Customer Reviews

The Misunderstood God: The Lies Religion Tells About God

5 star:		(48)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

God is Love.

It seems to be a simple thought conveyed in a simple sentence; a skinny diving board of a definition suspended over the greater pool of theology; an entry point for the uneducated. Darin Hufford doesn't agree. He portrays this minimal concept in a whole different light in his book, "The Misunderstood God." Instead of this truth being the jumping off platform to enter the deeper things of knowing God, he sees it as the whole, defining point. He thinks we've been lied to, about God, and about his love, especially for us.

Using the familiar passage in 1st Corinthians commonly referred to as "The Love Chapter," Hufford takes the definitions of love and applies them to God. Though it sounds like a basic, Sunday School lesson, the results are profound and often disturbing. If he is right, some of the common characteristics we have clothed God with are full of holes. Though he doesn't specifically finger any Christian teacher or leader with his correction, he doesn't need to. This isn't a treatise against one specific denomination; it is full-frontal attack on fear-based religion. Though I wished I'd read through his chapters unscathed, I found that many of the thoughts, beliefs and actions he confronts are ones that I've heard, accepted and repeated myself.

With a much appreciated edit from Windblown Media, Hufford's book (which was previously titled "The God's Honest Truth") is nearly half the length, has a friendlier cover, is half the cost, and has some great, new content. Hopefully it will find a new life and be read by a whole lot more people.

A suggestion--I expect this book to be misquoted by others whose opinions and positions are challenged by the content within. Hufford seems to be prepared for this, having faced it with the first printing. I would whole heartedly suggest reading this book yourself and not taking other's opinions of it as fact. You deserve to read this beautiful presentation of the love of God and the God of love.

Our emotional health is directly tied to our view of God. Faulty assumptions about God will sabotage your heart. For that reason, I highly recommend Darin Hufford's new book, "The Misunderstood God - the lies religion tells us about God," because the book so ably exposes those harmful assumptions and invites the reader into a deeper freedom.

The book also has staying power. I found myself reflecting on key portions of the book long after I'd read it. The chapter exposing the myth of "The Angry God" reminded me that, "Love is not easily provoked." And despite what we may have been told, the Holy Spirit is not easily wounded or offended. Our God's heart remains supple and open without the fragile neurosis that plagues most of us. We need him to be strong like that.

This book will help you get that heavy pack of religious assumptions and misunderstandings off your back, because you were never meant to carry that.

A WONDERFUL BOOK!!

Darin Hufford has in my opinion hit a home run with his newest book. A rewrite of his previous book, "The God's Honest Truth," "The Misunderstood God" is half the size of the original and has been updated with new material. Filled with examples taken from the author's own life, it's simple to read and yet very profound.

We've been told that God is love, yet religion has painted a picture of a god that is the complete opposite of love. As Darin explains, our understanding of love is so upside down that we've actually given Him the personality and characteristics of the devil. Using 1 Corinthians 13 as its foundation, "The Misunderstood God" turns the meaning of love right side up and paints a picture of God that is beautiful and very appealing.

I was originally introduced to Darin's ministry when I read "The God's Honest Truth" several years ago. I was immediately captivated and my life hasn't been the same since. Although I immediately fell in love with the original, this new edition is just as good.

I highly recommend "The Misunderstood God" but I suggest reading it with an open heart and mind. If you let it, it'll blow apart the lies you've been told about God and, like me, I believe you'll never again settle for manmade traditions. Instead, you'll want to know this wonderful God who really is love.

I gave this book a 5 star rating only because I couldn't give it a higher one.

