I wish I'd discovered Life After God a few years ago when I made the gut-wrenching decision to cast aside the theology with which I'd been indoctrinated for decades. I believed the "professional theologians" had to be right in their teaching; after all, they were the Ph.Ds. and world-famous evangelists. How frightening to throw their teachings aside and launch out on my own to find answers. Feldmeir's book would have been such a great help and comfort during that time.

So, I especially recommend Life After God to anyone struggling to find their way, to find an idea of, and a relationship with, a "God" that resonates with their spirit. Even though I read the book well after finding a new path, I was encouraged to see Feldmeir's description of the struggle and process involved to be right on the money. As I read, I couldn't help but think over and over, "Yes! that was me!"

Thank you to NetGalley and Westminster John Knox Press for the ARC of Life After God!

This book has some interesting ideas that I felt could have been explored more deeply. It definitely challenges some traditional teachings of the Christian church but as other reviews have stated, doesn't really live up to the premise of the title of this being a guide for Christians after they have lost their faith. It makes the teachings of the Bible more malleable for progressive thinkers but doesn't give much guidance for what to do "After God." It certainly doesn't give much hope for the Christian church actually adapting their teachings along the lines of his ideas.

Life after God was a quick read about the God that is still around even when we question God and his goodness. Feldmeir offers up a view of God that allows for the mystery, questions and unknowns in faith. I appreciated his approach to broadening our view of God. Some of the analogies and stories went a little long, but overall it was a great read!

I thank the Netgalley and the publisher for a copy of this book! The opinions in this review are entirely my own.

The title is quite misleading. After the first few pages, I thought I would be unable to finish it. However, it turned out to be a book I enjoyed. The author makes some great points! This is a book aimed not at those who no longer believe (as the title suggests), but actually for all Christians who ever doubt God. There were a few statements that I believe some Christians may find controversial, but, to me, this book answered a few questions I had before I was saved and some I had when I was still a "baby Christian."

Read my full review here: https://mimi-cyberlibrarian.blogspot.com/2023/11/life-after-god.html
Here is the publisher’s summary of the book. “The understanding of God that many Christians insist is so clear in the Bible makes faith seem like an all-or-nothing proposition. When much of that rigid projection seems in doubt, it’s not surprising that many people leave behind this take-it-or-leave-it religion. Pastor Mark Feldmeir offers an introduction to a God that many people weren’t aware existed—a mysterious, uncontainable, still-active God who loves and cares for real people with real problems. Life after God offers glimpses of the ineffable God, who can emerge when we forget what we think we’re supposed to believe about God and open us up to the mystery, wonder, and compelling love we crave.”

Last night, a young woman close to my family called me for some help. She has had 4 or 5 deaths in her family within the past year, including her mother. In the course of the conversation, she asked me, “Do you think God is mad at me?” Thank goodness I had just read Rev. Mark Feldmeir’s book because I was able to answer her with some truths, rather than some platitudes or a wake-up call to pray for forgiveness for wrongs she may have committed. Feldmeir’s truth helped me to tell her that what God was offering was strength to carry through during the times when life seemed overwhelming.

The subtitle of the book is “Finding faith when you can’t believe anymore.” Feldmeir explores the Biblical concept of God, traditional evangelical views of God, and a more cognitive awareness of the presence of a loving, trusting, and supportive God. The text is written in almost a prose poem style, or perhaps sermon style. It is very easy to read and digest. And, more importantly, it is encouraging and supportive.

It is a perfect book for those who are struggling with their faith, and those who wonder about why we are believing in a God at all. For me, it put into words the faith in a God whose arms are wrapped around me and supporting me.

Life After God is composed in a way that allows the reader to get through the book in a couple of sittings or to do as I did, read one section a night as my evening meditation. I have suggested the book for my spiritual growth book group at church, when I will read it again. I also think that it would do well as a 6-or-8 week study because there are study questions at the end of the book.
Mark Feldmeir is the pastor of St. Andrew United Methodist Church in Highland Park, Colorado. I identified so well with the book, it makes me want to visit the church sometime.

Easy to read and full of amazing supportive thoughts that challenge my own belief in Christ as my Savior. With personal testimony as well as historical stories, this book will stir your thoughts about what and how you think about the gospel.

A few key phrases are used throughout the book that really make you ponder your own existence and behaviors. For example, shalom. Are you loving your life representing the peace of shalom? Is there an area of your life that you’re battling others or maybe even God?

This book is full of scenarios to challenge yourself. It’s a lot to contemplate. I’ll admit I had some questions about some of what was said, but overall, I think it’s cause a stir in my own heart and made me reflect on my own faith.

