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Messy: God Likes It That Way
Christianity is messy. Unanswered prayers. Painful choices. Unresolved regrets. But there is good news: God works in the mess. He gets a kick out of these disturbing, disorderly moments because in these moments, we learn to trust Him. What if we all trusted Jesus? How would the world look different? How would we look different?
Both annoyingly honest and refreshingly humorous, Messy reassures Christians that God can reveal Himself in their clutter. Author and pastor A.J. Swoboda offers biblical insight and vivid, personal stories to redefine faith from something that must be perfect to something that is imperfect, but can still give beauty, meaning, and purpose to a messy life. As entertaining as it is challenging, this book teaches Christians what it means to trust in each other, in grace, in hope, and in a Savior who defied the rules of death. Here’s to finding joy in your chaos!
Both annoyingly honest and refreshingly humorous, Messy reassures Christians that God can reveal Himself in their clutter. Author and pastor A.J. Swoboda offers biblical insight and vivid, personal stories to redefine faith from something that must be perfect to something that is imperfect, but can still give beauty, meaning, and purpose to a messy life. As entertaining as it is challenging, this book teaches Christians what it means to trust in each other, in grace, in hope, and in a Savior who defied the rules of death. Here’s to finding joy in your chaos!
186 pages, Kindle Edition
First published March 1, 2012
36 people are currently reading
356 people want to read
About the author
A.J. Swoboda
16 books172 followersA. J. Swoboda (PhD, University of Birmingham) pastors Theophilus Church in urban Portland, Oregon. He is executive director of the Seminary Stewardship Alliance, a consortium of Christian higher education institutions dedicated to reconnecting Christians with the biblical call to care for God's creation. Swoboda also teaches biblical studies, theology, and church history at Portland Seminary and Fuller Theological Seminary, among others. He is an award-winning author or editor of nine books and speaks regularly at conferences, retreats, churches, and seminars. Visit his website and blog at www.ajswoboda.com.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews
June 7, 2012
***A must read for anyone who claims the name of Christian***
Rarely does wit and profound wisdom combine in a serious book about Christian life and spiritual growth like it does in A.J. Swoboda’s debut book, “Messy: God likes it that way.” In these authentic, inspiring and refreshingly honest pages, readers learn though they may have lost hope, face painful choices and suffer regrets, “God likes it that way.” Because it’s in our imperfections and pain that we are most authentic and open to God.
His entertaining treatment begins with when he met God in his sophomore geometry class “…ten minutes before lunch in Homeroom 221B…” Where he and three other students worked on “…a group project on the Pythagorean Theorem…” When two of the girls began talking about “…God, Jesus, and the end of the world…”
The talk turned into an argument about the “Left Behind” series and “…how a really ticked-off Jesus…”…Full Review: http://tinyurl.com/6u4sn3g
Rarely does wit and profound wisdom combine in a serious book about Christian life and spiritual growth like it does in A.J. Swoboda’s debut book, “Messy: God likes it that way.” In these authentic, inspiring and refreshingly honest pages, readers learn though they may have lost hope, face painful choices and suffer regrets, “God likes it that way.” Because it’s in our imperfections and pain that we are most authentic and open to God.
His entertaining treatment begins with when he met God in his sophomore geometry class “…ten minutes before lunch in Homeroom 221B…” Where he and three other students worked on “…a group project on the Pythagorean Theorem…” When two of the girls began talking about “…God, Jesus, and the end of the world…”
The talk turned into an argument about the “Left Behind” series and “…how a really ticked-off Jesus…”…Full Review: http://tinyurl.com/6u4sn3g
September 29, 2025
“Holy Spirit will… episkiazō you.” And when it has episkiazō’d her, she would give birth to God (Luke 1:35). Mary was overshadowed. And she gave birth to something. The Spirit hovered, overshadowed, episkiazō’d Mary. This same image is in Genesis 1, the desert, and the temple”
“God watches as the Spirit overshadowed the chaotic world, the Spirit overshadowed the tabernacle in the desert in the midst of the Israelites’ chaos, and in Luke the world watched as the Spirit overshadowed the otherwise normal twelve-year-old girl’s life”
“there is an oddly close relationship between chaos and God. The Spirit of God is either present over chaos or creating it”
“the mess was intentional. She had to embrace it. Because it was God. And letting it be what it is. We must do the same, whatever the mess is, because God is in it.”
“people sell Christianity because they’ve conjured it up in their mind as this solution that’ll fix the mess”
“God is like a little pubescent boy. He’s that kid in the neighborhood who likes to run up to your door every once in a while during dinner and ring the doorbell, only to run away and hide in the bushes. He gets so much satisfaction out of it. Watching you stand there with dinner on your face as you look for the little brat who rang your doorbell. He just sits there. Hiding in your bushes. Waiting. Smiling. Wanting to play tag. And if you look close enough, you can see the bush shaking. He’s out there. Just waiting for you to chase him. Because your chaos is his joy”
“We stand there, knowing someone’s out there. Somewhere. All we know is, someone has knocked on my door.Jesus is your chaos”
“Jesus has nothing better to do with his time than run around the neighborhood, knock on all the front doors, and run and hide in the bushes of our life, ruining dinner”
“That bush seems to be shaking”
“When we idealize community, we idolize community.And when we idolize church and community, we forget the one who formed it”
“Christians are pregnant people who understand that God is their mess”
“Jesus asks people to be past tense people in the present for the future”
“follow with a sense of purposeful insanity”
“Jesus sold death as a way to life”
“Jesus’ church is a support group for those learning to live with the bruise.”
