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.”
To contact Philip,
make booking inquiries,
or request blog subscription,
email Joannie: pyasst@aol.com
Phillip,
I loved reading your book The Gift of Pain. I am writing a book about addiction and recovery and would like to quote some passages in this book. Is there someone I can contact for permission? I have worked in medicine for 30 years. The message from that book made me rethink how I viewed not just physical pain but emotional pain. I would appreciate it if this is a possibility.
Thank you for all you do.
Scott Malm
There’s a “fair use” understanding in copyright that lets you quote around 250 words without applying for permission, as long as you credit the source. If longer, write us a pyasst@aol.com.
I’ve often thought of the parallels between physical and emotional pain. Worth exploring further!
I had watched the very funny film, “What About Bob?” 2 or 3 times before settling on the one kernel I should take away on my spiritual journey: When Bob (Bill Murray) is interviewed by a reporter, he says, “I treat people as if they were telephones. If I meet somebody who I don’t think likes me, I say to myself, Bob, this one’s just temporarily out of order. You know, don’t break the connection just hang up and try again.” This quote kept returning to me, and I began to ponder “waiting on the Lord” and “…in God’s time”. I could see Bob was really talking about patience, faith and forgiveness by suspending his judgement. And I believe Bob was giving me a sneak-preview to the true nature of our Lord! What if God actually spends 99% of His time forgiving and loving unconditionally, but only 1% of His time judging and punishing? And what if He doesn’t judge us until we stand before him, and he asks us, “Who do you say I am?” Perhaps from the day we are born, He lovingly and patiently waits for us to see the light (or answer the phone). And Perhaps until that fine day, He sees most of us as being just “temporarily out of order”. Perhaps He knows something we cannot understand… that most of His children who are not believers yet are actually “Future Believers”?