Stranger God: Meeting Jesus in Disguise
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Love and hospitality can change the way you see the world and others. That's exactly what modern-day theologian, Richard Beck, experienced when he first led a Bible study at a local maximum security prison. Beck believed the promise of Matthew 25 that states when we visit the prisoner, we encounter Jesus. Sure enough, God met Beck in prison.
With his signature combination of biblical reflection, theological reasoning, and psychological insight, Beck shows how God always meets us when we entertain the marginalized, the oppressed, and the refugee. Stories from Beck's own life illustrate this truth -- God comes to him in the poor, the crippled, the smelly.
Psychological experiments show how we are predisposed to appreciate those who are similar to us and avoid those who are unlike us. The call of the gospel, however, is to override those impulses with compassion, to "widen the circle of our affection." In the end, Beck turns to the Little Way of St. Thérèse of Lisieux for guidance in doing even the smallest acts with kindness, and he lays out a path that any of us can follow.
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Richard Beck is professor of psychology at Abilene Christian University in Abilene, Texas, where he also lives. He is a popular blogger and speaker and the author of several books, most recently Hunting Magic Eels: Recovering an Enchanted Faith in a Skeptical Age. His published research also covers topics as diverse as the psychology of profanity and why Christian bookstore art is so bad. Beck leads a Bible study each week for inmates at a maximum-security prison.