“The only thing he told his disciples at the end was to perimenein. It means to wait”
“The community of Jesus is the group of people who say their lives are beyond help and are so messy, all they have left is a little faith in a maniac who apparently didn’t obey the rules of death”
“Maybe the problem isn’t the church. Maybe the problem is what we are looking for.”
“Few of these books say what Jesus said to do”
“Wait for what? The Spirit. It will come on you, and then you will go. ”
“The greatest enemy to waiting on the Spirit of God to come in the way the Spirit wants to come is A, B, and C”
“we teach people that God is A-B-C. That’s a linear God. Nothing in all creation is linear. Everything is curved.”
“wrong, but only sometimes, only after you wait. Hear what God is saying and do it. If you don’t hear anything, keep waiting”
“Wait on Jesus before you get cynical. Wait before you quit”
“You aren’t called to have disciples. Jesus is.”
“we create and imagine something that exists neither in reality nor in God’s imagination”
“I have never heard anyone say about their AA meeting that they aren’t getting fed. There are two reasons for that. First, they don’t go for a product; they go for the friendship. And second, that’s because they have really low expectations of those who are showing up, because everyone, from top to bottom, is an alcoholic loser”
“Francis was a man who grew increasingly frustrated with all the trappings of church. He was frustrated with the hypocrisy. He hated the greed. He deplored the institution. But he didn’t run”
“Prayer is knowing in the chaos that there is a guy standing there smiling weirdly at you. With you. You just have to find him. He’s there, in that book. I promise.Prayer keeps the book open”
“Trust is what God resurrects when our security dies.”
“He goes because he wants to find God”
“I end up becoming a Christian all over again”
“The missionaries come back changed. They believe in God more. They love people more. They were the ones who met God. Imagine that: missionary needing God”
“God never takes joy in any needless suffering”
“moments like this are at the center of his plan”
“You are a missionary. And we are all on a mission trip”
“There is no furlough for being full of God’s Spirit”
“choosing to stop ignoring the love that has been around you this whole time—a love you just didn’t see”
“someone else makes your heart beat”
“seeing your story in a completely new light. It’s seeing the world differently because you have new eyes”
“Most of his surviving letters preserved in the Bible were penned either on some horseback, in some dark prison, or in the dark little corner of someone’s basement he’d crashed in for the night. He didn’t have time for a study or a quiet library”
“All of Paul’s letters were written in the context of personal chaos.”
“They would have started to worship Paul instead of Jesus”
“half of trust is dismembering old trusts”
“our trust will always cause us to hang out with people we would not normally like to hang out with. Awkward people. People with different theology. People of a different orientation. People of different denominations”
“invites himself into our personal lives and borrows our stuff. In the New Testament, he borrows someone’s colt, someone’s donkey, someone’s boat. Then he invites himself over for dinner.”
“To build muscles, people lift weights. To find love, people go on dates. To grow trust, Christians pray”
“Nothing else builds trust quite like facing all of your ongoing problems and unsolved struggles by getting down on your knees and not trying to fix them”
“prayer is trust in the form of silence and contemplation and honesty.”
“ask God open-ended questions, it gives God much more of an opportunity to talk”
“We talk to God as though he knows only two words”
“Ask God bigger questions and you will find bigger conversation a reality.”
“He invented the garden and put Adam and Eve in it because he wanted someone to walk around with and talk about vegetables.”
“prayer, where I’m forced to learn to simply be content”
“Communal prayer is authenticated when the person you are praying with knows all the dirt on your life. All of it.”
“Real prayer happens when in the back of your mind you keep thinking, This person knows just a little too much about me”
“Prayer, ultimately, is taking the time to allow the God that is under our nose to be given space to speak and be.”
“God is closer to you than you are to yourself”
“he gets your family more than you do.”
“the kingdom of God actually ran against family life at times”
“the messy parts of Jesus’ family tree are included.”
“love is nondenominational”
“love my dad for who he was and stop judging him for who he wasn’t.”
“baptism is the end of all spiritual achievement. It screams, “I can’t do it, so just kill me!”
“it offers a paradigm of love for those who have tried to earn it and realize they just aren’t good enough”
“Christianity celebrates and redeems ugly things like a cross”
“everyone who left the Christian faith because they felt like they couldn’t measure up”
“I kind of feel bad for God, who can’t even give us something beautiful and meaningful like baptism or good works to do without us turning it into some kind of attempt to prove to God how spiritual we are and to fill up our card for Jesus”
“What kind of God is that insecure?”
“chet is the human condition. There is a right way of life that we all have missed. ”
“tax collectors and “sinners” were people judged for who they weren’t rather than who they were.”