I give this book 5 out of 5 tiaras because of how it caused me to reflect and ponder my own faith and if I’m living in shalom. Thanks to NetGalley and Westminster John Knox Press for access to this title. I hope it stirs the hearts of many!

I don't usually give reviews on religious books, but because I got this one through NetGalley (thank you!) I'll leave a review for this one. I really appreciated the change in perspective this book offers. More people every year are struggling to connect with God through the religious institutions currently available, but still seeking a genuine relationship with Him. The nuances presented here in understanding may just seem like semantics or splitting hairs, and at times that is true, when when you're looking for a way to believe it's those little things that often make the biggest difference. Additionally, the book was a little more repetitive than may have been strictly necessary, but I read it more as reinforcing specific points that shift the focus of faith and belief to more concrete and tangible components. Personally, I found this a beautiful and enlightening book to reinforce things I already believed as well as challenge my thinking on some subjects I've been undecided on. Some of his points I don't believe at all. But my personal beliefs aside, I think this is an interesting philosophical work that could be beneficial for many individuals searching for a God they can connect to.

Have you lost your faith in God? I know, it's a heavy question, but for a lot of people, especially in today's world the answer is yes. If that's the case for you, then you should definitely read this book. Mark Feldmeir has some insight that might get your through and help you reframe your thoughts.

Westminster John Knox press and net gallery invited me to read and review an advance copy of life after GOD all thoughts and opinions written here are my own.
Life after GOD reads like a work of beautiful poetry, a scientific thesis, and an essay understand sermon all rolled into one.this made it easy to read. But some of it's more scientific points are complicated and deep. So just reading it once isn't going to do it justice in order to take in all of this beautiful manuscript test offer, you may have to read it more than once and like the Bible. Each time you read it, you might get something different out of it. As I previously stated, parts of it are eating to read and written in poem format. Other sections are more scientific, and still other sections die of deeply into humanity itself and strive to answer deeply rooted questions that we are facing today more than ever. Are we separate from the being the created us or are we deeply into whined with this? All loving all-knowing being? Is our future already planned out or is it up to us? Do we make choices and the future unfolds as we make those choices? It could go either way, but this book opens the doors to questions I had considered and others I had not ever before in my life. I'm really glad that this manuscript has been made available to us in publication and that we all can have a chance to read it and take in what it might have to offer to each of us. I thank the author, Mark Feldmier For his time, dedication, and tender loving care that it must have taken in order to put into this body of work. I hope that you enjoy it as much as I have. I hope it leaves you contemplating the real big questions, rather than the trivial things we find ourselves focusing on in this day and age.

This is my honest review of life after God without giving too much away leaving you to read for yourself. I've received no compensation for a reviewing an advanced copy of this book offered by the publisher via net gallery

Thank you for writing this book. I have already recommended it to a good friend. I highly recommend this book to anyone looking for a deeper understanding of God.

I can't get this book to open in a readable format on any of my devices so I have to give up. It's a shame there wasn't a send to Kindle option like the rest of the books I get on NetGalley I really wanted to read and review this book

Headline: Wait for the psst of God

The title of this book is truly what drew me in. I can’t imagine life after God so I had to see what this author had to say. I was a skeptic. Is this idea a possibility? What is this man going to talk about?
Then I let go of my assumptions and picked up my iPad. But then preconceived thoughts flooded my mind and I couldn't focus. I thought maybe the book was meant for people who don't believe in God anymore or who have abandoned their faith. But Pastor Mark makes it known that his real audience is those who find it hard to believe in the traditional understanding of God.

This book is about building a more realistic understanding of God that makes sense in today’s world which is summarized in chapter 1 where it asks “You see the suffering of the world and you can’t stop asking why” The author starts to examine the question of suffering, and proceeds to talk about the nature of God

In the next chapter the author tells a story about an attack and as you can imagine the question there is "if God could not have prevented this tragedy, then can we really say that God is entirely all powerful?

Pastor Feldmeir challenged the traditional idea s
that God has an exact plan for every person and also challenges conservative concepts such as salvation. This book is a gentle conversation to open our mind about a God we believe we know and a faith we think we understand.

I received a copy of this from Netgallery in exchange for my thoughtful and honest review

I am not too far in....however, so far...the concept seems intriguing. It feels like a drag to get to the point with people as he walks in the faith of Christ. I do appreciate the crumbs of knowledge. I may be impatient and I can be a slow reader at times. Nevertheless, I shall continue reading and updating my reviews.

I want to preface my review by saying that I love Christian philosophy and apologetics; I have invested many years in this field and it never gets old. I love digging into the way that we dig into things, thinking about how we think, and discovering how it is that we process things.

