customer Reviews

More than a STORY

To say that STORY is just a story is to say that the Louvre is just a storeroom for paintings. I have had an extremely rewarding time reading what I can only describe as one man's love for God. Steven's writings are filled with many dichotomies: Pain & Joy, Guilt & Grace, Lies & Truth, Depression & Redemption, Loss & Reward, Darkness & Light, Poetry & Prose, Today & Tomorrow, and Lonely Places & Eternal life in God's Kingdom. If you want to go below the surface and discover some of the depths you can go in your relationship with Christ, read this book. I challenge you not to find parts of yourself written into the STORY.

This Story will change your life...for eternity

Recently a book grabbed me and wouldn't let go. And it wasn't the Bible, yet... it WAS the Bible... seen through the heart of a storyteller. Story by Steven James is a fresh view of the Gospel that fills the soul with the realness of Christ and lets you experience the deepness of God. This book will meet you where you are on your walk with Christ and reveal the truth to you. I highly recommend it for anyone who is searching for Christ or for those who desire a closer walk with him. Steven James has true God inspired insight into the scriptures and can present it like none other. I closely identify with his heartfelt longing, in every moment, in every breath, to fall deeper in love with the one who died in his place. Story is a book for every shelf....but don't just let it sit there. Take it out, embrace the mystery and see yourself as you were meant to be seen, a deeply loved child of the God of the universe, who spilled his blood to save ours. This is a Story that will change your life...for eternity. Steven James, thanks for this. It has touched my heart, opened my eyes and filled my soul with the reality of what Christ really did for me. God is truly using you to advance the kingdom. Please keep writing; I'll keep reading. I also recommend Becoming Real: Christ's Call to Authentic Living by Steven James. Check out my review and see why.

Wow, what a Story!

Wow. What a Story. Story is the latest handiwork by Steven James, a little-known but extremely gifted writer and speaker. Story is a re-imaging of redemptive history, from Creation to Fall to Israel to Christ's birth, ministry, death and resurrection. It is a captivating interweaving of stories, penetrating observations, and evocative images and poems quite unlike anything I have ever read before. It has the potential to speak powerfully both to post-moderns who have little knowledge of the Bible, people who are comfortable in their pretty dead religion they would call Christianity, and people who are truly devoted followers of Christ. One of the fascinating things about the book is that it is intentionally not dry and theological, intentionally imaginative and readable, and yet is fairly full-orbed in its theology and doesn't try to soft-pedal the seriousness of sin nor the cost of truly following Christ. As James writes, "It's all one story. And only when you finally untangle it, see its scope, and enter it for yourself do you realize that the story has finally entered and at last untangled you." And that's what he does-he untangles it, sees its scope and majesty, and then plunges you deeply into it and invites you to follow Jesus. His chapter devoted to the wedding of Cana, and his imagining of how Jesus acted at a wedding, is worth the price of the book by itself. And there's zinger after zinger that will make you stop and think, regardless of where you are in your journey with God: You'll never understand Easter without first seeing the chains in your own heart. I've peddled God like the peanut guy at the ballpark. "God! I've got some red-hot God here!" When Christianity becomes something other than entering into and living out the story of God, it becomes something other than Christianity. When you string enough wasted moments together, you get a wasted life. I don't think there are too many followers of Jesus around anymore. There are plenty of churchgoing admirers, but most of us would rather not leave our nets behind and follow him. Instead we prefer dragging the nets onshore with us so we can have the best of both worlds. Believe the story and you'll finally enter it for yourself. Buy this book for people who don't know the truth; buy this book for people who think they know the truth but have yet to be changed by it; buy this book for people in love with the truth but hungry to know it deeper. Buy this book.

A book to savor and treasure

The greatest story ever told-that of Jesus-is retold in this book, Story, by one of America's most brilliant young authors, Steven James. James retells the story from a postmodern perspective that gives it a new taste and makes the story come alive for the younger generation. James begins with the Garden of Eden and goes through to the eternal kingdom of heaven. James has a Masters of Arts degree in storytelling. He has worked with youth at risk and has written twelve books with powerful messages for youth as well as the older generation. I have heard him speak and felt he had unusual perspectives and made a fascinating storyteller. He is a young man who loves God and is committed to following Him with his whole heart and leading others into that path also. This comes through in his writing as well. James fills the chapters with his stories, retold Bible stories, plus free-verse poetry. His poetry, written in short lines with no caps, is lyrical and powerful-beautiful and often painful to read. For example, "the greatest scars/are not found in wounded hearts, / but in overlooked ones./there is no greater pain / than the ice of loneliness." This book is difficult to describe. I start to say it is not a pretty book, but then I find it is a beautiful book. It is graphic in its descriptions. The poetry is stirring and disturbing, as all good poetry should be. Men will find it especially appealing because of the style of the author: he is definitely a rule breaker. As a result, the book is not in a typical layout or religious style. Parts are hard-strong and good-no sugar coating. I would not recommend it for young teens or as a gift. If you want a book to make you view Jesus and the story of the Bible from a whole different vantage point, to feel His pain and wonder of it again, this is that book to savor and treasure. - Elece Hollis, Christian Book Previews.com

couldn't put it down....

This is a beautiful book. I literally couldn't put it down, and while I was reading it, I kept thinking of all the people I wanted to send it to. It's warm, moving, intimate, laugh-out-loud funny, and achingly honest. It's filled with stories and poems so original and cool you want it to go on, and on, and yet its length is perfect, just as the book itself is. I would feel totally comfortable sending it to committed Christians and ardent agnostics alike.