“The term “sinner” had really almost nothing to do with living out our immoral acts as much as it did with not living up to the highly specialized theology of righteousness that the religious elite had constructed”
“Paul says there is only one line. And everyone is in it.”
“The original sin of America is that we have deified arrogance and think that there are two lines and that we are in the right one”
“Religion is often the place where we most encounter sin and the powers of evil”
“Religion crucified Jesus”
“When we ignore evil, whatever it is, we give it more power”
“Jesus solved the whole sin and darkness thing by coming to be in our category with us.”
“you walk home carrying with you the very thing that represents the old you”
“they deny they ever had a mat”
“So we never forget. So we never pass beyond that. So we keep being dependent on Jesus.”
“Is sin really God’s biggest problem? It isn’t. God has bigger problems. Sin was already defeated. Sure, God hates sin. But I’m rather sure God hates sin the same way I hate dirty diapers. I’ll always hate their diapers, but I’ll never confuse the diaper with the baby.”
“When we exist in authentic relationship, it makes our darkness and depravity rise to the surface”
“Jesus uses the idea of hell to get his disciples to stop being so darn complacent. To stop thinking they are in the only category that God likes”
“I became a Christian for one of the first times in my life”
“The very thing they sing the most about is the one thing they have very little of. Rain.25Is this why we sing so much about sex? And love?”
“rabbis who studied the book of Genesis in the Torah believed that God had made twenty-six universes before this one”
“The first time Spirit was talked about in the Hebrew tradition, it was called Ruach, which in Hebrew is a feminine noun. Then when the Greeks came along, in the New Testament they called it Pneuma, which is a neuter noun. Then the Latins came. Oh, the Latins. They called it Spiritus, which is a masculine noun”
“turning away from the Creator to creation for our fulfillment. ”
“This is what they were called. They called themselves “the way.”
“In Christ there is no shame.”
“nakedness is no longer your shame. Christ becomes your shame.”
“Nakedness, in the context of covenant, is God embodying love of the broken”
“when God chooses to write out a list of the qualities of his future wife, it has one word on it. Whore”
“Only this God could destroy evil by marrying it. That’s what God does to us. He marries us. Naked. Just as we are. Not as we’re not”
“ don’t have anyone to go into the basement with. I tell them Jesus will. He isn’t scared of the basement”
“When we admit our promiscuousness. When we don’t put on spiritual makeup; when we’re willing to try being naked in the presence of God.”
“individualism and idolatry are relatives deeply interrelated”
“True love for God must be marked not by total agreement but total fidelity despite disagreement”
“everyone seems to have significant problems with the God they don’t follow, and yet nobody seems to confess any problems with the God they do follow”
“How do we get revenge on people that crucify us? Do we come out with our guns blazing? Or do we come out resurrected?”
“he chose to minister in his woundedness. Not without it”
“Community won’t make us better people; it will make us crucified people.”
“Religion is nothing more than the things we do to give our life meaning”
“The first person in the Bible to get his feet washed is God. By Abraham at the great trees of Mamre.46 Years later, I think God loved it so much he wanted to do it for his disciples”
“They didn’t realize how much they had been loved until years later”
“in order to know this God, you have to go to where he lives. Or invite him over for dinner.”
“It was Jesus who over and over again stood on the side of the oppressed. He stood with the people, not Rome. The peasant, not religious powers. The harlot, not the law”
“In koan, the truth is in the question”
“Suffering is Christ’s koan to the world”
“Where is God in this? What if the beauty is in the question? Not the answer.”
“The message of Jesus is not that he brings answers to the suffering. No. Jesus brings presence to the suffering.”
“The lesson of Job is how insufficient religious answers are for suffering”
“bad theology is often the thing that makes suffering unbearable.”
“We get so cynical about church because God lives in us and tells us stuff about the church, things that are wrong about it, and we know he’s right”
“The Spirit of prophesy that lived in all the Old Testament prophets would live in all of us today, telling us about justice and righteousness and what is good and evil in the world”
“So many humans are in the aquarium. They have lost heart because they have been hurt so many times”
“to be blessed meant you suffered with Jesus”
“To share in the suffering of Jesus was to be a blessed people”
“Of the twenty-two thousand denominations in the world, you probably aren’t in the right one.They’re all wrong. Jesus is right”
“we don’t talk about God because we fully understand God. We talk about God because we want to search God out”
“This kind of knowing is much more intimate. Much more relational. Much more touchable. Yada, as with so many other Hebrew words, has two meanings. First, it means “to know.” Then, and closely related, it means “to have sex with.”
“Too often I know God in the ginōskō sense. We need more yada. The beauty of life is knowing God intimately. To live with God and be known by God and become like God in all that we do. ”
“That’s why I call theology foreplay. It should always lead to something yet is never the point in itself”
“God doesn’t have a theology”
“When we want to know our theology, so often we look in the mirror. So much of our theology looks like us.”
“Everything we do as human beings proclaims the theology that we nurture and care for in our heart, it proclaims to the world what we think about God”
“Hiding behind lies never works. God is too big”
“our gospel forces us to admit that we are wrong and need correction. Otherwise we are following a false gospel.”
