Sarah’s book Out of Sorts was a game-changer for me so I was especially eager to see where she went here … Out of Sorts took her out of church, so where is she now?

She relates her life-changing car accident in a meandering soft way and until the moment of impact I was gliding along with her. The paragraph is seared in my memory: as she sees she will hit the other car, she says “So this is how my life ends.” It wasn’t PTSD for me reading those words, it was, “I am 55 and closer to death than birth: this is how the whole thing goes down.”

That waking, that naming, that knowing is: Jarring, Helpful, Edgy, Life-y.

I’m sitting with it still.

Sarah lives to tell the tale, and is forever changed by the physical affects.

And for both of us, “At least you’re still alive” is not the satisfaction one seeks when looking for meaning, miracle, and mystery.

Miracles goes a little woo-woo (by Sarah’s own admission) and at times a little churchy for me; that said, I did find it to be a good modern look at the problem of pain, given the Western religious culture of the Prosperity Gospel that has warped and shaped much Christian thinking.

I heard echoes of Kate Bowler’s book and podcast Everything Happens for a Reason. Two important voices helping us wake up to … many things.

4/5 stars