Sunday, August 2, 2020

About the Book

Book: Back to God

Author: Tim Witte

Genre: Nonfiction

Release Date: January 27, 2020

Back to God: The Journey of Hope through a Broken World is a timeless, grace-filled message from the Bible to bring us back to God.

Sometimes we long not for escape but to find our way in the midst of the questions burning in our minds. Who can I trust? Do I have meaning? What hope do I have?

In a society where nothing is permanent, technological advances increase our sense of vulnerability, and relationships come and go, we long for one unchanging element in which we can trust and rest in wholeheartedly without fear. We long for hope. Author Tim Witte conveys just that with Back to God, offering foundational principles from the timeless truths of the gospel of Jesus Christ:

the message of unfailing hope that meets us in our broken world
a promise from the only one who cannot lie and who will not fail
a powerful word from God to bring us back to God

Back to God is neither academic nor profoundly apologetic but is a truthful, down-to-earth dialogue filled with illustrations that will resonate with readers who long for true answers from the Bible for life’s biggest problems.

Click here to get your copy!

MY REVIEW

When I saw the title of this book I thought of a song. I don’t remember much of it except it did say, “back to the basics of life.” That is where we need to be right now in this chaotic world. We need to get back to the basics of the gospel and there we will find answers, hope and peace. The first few pages talked about a shooting in school. We may never know why things happen or why people do what they do, but God wants us to live together in harmony. If we start to turn away from Him, the enemy has a way to slither into our lives and cause us to stumble.

I enjoyed reading the different illustrations the author used to explain questions we may have about scriptures in the Bible. He uses easy to understand examples like the space shuttle to show where a flaw can cause damage that becomes harmful. Oh how I struggled when I read about how we can be foolish, disobedient and led astray. We excuse things we do that are wrong by saying “it’s just a little lie,” or “ being boastful is okay.” Our society has become a hotbed for looking the other way or not owning up to our mistakes.

Trust has always been a huge issue for me. I learned as a child that I couldn’t trust adults and that has spun into a world where I have built walls around my heart to protect it. What happened to my faith? I lost it along the way and blocked it out of my life for years. “Faith is implicit trust.” We have to learn to have faith and begin to trust God with our needs. With God’s help I have slowly learned to trust a bit more.

The author has written a book that I found very helpful. It would be easy to just skim the pages but I would have missed out on truths I needed to read. So for me, “I want to go Back To God.” I want to change my thinking and remember that there is hope, forgiveness and unconditional love.

I received a copy of this book from Celebrate Lit. The review is my own opinion.

About the Author

Writer and veteran Bible teacher Tim Witte holds a bachelor’s in Bible and Greek from Bryan College in Dayton, Tennessee, and studied computer science at Austin Peay State University. He lives in northern Indiana with his wife of thirty years. They have three daughters, two sons-in-law, and two grandsons. Tim enjoys teaching Bible classes at his church, woodworking, barbecuing, and spending time with family.

More from Tim

If I Should Die Before I Wake

Next to a chainsaw, the most dangerous tool you could find in my hand is a rhyming dictionary. The good news is I have not touched a chainsaw for months. The bad news is I recently dusted off New Rhyming Dictionary and Poetry Handbook. My subject is prayer so maybe, with much prayer, I can do more good than harm.

A Child’s Prayer

Writing Back To God made me reflect on the people and events God used in preserving my life and leading me to faith in Christ. Though I did not have a clear understanding of the gospel as a child, my parents laid a good foundation with biblical truths about God and myself. One of my earliest memories is of my Mom stooping beside my bed and having me repeat this prayer:

Now I lay me down to sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep;
If I should die before I wake,
I pray the Lord my soul to take.

That nightly routine and the words of that little prayer helped establish a Godward orientation to my life. Not every child receives that. I learned some vital truths at a very young age:

I learned I could pray to God. What a concept! Many PhDs have not figured that out.
I learned I was not ready to go to sleep until I had said my prayers. I don’t speak of praying in that way now; it sounds more ritualistic than personal. Yet, it conveyed the priority of praying to God.
I learned that God could protect me, but I should not presume upon that protection. I should ask for it.
The third line presents the possibility of death. It would have been bizarre and borderline cruel if, night after night, my mother had said, “Now remember Timmy, you might die in your sleep. Good night!” However, prayer is serious business, and I can talk to God about the scariest stuff.
Additionally, I learned my eternal destiny was not to be taken for granted; it was to be a matter of prayer. Ultimately, God would decide where I ended up.

As one would expect, my prayers became more varied and improvised as I matured. For most of my adolescence, I continued a somewhat sporadic pattern of prayer at night.

Gospel-ignited Prayer

However, the time came while in the Army when I ceased to pray. I recount some of this in Back to God. My life was a sinful mess. The last thing I wanted to think about was what happens “if I should die before I wake.” For prayer to be possible one has to have hope, but I was hopeless. Prayer would only be reawakened in me when another soldier brought me God’s message of hope.

Interestingly, my evangelist started the conversation by asking, “Tim, do you know where you would go if you died tonight?” From there, he proceeded to share the gospel of salvation by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. That prompted me to read the Bible, and particularly the book of Romans. I was overwhelmed by the astonishing message of God’s grace. Then the flame of prayer was reignited when I read, “For ‘everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved'” (Rom. 10:13). God heard my cry that day, and now I have the Holy Spirit dwelling in me and teaching me to cry, “Abba! Father!” (Rom. 8:15).

So recited prayers can be powerful tools for instructing small children about themselves and God. Such prayers may help them form a daily habit of praying. However, only the gospel has power to kindle the eternal flame of prayer in our hearts.

A Responsive Prayer

You may want to take cover now as I am about to wax poetic. Understanding the role that prayers can have in teaching important theological truths and the necessity of the gospel to ignite prayer in the heart, I recently composed a responsive bedtime prayer for my daughter and son-in-law to use with their young sons. I patterned it after the prayer my mother taught me, but I filled it with gospel hope.

Child:
As I lay me down, I pray,
Thank you Jesus for this day.
By your grace forgive my sin,
Make me true and clean within.

Parent:
Holy Jesus guard your sheep,
For you died our souls to keep.
Keep us trusting in your grace,
Till we see you face to face.