“Jesus spends almost no time during his life asking what God’s will is. He just does it”
“When any follower of Christ is invited to the table, even if they go to a different church, it says something about God.”
“God watches as the Spirit overshadowed the chaotic world, the Spirit overshadowed the tabernacle in the desert in the midst of the Israelites’ chaos, and in Luke the world watched as the Spirit overshadowed the otherwise normal twelve-year-old girl’s life”
“there is an oddly close relationship between chaos and God. The Spirit of God is either present over chaos or creating it”
“the mess was intentional. She had to embrace it. Because it was God. And letting it be what it is. We must do the same, whatever the mess is, because God is in it.”
“people sell Christianity because they’ve conjured it up in their mind as this solution that’ll fix the mess”
“God is like a little pubescent boy. He’s that kid in the neighborhood who likes to run up to your door every once in a while during dinner and ring the doorbell, only to run away and hide in the bushes. He gets so much satisfaction out of it. Watching you stand there with dinner on your face as you look for the little brat who rang your doorbell. He just sits there. Hiding in your bushes. Waiting. Smiling. Wanting to play tag. And if you look close enough, you can see the bush shaking. He’s out there. Just waiting for you to chase him. Because your chaos is his joy”
“We stand there, knowing someone’s out there. Somewhere. All we know is, someone has knocked on my door.Jesus is your chaos”
“Jesus has nothing better to do with his time than run around the neighborhood, knock on all the front doors, and run and hide in the bushes of our life, ruining dinner”
“That bush seems to be shaking”
“When we idealize community, we idolize community.And when we idolize church and community, we forget the one who formed it”
“Christians are pregnant people who understand that God is their mess”
“Jesus asks people to be past tense people in the present for the future”
“follow with a sense of purposeful insanity”
“Jesus sold death as a way to life”
“Jesus’ church is a support group for those learning to live with the bruise.”
“The only thing he told his disciples at the end was to perimenein. It means to wait”
“The community of Jesus is the group of people who say their lives are beyond help and are so messy, all they have left is a little faith in a maniac who apparently didn’t obey the rules of death”
“Maybe the problem isn’t the church. Maybe the problem is what we are looking for.”
“Few of these books say what Jesus said to do”
“Wait for what? The Spirit. It will come on you, and then you will go. ”
“The greatest enemy to waiting on the Spirit of God to come in the way the Spirit wants to come is A, B, and C”
“we teach people that God is A-B-C. That’s a linear God. Nothing in all creation is linear. Everything is curved.”
“wrong, but only sometimes, only after you wait. Hear what God is saying and do it. If you don’t hear anything, keep waiting”
“Wait on Jesus before you get cynical. Wait before you quit”
“You aren’t called to have disciples. Jesus is.”
“we create and imagine something that exists neither in reality nor in God’s imagination”
“I have never heard anyone say about their AA meeting that they aren’t getting fed. There are two reasons for that. First, they don’t go for a product; they go for the friendship. And second, that’s because they have really low expectations of those who are showing up, because everyone, from top to bottom, is an alcoholic loser”
“Francis was a man who grew increasingly frustrated with all the trappings of church. He was frustrated with the hypocrisy. He hated the greed. He deplored the institution. But he didn’t run”
“Prayer is knowing in the chaos that there is a guy standing there smiling weirdly at you. With you. You just have to find him. He’s there, in that book. I promise.Prayer keeps the book open”
“Trust is what God resurrects when our security dies.”
“He goes because he wants to find God”
“I end up becoming a Christian all over again”
“The missionaries come back changed. They believe in God more. They love people more. They were the ones who met God. Imagine that: missionary needing God”
“God never takes joy in any needless suffering”
“moments like this are at the center of his plan”
“You are a missionary. And we are all on a mission trip”
“There is no furlough for being full of God’s Spirit”
“choosing to stop ignoring the love that has been around you this whole time—a love you just didn’t see”
“someone else makes your heart beat”
“seeing your story in a completely new light. It’s seeing the world differently because you have new eyes”
“Most of his surviving letters preserved in the Bible were penned either on some horseback, in some dark prison, or in the dark little corner of someone’s basement he’d crashed in for the night. He didn’t have time for a study or a quiet library”
“All of Paul’s letters were written in the context of personal chaos.”
“They would have started to worship Paul instead of Jesus”
“half of trust is dismembering old trusts”
“our trust will always cause us to hang out with people we would not normally like to hang out with. Awkward people. People with different theology. People of a different orientation. People of different denominations”
“invites himself into our personal lives and borrows our stuff. In the New Testament, he borrows someone’s colt, someone’s donkey, someone’s boat. Then he invites himself over for dinner.”
“To build muscles, people lift weights. To find love, people go on dates. To grow trust, Christians pray”
“Nothing else builds trust quite like facing all of your ongoing problems and unsolved struggles by getting down on your knees and not trying to fix them”
“prayer is trust in the form of silence and contemplation and honesty.”
