About Philip
Growing up in a strict, fundamentalist church in the southern USA, a young Philip Yancey tended to view God as “a scowling Supercop, searching for anyone who might be having a good time—in order to squash them.” Yancey jokes today about being in recovery from a toxic church. “Of course, there were good qualities too. If a neighbor’s house burned down, the congregation would rally around and show charity—if, that is, the house belonged to a white person. I grew up confused by the contradictions. We heard about love and grace, but I didn’t experience much. And we were taught that God answers prayers, miraculously, but my father died of polio just after my first birthday, despite many prayers for his healing.”
For Yancey, reading offered a window to a different world. So, he devoured books that opened his mind, challenged his upbringing, and went against what he had been taught. A sense of betrayal engulfed him. “I felt I had been lied to. For instance, what I learned from a book like To Kill a Mockingbird or Black Like Me contradicted the racism I encountered in church. I went through a period of reacting against everything I was taught, and even discarding my faith. I began my journey back mainly by encountering a world very different than I had been taught, an expansive world of beauty and goodness. Along the way I realized that God had been misrepresented to me. Cautiously, warily, I returned, circling around the faith to see if it might be true.”
Ever since, Yancey has explored the most basic questions and deepest mysteries of the Christian faith, guiding millions of readers with him. Early on he crafted best-selling books such as Disappointment with God and Where is God When it Hurts? while also editing The Student Bible. He coauthored three books with the renowned surgeon Dr. Paul Brand. “No one has influenced me more,” he says. “We had quite a trade: I gave words to his faith, and in the process he gave faith to my words.” In time, he has explored central matters of the Christian faith, penning award-winning titles such as The Jesus I Never Knew, What’s So Amazing About Grace? and Prayer: Does It Make Any Difference? His books have garnered 13 Gold Medallion Awards from Christian publishers and booksellers. He currently has more than 17 million books in print, published in over 50 languages worldwide. In his memoir, Where the Light Fell, Yancey recalls his lifelong journey from strict fundamentalism to a life dedicated to a search for grace and meaning, thus providing a type of prequel to all his other books.
Yancey worked as a journalist in Chicago for some twenty years, editing the youth magazine Campus Life while also writing for a wide variety of magazines. In the process he interviewed diverse people enriched by their personal faith, such as President Jimmy Carter, Habitat for Humanity founder Millard Fuller, and Dame Cicely Saunders, founder of the modern hospice movement. In 1992 he and his wife Janet, a social worker and hospice chaplain, moved to the foothills of Colorado, and his writing took a more personal, introspective turn.
“I write books for myself,” he says. “I’m a pilgrim, recovering from a bad church upbringing, searching for a faith that makes its followers larger and not smaller. Writing became for me a way of deconstructing and reconstructing faith. I feel overwhelming gratitude that I can make a living exploring the issues that most interest me.
“I tend to go back to the Bible as a model, because I don’t know a more honest book. I can’t think of any argument against God that isn’t already included in the Bible. To those who struggle with my books, I reply, ‘Then maybe you shouldn’t be reading them.’ Yet some people do need the kinds of books I write. They’ve been burned by the church, or they’re upset about certain aspects of Christianity. I understand that feeling of disappointment, even betrayal. I feel called to speak to those living in the borderlands of faith.”
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Hello Mr. Yancey,
I have been a fan of your writing for almost 20 years and appreciate your voice being in modern-day discussions about grace, love, etc. Like you, part of my journey involves working through a very legalistic upbringing in the church; while there have been so many subsequent encouraging steps forward to learn about, as you say, “a faith that makes its followers larger and not smaller”, one recurring setback in my life is a sense of anger against that upbringing (and the people involved with it) – at times, this anger is a stumbling block that prevents me from continued growth. Realizing that overcoming this anger is part of the process and is a mixture of philosophical and practical elements, I wanted to pick your brain and get your recommendations for someone who wants to move forward in faith but at times just can’t seem to move beyond the anger/bitterness from past sleights…just curious what the “game changers” were in your life to move beyond the pain in your religious upbringing. Thanks!
Bob
Whew, great question and well-expressed. First, some anger is appropriate. Look at Matthew 23 and Luke 11 in which Jesus lashes out against the judgmental and rigid religious leaders of his day; you’ll never find him more angry. At the same time we, not being Jesus, can easily move from appropriate righteous anger into the wound/revenge cycle. Over the years I’ve been helped by writers such as Scott Peck (especially his “People of the Lie”), Gerald May, James Fowler, and James Hillman to understand the stages of faith we go through. Kathleen Norris and Richard Rohr are also helpful, especially Rohr’s template of Order/Disorder/Reorder. I now view the churches I grew up in with more empathy. Life is difficult, and people raised in fear (theologically, socially, racially) respond with defensiveness and bias. Along the way, I’ve tried to identify the very positive things I took away: biblical knowledge, a community that embraces the needy within the community at least, a deep sense that our life choices matter ultimately, a resistance against the surrounding celebrity culture. Mainly, though, I have looked for healthy Christians to help heal my image of what wholesome faith looks like. For me, Dr. Paul Brand was a key, along with people I interviewed as a journalist: Millard Fuller of Habitat for Humanity, Robert Coles, Surgeon General C. Everett Koop, etc. I sought out people I wanted to emulate in some way. Then I found a very healthy grace-filled church in Chicago. They are out there, at least in the big cities. Why did people flock to Jesus? Because he stood out as a fountain of Living Water to people who grew up in a rule-oriented spiritual environment. That’s my story, or at least a bit of it. I’ll have a memoir out in 2021, if plans hold, and you can read the rest. The fact that you’re asking the question indicates you’re well on the way to health.