From the pen of a former pastor, comes a story of passion whose unfettered force fills the lungs of his writing and resuscitates the reader to respond with either a resounding "yes," a faint hope that breathes "can this be so?" or an expulsion of air that cries "heresy!" Darin Hufford is pretty much guaranteed attention and to get one of those responses in the reading of his new book The Misunderstood God. Attention that is enhanced by his powerful grip on the English language, keen insight into human behavior, and the character of his God, that leaves us in no doubt about his conviction that God really is misunderstood and that the Christian religion has perpetuated lies about who he really is.
The brilliance of this book lies in the way he has taken perhaps the most familiar of all biblical sentiments--the four verses in the Love (or Wedding!) chapter of I Corinthians that extol the virtues of love as patience, kindness, selflessness etc--and shows how historically humankind has distorted these qualities due to the lack of comprehension of what constitutes real love, and then subsequently transferred that twisted perception onto God--creating him in our own inadequate image and rendering him manifestly misunderstood.
But the most compelling feature of Darin's writing is his use of very personal experiences to illustrate and illuminate the obfuscated face of Father God. One that illustrates a combination of love's attributes--patience, not easily angered and protective--is the recollection of an incident when one of his little girls found him following evening service embarrassed and nervous because she had not made it to the bathroom in time and whimpered, "Daddy, I went pee-pee." Without even a pause, I scooped her up in my arms and covered her from the crowd. I held her close to my body and quickly found a nearby exit...I could feel my suit and tie beginning to soak. Not once was I tempted to hold her out away from me, but I squeezed her tight and spoke gentle, loving words in her ear and reassured her that no one saw what happened. The words of Jesus came to mind: If you being evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more your Father in heaven...
Within a very few pages of reading, the vibrant, pulsating picture of a God who longs and lives only to love, leapt off the pages. The visceral revulsion and grief of the extent of his misrepresentation and the lies told by religion, registered just as rapidly and deeply. From this reviewer's heart resounded an unequivocal "yes." From the heart of a man who was groomed in the traditions of his denomination and climbed to the top of his career in the clergy, we are now exposed to an epiphany of the transforming theology that ended that career. Says Darin; I fell in love with the people!
Alice Scott-Ferguson
Author of Reconcilable Differences; Mothers Can't Be Everywhere, But God Is; Little Women, Big God.

If you love people you will understand this book. Detached leaders have corrupted the message of Christianity by intellectualizing its principles and forgetting the true message. This book cuts through the empty theology and confirms the truth you already know in your own heart.

If you've ever felt that your logic and your faith were at odds with each other, then read this book!!!

I've felt like that many of times. The thoughts go something like this: "I believe in God, I know I do; I feel Him with me and I have faith in Him. But... why would God tell us to get down on our knees and worship Him or spend eternity in hell? That's not very nice. In fact, that is rather selfish and self-serving. God can't be that shallow... what is going on here?!???" This book solves that question for you. God DOESN'T request that of us. Instead, He is all about love. God is love; love is God. This book explains how organized religion and our society in general have twisted our views and definitions of terms that we use to describe God so much that we now view Him as an abusive boyfriend - one that we do our best to please so as not to be beaten, but one who we can never give our hearts to because we truly fear him deep down. But then this book goes on to clarify the true meaning of what God is and to rectify any conflicts between logic and God.

The great thing about this book was I did not feel it was threatening my church or my religion. It was not threatening or trying to change my faith at all. It was simply clarifying that God is not "a jealous God," or "a prideful God," or "a condemning God" as so many times we have been taught to believe He is. Instead this book, without trying to break your traditional church foundation, simply clarifies that God is pure love and nothing else. It also did not feel preachy to me at all, as so many other Christian inspiration books tend to do.

I wholeheartedly recommend this book to any Christian out there. Moreover, I would honestly recommend this book to any person who was raised Christian but no longer believes in God. I understand why that person would lose his/her faith, with all our distorted views of who God is. This book will rectify those views; and while the person still might not believe in God, and the goal of this book is certainly not to convert (actually, it is clearly written to speak to those that already believe), it will at least clarify what the religion that so many reject actually is, instead of the distorted view our current society actually has. I feel truly inspired and with a new connection to my God... yet still, again, I feel no threat to my church. This book was not meant to change your denomination or to put down the church. It was only meant to make you fall even more in love with God. And it succeeds.