“ask God open-ended questions, it gives God much more of an opportunity to talk”
“We talk to God as though he knows only two words”
“Ask God bigger questions and you will find bigger conversation a reality.”
“He invented the garden and put Adam and Eve in it because he wanted someone to walk around with and talk about vegetables.”
“prayer, where I’m forced to learn to simply be content”
“Communal prayer is authenticated when the person you are praying with knows all the dirt on your life. All of it.”
“Real prayer happens when in the back of your mind you keep thinking, This person knows just a little too much about me”
“Prayer, ultimately, is taking the time to allow the God that is under our nose to be given space to speak and be.”
“God is closer to you than you are to yourself”
“he gets your family more than you do.”
“the kingdom of God actually ran against family life at times”
“the messy parts of Jesus’ family tree are included.”
“love is nondenominational”
“love my dad for who he was and stop judging him for who he wasn’t.”
“baptism is the end of all spiritual achievement. It screams, “I can’t do it, so just kill me!”
“it offers a paradigm of love for those who have tried to earn it and realize they just aren’t good enough”
“Christianity celebrates and redeems ugly things like a cross”
“everyone who left the Christian faith because they felt like they couldn’t measure up”
“I kind of feel bad for God, who can’t even give us something beautiful and meaningful like baptism or good works to do without us turning it into some kind of attempt to prove to God how spiritual we are and to fill up our card for Jesus”
“What kind of God is that insecure?”
“chet is the human condition. There is a right way of life that we all have missed. ”
“tax collectors and “sinners” were people judged for who they weren’t rather than who they were.”
“The term “sinner” had really almost nothing to do with living out our immoral acts as much as it did with not living up to the highly specialized theology of righteousness that the religious elite had constructed”
“Paul says there is only one line. And everyone is in it.”
“The original sin of America is that we have deified arrogance and think that there are two lines and that we are in the right one”
“Religion is often the place where we most encounter sin and the powers of evil”
“Religion crucified Jesus”
“When we ignore evil, whatever it is, we give it more power”
“Jesus solved the whole sin and darkness thing by coming to be in our category with us.”
“you walk home carrying with you the very thing that represents the old you”
“they deny they ever had a mat”
“So we never forget. So we never pass beyond that. So we keep being dependent on Jesus.”
“Is sin really God’s biggest problem? It isn’t. God has bigger problems. Sin was already defeated. Sure, God hates sin. But I’m rather sure God hates sin the same way I hate dirty diapers. I’ll always hate their diapers, but I’ll never confuse the diaper with the baby.”
“When we exist in authentic relationship, it makes our darkness and depravity rise to the surface”
“Jesus uses the idea of hell to get his disciples to stop being so darn complacent. To stop thinking they are in the only category that God likes”
“I became a Christian for one of the first times in my life”
“The very thing they sing the most about is the one thing they have very little of. Rain.25Is this why we sing so much about sex? And love?”
“rabbis who studied the book of Genesis in the Torah believed that God had made twenty-six universes before this one”
“The first time Spirit was talked about in the Hebrew tradition, it was called Ruach, which in Hebrew is a feminine noun. Then when the Greeks came along, in the New Testament they called it Pneuma, which is a neuter noun. Then the Latins came. Oh, the Latins. They called it Spiritus, which is a masculine noun”
“turning away from the Creator to creation for our fulfillment. ”
“This is what they were called. They called themselves “the way.”
“In Christ there is no shame.”
“nakedness is no longer your shame. Christ becomes your shame.”
“Nakedness, in the context of covenant, is God embodying love of the broken”
“when God chooses to write out a list of the qualities of his future wife, it has one word on it. Whore”
“Only this God could destroy evil by marrying it. That’s what God does to us. He marries us. Naked. Just as we are. Not as we’re not”
“ don’t have anyone to go into the basement with. I tell them Jesus will. He isn’t scared of the basement”
“When we admit our promiscuousness. When we don’t put on spiritual makeup; when we’re willing to try being naked in the presence of God.”
“individualism and idolatry are relatives deeply interrelated”
“True love for God must be marked not by total agreement but total fidelity despite disagreement”
“everyone seems to have significant problems with the God they don’t follow, and yet nobody seems to confess any problems with the God they do follow”
“How do we get revenge on people that crucify us? Do we come out with our guns blazing? Or do we come out resurrected?”
“he chose to minister in his woundedness. Not without it”
“Community won’t make us better people; it will make us crucified people.”
“Religion is nothing more than the things we do to give our life meaning”
“The first person in the Bible to get his feet washed is God. By Abraham at the great trees of Mamre.46 Years later, I think God loved it so much he wanted to do it for his disciples”
“They didn’t realize how much they had been loved until years later”
“in order to know this God, you have to go to where he lives. Or invite him over for dinner.”
“It was Jesus who over and over again stood on the side of the oppressed. He stood with the people, not Rome. The peasant, not religious powers. The harlot, not the law”
“In koan, the truth is in the question”
“Suffering is Christ’s koan to the world”
“Where is God in this? What if the beauty is in the question? Not the answer.”
“The message of Jesus is not that he brings answers to the suffering. No. Jesus brings presence to the suffering.”
