Messy Beautiful Love #bookreview

I’m a big fan of books here.  You can probably tell that by scrolling through the reviews here on the blog.  But you may not know I’m also a fan of Darlene Schacht, the lady behind The Time Warp Wife.  So I was thrilled to be able to review her book Messy Beautiful Love through Family Christian.  You can purchase the book online through their store(in paperback) for $15.99.  

I have been discouraged before.  In the depths of despair to say.  Life is not good there.  Faith can be scarce there.  Sometimes I feel myself trying to slip down there again but I’ll find a quote or a story from someone else that reminds me just how lucky I am, that pulls me back up and puts me where I need to be.  That can be a bit stingy like a slap in the face or a soft ride on a cloud.  Just depends what I’m needing then and there.  Many times God has used The Time Warp Wife on facebook to bring me back to where I should be or to make me drop to my knees and pray about where I am and what I’m doing.

I began to see Darlene Schacht as a great woman.  A great Godly woman who could lead me and I could look up to.  I think I put her on a pedestal.  But to borrow a line from Bing Crosby in White Christmas, sometimes it gets lonely up on those pedestals and people(my word) tend to fall off.  Well I don’t know that Darlene fell off my pedestal but she definitely gained a lot of respect from me.

You see, she starts out this book by admitting that she almost ruined her marriage by having an affair.  I had to pick myself up off the floor!  We don’t normally expect that of people who are encouragers; people we’ve put up on pedestals.  Normally once someone has risen to fame they try to hide anything bad they may have done before and keep a squeaky clean image.  Not Darlene.  She wants to help the rest of us through her book.  And to do this she had to bare her soul and let us into her marriage.  

This is a great book.  It’s an excellent read.  I highly recommend it to everyone.  You don’t have to think you have problems to read this book.  Maybe you’ll see that you’re doing everything right, or maybe you’ll spot some areas you can improve on, or maybe you’ll go wow I’m horrible at this!  Either way, it’s a great book that I think we can all benefit and glean something from.  

You’re going to want to make sure you follow her blog and her facebook page.  But most of all, read the book.  Take your time reading.  Read things over and then reread them again.  There are challenges in each chapter.  Implement them.  Even if you don’t feel that it’s an area you need to work on in your marriage, maybe just maybe it might make a good area even better!  

Marriage is not a bed of roses.  Marriage is hard work.  Messy Beautiful Love offers a view of what a good solid Christ based Biblical marriage should look like.  It’s hard work folks.  You can’t have this by following what society thinks marriage is.  This book is one that you will come back to over and over again.  You’re never going to be through reading this one.  

A key point to glean from the book.  You have to surrender to God first.  You both must be surrendered and in obedience to God to have this kind of marriage and to make it work.  You’re still going to have problems, but by following God’s prompting and leading you’re going to end up with the best marriage you’ve had.