The Grand Weaver

Read another fascinating book by Ravi Zacharias called "The Grand Weaver". [I had become a huge fan of the author earlier after reading one another of his books - "Jesus Among Other Gods".]

In "The Grand Weaver", the author reminds us and urges us to see the unique thread-patterns which God weaves in each one of us through the everyday events of our lives - ranging from the commonplace to great elation to bitter disappointments.

One story/incident which the author describes in the "Introduction" of the book, stands out and from which the entire book is woven out. It is the author's description of sari-making in a Benares sari factory by a father-son team. The father, who has the design of the beautiful sari already in mind, sits on top, handing out beautiful threads of magnificent colors to the son. The son waits for the father's nod and moves the lever from left to right without an inkling of what he is making. That is all that the son has to do - move the lever from left to right upon seeing his father's nod. I needn't spell this out explicitly but the author, through this sari-making description, reminds us that that is the sort of relationship which we (sons) have with God (the Father) in weaving the patterns of our life.

The book is further divided into such chapters as "Your DNA Matters", "Your Disappointments Matter", "Your Calling Matters", "Your Morality Matters", "Your Spirituality Matters", "Your Will Matters", "Your Worship Matters" and "Your Destiny Matters".

In each of the chapters, through the wonderful description of heart-warming personal experiences, thought-provoking stories, funny incidents, Bible references etc. the author shows us how each of the "threads" are woven up to shape and form the beautiful design of our life, made perfect by our Grand Weaver.

A must-read for anyone who wants to see "how God shapes us through the events of our lives".

Unique Jesus

Happened to stumble across Ravi Zacharias' book "Jesus among other Gods" while we were visiting Shoba (Tara's cousin) and Vikram's place in Pittsburgh, PA. I pocketed it and brought it along home!

I got introduced to the field of Christian apologetics (Wikipedia definition - Christian apologetics is a field of Christian theology that presents a rational basis for the Christian faith, to defend the faith against objections and misrepresentation, and to expose error within other religions and world views.) via this book which i found fascinating because i didn't know that such a field existed! It certainly is a good-read and handbook for those Christians who tend to think about their faith in rational/scientific ways.

Ravi Zacharias, a leading Christian apologist of our times, beautifully brings out the uniqueness of Jesus among other prophets/religious persons (Buddha, prophet Mohammad) and the uniqueness and truth of Christianity among other religions (Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam) in the various chapters of the book. The author's arguments for Christianity are well-balanced and convincing (to me at least). I found the tone used by the author when critiquing other religions and their leaders very respectful and felt an instant respect for the author. In essence, he makes the point that all religions, plainly and simply, cannot be true. He passionately presents the Passion of Christ as the one truth to be embraced by one and all.

It was particularly interesting for me to read the well-constructed argument against Hinduism's concept of pantheism. Pantheism has been a fascinating topic for me all along and in my limited readings had never read about anyone arguing against it.

Having read Stephen Hawking's "The Grand Design" recently, in which scientists' quest to find the nature of reality thru mathematical equations and their efforts to arrive at a "theory of everything" are explained in great detail, the following lines of Ravi Zacharias jumped out at me:

"Jesus reversed the process. He told us that the only way we could understand who we are is to cast our gaze not on the equation that binds it all together, but on the relationship toward which we move in the sum total of our being. It is the assemblage of an object that gives it its purpose, not the reduction of it. In the words of Jesus to Nathanael, our amazement will know no bounds when we understand all that the realm of God's existence means."

I finished reading the book and decided to place it on top of "The Grand Design"!