“The lesson of Job is how insufficient religious answers are for suffering”
“bad theology is often the thing that makes suffering unbearable.”
“We get so cynical about church because God lives in us and tells us stuff about the church, things that are wrong about it, and we know he’s right”
“The Spirit of prophesy that lived in all the Old Testament prophets would live in all of us today, telling us about justice and righteousness and what is good and evil in the world”
“So many humans are in the aquarium. They have lost heart because they have been hurt so many times”
“to be blessed meant you suffered with Jesus”
“To share in the suffering of Jesus was to be a blessed people”
“Of the twenty-two thousand denominations in the world, you probably aren’t in the right one.They’re all wrong. Jesus is right”
“we don’t talk about God because we fully understand God. We talk about God because we want to search God out”
“This kind of knowing is much more intimate. Much more relational. Much more touchable. Yada, as with so many other Hebrew words, has two meanings. First, it means “to know.” Then, and closely related, it means “to have sex with.”
“Too often I know God in the ginōskō sense. We need more yada. The beauty of life is knowing God intimately. To live with God and be known by God and become like God in all that we do. ”
“That’s why I call theology foreplay. It should always lead to something yet is never the point in itself”
“God doesn’t have a theology”
“When we want to know our theology, so often we look in the mirror. So much of our theology looks like us.”
“Everything we do as human beings proclaims the theology that we nurture and care for in our heart, it proclaims to the world what we think about God”
“Hiding behind lies never works. God is too big”
“our gospel forces us to admit that we are wrong and need correction. Otherwise we are following a false gospel.”
“Jesus spends almost no time during his life asking what God’s will is. He just does it”
“When any follower of Christ is invited to the table, even if they go to a different church, it says something about God.”
October 7, 2018
I really liked this one. Swoboda keeps it real, without getting the least bit preachy. His writing style is very conversational, as if you are just sitting there with him in a coffee shop as he talks about his faith and the everyday things ghat challenge each of us in our own walks of faith. Do i agree with everything he says? No. But he gets me thinking about many aspects of my faith and why i do much of what i do. He got me to think hard about my own walk, which i think is all he could ask for in writing this book.
I made a lot of notes and highlighted a lot of lines in this book. Just a few of my favorites from the book are:
- Stop looking for your church to give you a mission. Start practicing the things Jesus did at church. Probably no one will follow. That's okay. You aren't called to have disciples. Jesus is.
- You don't even have to talk about God to talk about God. When i read the book of Esther in the bible, i found out that God's name isn't even mentioned. Not once.
- Theology is only as good as it gets us to God. So too, Christianity is only as good as it gets us to Christ.
I made a lot of notes and highlighted a lot of lines in this book. Just a few of my favorites from the book are:
- Stop looking for your church to give you a mission. Start practicing the things Jesus did at church. Probably no one will follow. That's okay. You aren't called to have disciples. Jesus is.
- You don't even have to talk about God to talk about God. When i read the book of Esther in the bible, i found out that God's name isn't even mentioned. Not once.
- Theology is only as good as it gets us to God. So too, Christianity is only as good as it gets us to Christ.
October 12, 2018
Messy is a way of life, and it's okay to not be okay.
April 1, 2024
The average rating (at the time I am writing this) at 3.89 is probably accurate for me...or maybe 3.5. The book was written quite a while back (and maybe Swoboda's first book?) so one would expect or hope that Swoboda has grown as a writer and as a person. The latter being one of the ideas in this book. One might hope he no longer has a predisposition toward movies with Kevin Spacey in them. (Note that the book was written in 2012.) The comments made by many 3 star readers, I find accurate for me: the book is a hodgepodge at times, and "borderline inappropriate" (Ha! so, no, my mom wouldn't read it.) Swoboda reminds me of a young Scott Cairns -- two different genres from these men as Cairns is a poet (who, in his younger years, wrote an erotic poem -- semi-erotic?-- about the Spirit and lost a job over it) and Swoboda writes non-fiction prose. Swoboda was (and still is!) young. I expect we'll see more good books from him which I will want to read.
I've actually read two Swoboda books now and reading a third. The first two were "messy" writing, but I find myself struggling with the third which seems more "together". Ha. Go figure.
As other readers have written, there are things in here that I disagreed with (eek, maybe because I'm more "liberal" than he was at the time), but also thoughts that were fresh and hope filled and, frankly, funny. Do I wish I had read Swoboda in 2012? Yes, definitely. I happened to buy up 4 of his books after seeing /hearing him (youtube) give an aTalk at the Apprentice Gathering 2023. I found his talk on the presence and work of the Holy Spirit gracious and refreshing. I'm not disappointed that I bought this book. Maybe it should be 4 stars?
I've actually read two Swoboda books now and reading a third. The first two were "messy" writing, but I find myself struggling with the third which seems more "together". Ha. Go figure.
As other readers have written, there are things in here that I disagreed with (eek, maybe because I'm more "liberal" than he was at the time), but also thoughts that were fresh and hope filled and, frankly, funny. Do I wish I had read Swoboda in 2012? Yes, definitely. I happened to buy up 4 of his books after seeing /hearing him (youtube) give an aTalk at the Apprentice Gathering 2023. I found his talk on the presence and work of the Holy Spirit gracious and refreshing. I'm not disappointed that I bought this book. Maybe it should be 4 stars?