That said, this was not the best book in the field that I've read. Not even among new releases - of which I've read probably 6 or 7 in the past year. It was just...weird. It started out weird and it just never really brought me back.

The author does a lot of talking, but not a lot of point-making. He spews a lot of information, but he doesn't tell you why it matters. He keeps talking about "life after God" (as he should, since it's the title of the book), but he never even really clearly defines what he means by that. So it doesn't really read like a conversation - and by that, I don't mean that it doesn't read like a conversation the author is having with you, but I mean that it doesn't read like a conversation that the author is having with your doubts/fears/questions/lived experience. It reads like a guy in a coffeeshop talking to himself out loud, or perhaps a guy who seems to be talking at you but you're not sure if he actually knows you're there or not.

The information in the book is good. The sources cited and the stuff pulled out to present are unique in the landscape of this genre for the past few years, and it's refreshing. It's just not very well put together and was a very messy read for me that I got lost in several times.

The book is rather progressive which is saying a lot coming from someone with progressive views. This will turn off a lot of readers. But it also provides historical information that shapes the Bible and our beliefs.
I was turned off by the author judging how someone came to faith which isn't very progressive of him.

Life After God is an interesting read. While written conversationally, it provides a depth that causes the reader to really think and contemplate spiritual concepts often taken for granted. It's a book I will be thinking about for a while after finishing it.

~ While this book was provided for free, I was under no obligation to provide a favorable review. (2023)

Life After God

I was raised an evangelical fundamentalist, and as I have matured in Christ have found that that world view is more restrictive than I currently understand God to be. I vacillate between feeling guilty and feeling liberated. This book pushes boundaries with some thought provoking ideas, but also validates a new view of theology which is really an old/original view. This book encourages us, in the author’s words, to have an enlarged heart, a spaciousness of spirit. The middle of the book (163) discusses the intensity and variety of outlook we can entertain without feeling defensive or insecure. I’ll be reading this book another time (or two) as I work to enlarge my heart toward/about God.

On page 38 of the book, I came across a couple of my favorite sentences in the book, and the way I view creation. ”The Jussive mood is different. It's not coercive. It’s simply a form of hopeful expression that something could happen, might happen, will happen. But it doesn’t have to happen.”
and
“And God’s very first interaction with the universe is completely absent of coercion.”

The author goes on to comment on how the Hebrew concept of an existing intimate God was repurposed by the Roman Empire to become an all powerful, ruling God. We have moved away from the model shown by Christ to one modeled after Roman Caesars.


In chapter three the author goes off the rails a little bit. In one, he forgets that God may be able to self-limit, but man, for all his glory, isn’t able to limit God even when it would be more convenient for your argument to be able to do so. He forgets that creation is not all about humanity, but an expression of the very God he is advocating. A God without limits. The other area he goes off the rail is in his failure to understand that time is not linear. That is how humans perceive/live it. Astrophysicists will happily remind you that it is actually a space/time construct. The author incorrectly argues that if because God knows time non-linearly, he predestines events. Therefore He cannot know time non-linearly since we cannot know time in that fashion. .Again, he is placing limits on God’s abilities in order to promote the arguments of this chapter.

Once he gets this chapter out of his system, our author again has some interesting insights. He addresses the duality of God’s nature. God is Unchanging and Everchanging. Elohim is the God of all that is. Adonai is the God of all that could be.

The remainder of the book discusses God’s all encompassing nature, and uses scripture to counter a restrictive access to God. He does a very good job of supporting his argument. However, rather than countering the alternative viewpoint, he just ignores scripture that does not support his world view. He ends with the idea that God loves us so much he can’t really let us go. We have free will up to a point, but we don’t really have the choice to walk away from God for all eternity, because God’s love won’t give us that choice.

I feel that God’s greatest gift to creation is free-will. God is willing to self-limit his choices so that we have the space needed to make our choices.(I would redirect your attention to the idea from page 38 noted at the start of this review) No rereading of this book will change that viewpoint.

A complimentary copy of this book was provided by the publisher for the purpose of review at Netgalley.com .
A copy of this review was also posted to my Goodreads account.

It was... good, but I suppose I'm in a different situation than the author had in mind for the audience. I felt distant from it and like things didn't quite apply, which was very unfortunate. It's been a difficult process and I've not found anything that's really felt like it spoke to me.

Reviewed today on my Substack Thinking About Thinking blog @geraldeverettjones. The book introduced me to Alfred North Whitehead and the notion of process theology. Much of that explanation is buried in a footnote, however. Nevertheless, thought-provoking.

Not my usual type of book but I was intrigued to see what the story was about. I found it a bit over my head to be honest. I do appreciate the chance to read it though from NetGalley. I may revisit it at another time in my life.