When I first read this book my heart had been deeply stirred by a compelling desire to experience God in his wild, untamed attributes, knowing that the experience would be terrifying and purifying. It was then that my deep desire was birthed to spend at least one year in the Pacific Northwest where I would experience the gray, windy, blustery, wet winter that only the Pacific Northwest knows. I knew it would be at once terrible and transformationally beautiful. Well, I got my wish when I moved up to Seattle to attend grad school. I have experienced the wild fury of God in ways that make me tremble and make me wish for a tamer God. Yet somehow I know deep inside that a tamer God than our Lord Christ would not be powerful enough for me. I have been buffetted by the blustery, cold winter winds of hardship and suffering. I have reached the end of my rope many times, but as I look back to the beginning days of my desire, I realize my prayers were answered. Why is it that I want to know Christ in this way? I can only say that a desire that is not of me has been planted in me, and it is a desire that can be satisfied in no other way than through the winds of adversity. You can see that this book has had a profound mystical affect on me--an affect that goes far deeper than the words could convey.