July 16, 2021
Bought this book on 12th October 2017 after I attended one of our college’s event on ‘Praise & Worship’ yes, I’m that typical on-the-spot Christian who got excited after attending every event. I attempted to read it back then but couldn't even reach Chapter 2, so I put it on hold for about 3 years. So, I just have the urge to read it again to give it one last try. And tbh I’m glad that I didn’t read it back then considering I’ll just skim through it. Quoting Pope’s “The bookful blockhead, ignorantly read, With loads of learned lumber in his head”.
It’s a messy one, what more can you expect it from the title? nevertheless, it is the ‘perfect messy’ kind of book that leads to a lot of eye-opening moments and it is just ‘a breath of fresh air’ quoted Mikalato’s. So, I recommended it to everyone to give it a go and delve into the road of Christianity: our questions on our faith, struggles, messiness, community & church.
It’s a messy one, what more can you expect it from the title? nevertheless, it is the ‘perfect messy’ kind of book that leads to a lot of eye-opening moments and it is just ‘a breath of fresh air’ quoted Mikalato’s. So, I recommended it to everyone to give it a go and delve into the road of Christianity: our questions on our faith, struggles, messiness, community & church.
February 7, 2018
This is an interesting book which some people will find offensive because of some of the words and expressions. It uses what you might call a shock treatment to get points across. Some would call it a breath of fresh air.
November 21, 2017
Delves into topics about the messiness of life and the God who meets us where we are.
December 12, 2017
Favorite book I've ever read. I've read it over and over and always brings something new to mind.
February 6, 2019
This was a great read and really good for a small group discussion.
May 2, 2023
Going along very nicely through the novel, until the author decided to start playing fast and lose with a few of the creative themes.
December 30, 2016
Solid Read
Solid book! Fairly creative and provides an interesting take on both living out and understanding your faith. The author is very intelligent, quirky, entertaining, and easy to follow as he communicates the messiness and difficulties in living out your faith in the real world.
Solid book! Fairly creative and provides an interesting take on both living out and understanding your faith. The author is very intelligent, quirky, entertaining, and easy to follow as he communicates the messiness and difficulties in living out your faith in the real world.
July 11, 2012
If you're a Christian looking for help in understanding how God can work in your life and you're looking for guidance and reassurance rather than concrete answers then I recommend that you read "Messy: God Likes It That Way".
This book helped me to reflect on many questions that I have as a Christian and has helped me find answers to some of them by providing me with a method for looking at things differently.
A.J. helps to drive home the point that we don't really know why the Lord does the thing he does and that scripture can leave a lot of room for explanation. A.J. Swoboda's book can help you come to grips with some of the more difficult aspects of Christianity.
I've had the good fortune to sit in on several of A.J.'s sermons when he helps fill in at our church. He's humorous and insightful and his wit and depth reach in to this book and really help the reader to connect with the author.
Don't expect fireworks and flash in this book; if you do you'll be disappointed. If you go in hoping for a little more insight in to what it means to be a Christian you'll probably love this book.
Get it and read it.
This book helped me to reflect on many questions that I have as a Christian and has helped me find answers to some of them by providing me with a method for looking at things differently.
A.J. helps to drive home the point that we don't really know why the Lord does the thing he does and that scripture can leave a lot of room for explanation. A.J. Swoboda's book can help you come to grips with some of the more difficult aspects of Christianity.
I've had the good fortune to sit in on several of A.J.'s sermons when he helps fill in at our church. He's humorous and insightful and his wit and depth reach in to this book and really help the reader to connect with the author.
Don't expect fireworks and flash in this book; if you do you'll be disappointed. If you go in hoping for a little more insight in to what it means to be a Christian you'll probably love this book.
Get it and read it.
June 21, 2012
I thoroughly enjoyed Messy: God Likes It That Way by A.J. Swoboda. A.J. is funny, simple, honest, and writes with a thought-provoking style. You’ll feel like you can now ask the very questions you’ve been afraid to ask. Contrary to us believing we have to have everything figured out in our life, our relationship with God, and what we believe about the Bible, we realize that God knows what he’s doing much more than we do—oftentimes it looks really messy and not something that is easily categorized. We have to simply trust God in the midst of the mess. It’s not that God is continually changing (because he’s not), but it’s just that how we view him, how we understand him, and how we relate to him are constantly evolving. Talking about the inherent messiness with how our relationships, sin, families, prayer life, Bible reading, suffering, and theology works, A.J. leads the reader down a path of both laughing and crying, making you feel somehow normal in the messiness of life.
August 20, 2012
This first book by Swoboda packs a punch. In short chapters he tackles many issues Christians have with their faith. His main theme was that when people become Christians they are often duped into believing that everything will now be ok. What we don't realize right away is how tough life actually is. The Bible is not full of nice happy stories, people struggled then and we still struggle now. The thing we need to see is that God is present in the mess, He created everything, so our personal messes don't take Him by surprise. We need to reach out to Him and admit our failures and then move on.
