The Way of Letting Go
By: Wilma Derksen
Find it on:
Maybe it was the sting of remarks from a relative or friend. Maybe a miscarriage ended your hopes for a family. For all of your heartbreaks, maybe you wished there was someone to help you through. For Wilma Derksen, letting go of the 15 misconceptions about grief led her back to hope. In this book she tells how you can do the same.
Wilma’s world collapsed when her teenage daughter, Candace, was taken hostage and murdered. Wilma now shares her choices to “let go” of heartbreak, which gave her the courage to navigate through the dark waters of sorrow. Like Wilma, maybe your heartbreak forced you to retreat from happy expectations, of believing that life is fair, of finding closure for every circumstance. She encourages patiently: let go of the happy ending, let go of perfect justice, let go of fear, and let go of closure. Wilma’s wisdom will help you overcome your broken heart, and her advice will enable you to break free of pain to live a life of true joy.
Why I Choose this Book:
I don’t even remember why I requested this book for review, but I’m glad I did.
What I Thought about this Book:
It was beautiful. The message, the writing, the ideas presented, all of it was beautiful. I was amazed the whole book through how the tone of each page was so peaceful and forgiving, and yes, full of letting go. The author’s daughter was murdered. By human standards the author has every right to rant and rage, yet she knew she was held to a higher standard – God’s standard. And, even though she wasn’t always triumphant, she knew forgiveness was the best way.
The book was very eye-opening to me. I hadn’t realized how drastically someone’s life changes when their child is murdered. With the author, it had been a very publicized crime because first the daughter was missing, so they needed everyone to help look for her. That meant that when they eventually found her body, the news didn’t die down – instead they continued being in the news, and that would have to have been really hard. Also, the fact that it took many years to find the murderer meant that there wasn’t closure. I can’t even imagine what they had to go through, and to continue to have forgiveness and grace through it all? Very powerful.
The author goes through the Sermon on the Mount, point by point, as she goes through her story. The way she fit everything together, and goes back and forth speaks of impressive writing skills. She’s honed her writing craft very well.
At the beginning of each chapter there were quotes, and the quotes by Corrie ten Boom were my favorite. I’m very thankful that the author, like Corrie, was able to take the hardest thing in her life, and turn it around to use it for God’s glory. I had never heard about the author before reading this book, but apparently she’s traveled around speaking about forgiveness, and she has a blog. (Although, I don’t know if her blog is about forgiveness or not.) The author shows that even horrible and painful things in life can end up being used for good if they are handled the correct way.
Conclusion:
There are some details in the book that make it unsuitable for ages 16 and under or so, but overall I think the author did a good job of not getting too detailed.
There were also several things I didn’t agree with all of the way, but for the most part I really appreciated everything in the book.
Rating:
I’m giving The Way of Letting Go 4 out of 5 stars, and 7 out of 10.
*I received this book from BookLook
Noveltea 