Dear Mr. Yancey,
I’ve been wanting to write to you for a long time. I live in Germany and have been reading your books. Your book “Disappointment with God” is the reason I found God in my life. I was reborn in Spirit through your book. I want to thank you sincerely and hope you always keep on writing! Your style of writing is so wonderful and natural. God bless you and keep on writing and reaching out to people like me.
Sincerely,
Maryam
I am rereading Soul Survivor for the 3rd time. I have read it at very different stages in my life and get something fresh and encouraging each time. In the opening chapter, you conclude with a confession that this book is your response to the exercise Mr. Fred Rogers presented whenever he had a chance to speak… “pause for a minute of silence and think about all of those who have helped you become who you are.” As I pause, once again, I am overwhelmed by the sea of faces and voices that fill my mind in answer to all those who helped me become who I am. There are many… so many… and you are among those who have helped me become me. Thank you! Your work on this front may well be complete, or at least the public sharing of it… but I have to ask… if your list is not exhaustive, and I know it is not… who else would you include in your hall of honor? What would Vol. II look like? Is it possible there is enough there to literally write a sequel? If so, I am sure others would love to read it! Feel the love!
I wrote that book in my active journalism days, when I was seeking people to interview who might be models for my life. It’s probably too late to start a volume 2, but you ask a great question. I would certainly include Dame Cicely Saunders, founder of the modern hospice movement; and Sir Ghillean Prance, one of the early voices in climate change and former director of the New York Botanical Gardens. Francis Collins, head of the National Institutes of Health, would be at the top of the list. Some others, both living and dead: Jurgen Moltmann, a contemporary German theologian; Millard Fuller, who founded Habitat for Humanity; John Perkins, who pioneers racial reconciliation; Ron Nikkel, who took Prison Fellowship to more than 100 countries; Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, President of Liberia. I’d like to explore perspectives on faith with one or both of the Obamas, though they’d be tough to get to. N. T. Wright, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Vaclav Havel, Richard Rohr, Will Campbell, Jimmy Carter, Wendell Berry, George Herbert, Ernest Gordon (amazing POW survivor of the “River Kwai” Japanese camp who became chaplain at Princeton)…the list goes on. Now you’re getting me excited.
What an honour to have an opportunity to write to you and express my sincere gratitude in your work. i was introduced to your work by my lecture at Bible School in South Africa. Your book “What’s So Amazing About Grace?” provided me with such freedom in my Christian walk especially now that i am Pastor. Thank you. AB Sithole, Pretoria: South Africa
Hey Philip,
You’ve written a lot about how your racist upbringing and how you’ve worked to overcome it. In the midst of what’s going on in America right now, what encouragement can the Gospel offer to a black person that’s wondering how long God is going to sit back and watch injustice unfold?
I’m reading “The Jesus I Never Knew” and trying to find some comfort in the fact that Jesus seemed to lean towards the oppressed, but I’m finding that a bit hard because it doesn’t seem to be like any of the ‘oppressed’ in the bible had suffered hundreds of years of abuse as a people *solely* because of the colour of their skin. God has never seemed more distant and this passivity doesn’t seem to be doing it for me any more.
Also, are there any black authors you have read who have helped shape your faith in some way? Just curious because I would love to read about a biblical response to racial injustices that is coming from someone on the receiving end of it.
P.S. “What’s so Amazing About Grace” is a book that has changed my life, so thank you for writing it.
I can’t say I understand, because I really couldn’t understand unless I shared your experience. I do think the Israelite story, which later became the Jewish story, may be an example worth considering; it’s no accident that so many spirituals and so many civil rights sermons hark back to those days of oppression and liberation. Man, were those prophets angry! And history has shown that anger can lead to even further injustice (French and Russian revolutions) or to genuine progress (anti-colonialism movements, fall of the Berlin Wall, South Africa). All this gets theoretical though, and doesn’t help much when you’re in the midst of the oppression.
Black authors: Cornel West is one contemporary who has strong views yet engages well with people he disagrees with. John Howard Griffin, a “temporary” black man, had the most impact on me because of his expose Black Like Me experiment. John Perkins, whom I got to know, holds out realistic optimism for reconciliation, something in short supply. John Lewis of Georgia is a significant voice who has affected me. Otherwise, I’ve mostly read the novels by Richard Wright, Toni Morrison, Ralph Allison and the like–they’ve certainly shaped my sensibility, if not my faith. I’d love to hear any you would recommend.