The book felt a bit like Donald Miller and Rob Bell, full of funny stories and interesting analogies. It was down to earth and gritty, the way real Christians should be.
The book felt a bit like Donald Miller and Rob Bell, full of funny stories and interesting analogies. It was down to earth and gritty, the way real Christians should be.
July 24, 2012
Overall what I took from this book is that it is ok to be asking hard questions, to be wrestling with God and others…he communicated well with a refreshing vulnerability that will surely plant seeds in others to do the same in their life. We have so much technology to communicate these days BUT we lack the tools/skills to deal with root/deep life stuff(so far). Thanks for stirring the pot!! We were ment for more than the superficial & shallow!
(E-book note: On my little kindle it got a bit frustrating because you packed so much deep stuff in your book that at times I was going from deep to deep to deep. It’s easier to stop & ponder in a book when having to turn pages…though I took alot of clipping/notes!! Just a comment relating to overall flow on e-book)
(E-book note: On my little kindle it got a bit frustrating because you packed so much deep stuff in your book that at times I was going from deep to deep to deep. It’s easier to stop & ponder in a book when having to turn pages…though I took alot of clipping/notes!! Just a comment relating to overall flow on e-book)
October 26, 2012
I'm not sure how to comment on this book... The writing style is casual, conversational, and borderline inappropriate at times for the given topic. The theology is, while at times challenging, at others quite in contrast with my own. The flow of the book seems to match the title - I felt the first half of the book was a bit more cohesive than the latter as at the end it felt a bit like the author was wandering (or maybe just my attention was...).
As negative as all of that sounds, I found myself challenged by the book. Many points made (often indirectly) gave me pause and even some of the sections I disagree with caused me to evaluate why I do, and are those valid reasons, etc.
As negative as all of that sounds, I found myself challenged by the book. Many points made (often indirectly) gave me pause and even some of the sections I disagree with caused me to evaluate why I do, and are those valid reasons, etc.
September 18, 2015
Musings of a post-modern pastor. Swoboda had a lot of excellent insight on various topics ranging from church, prayer, family, sex, suffering, and theology, just to name a few. Drawing from both Scripture and real life experiences, Swoboda does an excellent job in achieving his point. Namely, that many aspects of our lives are messy and God works through these messes to make us more into the person He wants us to be. Not sure God would have it any other way. Easy and quick to read, entertaining, many times comical, and definitely not academic. I highly recommend this refreshing read for all of us who have messy lives... one way or another.
August 2, 2012
Amazingly good book!!! I loved how the author used humor throughout the book and never hid his thoughts about doubt. This book was especially helpful for me when I was wrestling with the decision to become Christian. Reading this book helped me understand that it's ok if you're not "perfect," it's ok if you don't get everything right, God loves you anyway and wants you to have a relationship with Him.
February 8, 2016
I received this book through the LibraryThing Early Reviewers.
A humorous but real look at how life really is. The author acknowledges Christian life can be messy, but God makes sense out of the mess. This book provides a pathway to answers many Christians and non-Christians have about God and life in general.
A humorous but real look at how life really is. The author acknowledges Christian life can be messy, but God makes sense out of the mess. This book provides a pathway to answers many Christians and non-Christians have about God and life in general.
September 26, 2014
I am seeing things I disagree with but on the whole it is, so far, and interesting book. Which is to say, a different but interesting approach to the Gospel. No question that the author is leading people to the Lord, and one can't argue with that.
September 9, 2012
One of the best books I've ever read. What AJ says makes sense but you would never think about things that way, normally. Also, love that I actually know who this author is because he's preached at my mom's church before. He's as amazing in real life as in this book :)
January 9, 2013
There are a lot of good points interspersed throughout the book; however they are often sandwiched in between some far-out stuff. I think with some good editing, it could be a tighter, more compelling read.
Read
September 8, 2020Originally I gave this title 3 stars. I am revising my stars to zero.
The reason I am doing so is that since reading this title, several things about my faith journey and expression have changed and I no longer subscribe to evangelical ideologies.
The reason I am doing so is that since reading this title, several things about my faith journey and expression have changed and I no longer subscribe to evangelical ideologies.
February 5, 2016
Good thought-provoking book and easy to read but sometimes felt a bit scattered (but that thankfully didn't detract from the ways in which it resonated with me and challenged me). All in all a good read.
Read
July 10, 2016My favorite of AJ's books so far! Put into words all my feelings about community and relationship and why and how it's worth it to invest and to be vulnerable and to love each other well and love each other deeply.
July 25, 2012
Very satisfying. Stimulated my thinking and now I have a few things to mull over.
July 17, 2012
The Christian life is a messy one but God makes order out of the seemingly chaotic mess.
August 2, 2012
I like this book. This is a pastor who talks about things in the present day. How he struggled through his life.
September 5, 2012
I really enjoyed this book. I thought the questions the author posed were relevant and real. What if our 'mess' is where we learn to truly trust God? This perspective is one I want to embrace!
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