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.”
Phillip,
I am a minister that read your Book Whats so Amazing about Grace the year it was published and have never recovered. I still Go to it from time to time. Thank you. I would love to hear you thoughts on word written by the ancient Greek pagan poet Aeschylus.
“And even in our sleep pain that can not forget falls upon the heart, and in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom to us by the wakeful grace of God.”
These are profound words that leave me with questions. Namely, who is God and what is grace.
Thank you,
Cameron Dockery
Dear Philip,
I’m interested in finding an Amplified Bible, being moved to read more of it, but I’m wary of authors that take liberties with interpretation. I’ve always loved your books, and lens. Can you recommend an amplified that you’d feel comfortable reading/trusting?
Warmly,
Leslie Calderoni
The official “Amplified Bible” is very trustworthy, giving alternative readings from the original Greek. The Message by Eugene Peterson is a paraphrase in modern, sometimes casual English which is more subjective, though Peterson is quite trustworthy.
Dear Sirs,
I’m just reading your book What’s So Amazing About Grace? in translation into Croatian language. And I came to page number 106, where in the passage you wrote that Nazi Germany at the time of the occupation of the Balkans, Germans and Croats infiltrated hundreds of thousands of Serbs, Roma and Jews. The same moment I felt the need to write to you. In a few paragraphs before you wrote that AVM is not completely clear of all these developments in the Balkans and the former Yugoslavia. As a Croat generation and proud of my ancestors who have left me in the legacy of love for homeland and faith I must correct you. Those Serbs who had so much hatred of my people had ethnic cleansing of Croats, Roma and Jews. Take a look and explore how well Alojza Stepinac rescued people. Now look back at 2018 what you mention in the book. Deeply explore and do not write what only a part of the source says. Look at the movie called Huda Jama. Such places of suffering in Slovenia are “only” 300. Do not write about the history of the area where you are not close. How do I write about America’s history of suffering? Neither sources nor archives are sufficient. Only people in this area who live for generations of oppression and persecutions can write about it. Look at Vukovar. Then write it down.
Best regards.
I wanted to thank you for speaking at our church, Southeast Christian in Parker, a few weeks ago. Your sermon was wonderful, but I wanted to thank you for your last comments most of all. You said you understood that our church was going through a rough patch, but that God was not finished, that you were excited to see what God was going to do in the next chapter of Southeast. Thank you for that; it really meant a lot!
I really resonated with the sermon portion about India. I just came back from a mission trip with Greg and others from Southeast in April where we got to go to Damoh as well as the Siliguri area. I got to hear firsthand many of the stories you talked about. It is incredibly heartbreaking and life-changing to hold their hand, hug them, and pray with them as your world is changed. I wrote about it in my blog, the website below.
http://lifeisbynancy.blogspot.com/
Thank you for your time and for your sermon!