The Misunderstood God will set you free from religion and open you up to receive, live in and share the love of God. You will learn what real love is and experience it's transforming power so you can truly live the abundant life Jesus came to give you. Definitely read the book before believing any negative comments. This is a book you have to judge for yourself, with your heart. Read this book and let God's heart speak to your heart.

Wow! This book is amazing! We all know that "God is Love" but what we don't know is what love actually is. I certainly have been taught much of what this book exposes as false beliefs about love and God, and what a relationship with the God who is 3 in 1 is all about.

I have some serious rethinking to do. I have some lies deep in my heart that I have absorbed by false teaching, both from my church experiences and the so-called culture we live in. How can we have been so misled? It is truly amazing that I have gone through most of my life with such upside down conceptions about God and even myself.

This book is a breath of fresh air: you will discover what love is really all about - much better than you have been led to believe! If God truly loves us, and we truly understand what love is, we will be attracted into a close relationship with Him rather than being afraid of Him, expecting Him to "whack us upside the head" when we make mistakes or even on purpose, do what we know is wrong.

So this book will not only address how badly we misunderstand God, but how we misunderstand ourselves and others around us. I am changing my thinking - literally "repenting" or turning around and going another way, and discovering a new kind of freedom in Christ! Read the book slowly, contemplate, absorb. It will change your life!

I only wish this book would have been written years ago! It would have saved me so much struggle in trying so desperately to see God how I needed to see Him! Religious philosophies and tradition kept me from really getting to know the lover of my soul but now that is all changed! Thanks so much to Darin for bringing God up close and personal so I can finally stand face to face with Him!

I'm going to disclose that I purchased this book fully expecting to be challenged by it because I've had an opportunity from a distance to get to know the author by participating on his web-site, listening to his podcasts and reading his blog. In addition, knowing this book was presented by Windblown Media, the publishers of The Shack, So You Don't Want to Go to Church Anymore and He Loves Me! Learning to Live in the Father's Affection all books which have had a profound impact in my life, I fully expected that this would provide a similar challenge.

I was not disappointed.

This material represents something of a rewrite and editing of previous work by Hufford and while I have not read the previous material, I can't help but believe that the message has improved in strength and clarity for that.

Those who measure the value of a book by its adherance to familiar systematic theological patterns are likely not to appreciate this book. It doesn't conform to those patterns and indeed, as is the case with most material from Windblown Media, that is the point. The Misunderstood God plays strongly upon the theme that God is Love (period). The common themes within today's christian community that would add something to that statement (the yeah, ... buts) have contibuted to an image or picture of God that has people seeing God as something He is not. This is true of institutional religion that has added elements that seem designed to influence behavior and commitment based upon an appeal to fear, guilt or shame and has resulted in a representation of God that seems more akin to a schizophrenic deity or an alcoholic celestial father, when clearly the New Testament speaks repeatedly that God is Love.

Hufford dares to take the statement seriously and structures his book upon I Cor 13 by contrasting the popular images within today's performance based, behavioral modifying religious approaches and then dares to present God as the loving non-manipulative God that He in fact is. In doing so, Hufford draws from the simplicity of the images found in scripture and his own experiences. This simplistic approach flies in the face of those more "sophisticated" theologies that insist that God's love must be balanced by his justice, his wrath, his judgement etc. Hufford seems to be saying in fact, that these elements must be seen first and foremost through the prism of his love, and nothing else.

As I read the book, I could not help but draw my own analogy to today's examination of what the real components of communication are. Tone and body language in fact convey more of the total message in most communications than the words themselves. What Hufford is suggesting is that you cannot understand God if you "hear" or "apply" tones and motives to his words that are not there. If you see God as anything less, or anything more than love in essence and truly desirous of your best, then you have misunderstood God.

This book is worth the read and even those who may be predisposed against such a message for whatever reason I believe will find something within that will help to draw God into a sharper and more personal focus.

I purchased this book for reading on my Kindle and I found nothing in that medium that detracted from the reading experience.

5 stars.

bart breen