A gift to us all

        

The section to which I turn first each week in the Sunday edition of the New York Times is By the Book which features interviews with authors on literature and the literary life.

And this standard question never fails to grab my attention: “You’re organizing a literary dinner party. Which three writers, dead or alive, do you invite?”

If I were the author being interviewed, my instant answer would be: 1) Rachel Held Evans; 2) her husband, Daniel; and 3) their close friend, Jeff Chu. And I would choose to focus most strongly on the last of Rachel’s books, Wholehearted Faith (HarperOne, 2021), published after her unexpected passing at the age of 37 in May of 2019.

Chu was given access to many of Rachel’s ideas, anecdotes, scribblings, and other unpublished material which made it possible for him complete Wholehearted Faith after her death.

The book includes essays on the doubts and fears within the Christian life that Rachel dealt with in her writing and speaking engagements.

        She was probably best known as a Christian columnist, blogger, and author of A Year of Biblical Womanhood and Searching for Sunday.

But inevitably perhaps, and ironically, it’s what friends and family say about Rachel within the pages of Wholehearted Faith that will impress readers—and be more quoted—than the scriptural insights Rachel shares.

I was especially touched by husband Daniel’s comments on her concern to uplift people and share ideas that benefit the marginalized. He believes that Rachel’s vision lives on.   

“Her stubborn hope for a better future was all-encompassing. She lived more life in her short time with us than most people twice her age. She prioritized doing well at what’s important, and she discarded her imperfections with the chaff of each day.”

Jeff Chu also speaks from the heart when he writes: “I hope you will not just hear but also feel Rachel walking alongside you, probing with her characteristic curiosity and listening for the questions that dog you on your own journey.

  “My wish is that through this book you might experience the Rachel that I did: a faithful friend, a steadfast companion, and a wholehearted sojourner who asked over and over, ‘How can I help?’”

To which I would have responded, “You’ve already done that, Rachel—through the healing spirit you have brought to millions of grateful readers."

And I would probably have added something about Rachel’s honesty; as, for example, in her opening remarks in Wholehearted Faith.

“For better or for worse, there are seasons when we hold our faith, and then there are seasons when our faith holds us.

“In those latter instances, I am more thankful than ever for all the saints, past and present, … whose faith sustains mine. They believe for me when I’m not sure I believe. They hold on to hope for me when I’ve run out of hope.”

Or, by contrast there’s the lyricism of her thoughts on “the days when she believes”—and her modesty. She says: “The raucous laughter of my kids sounds like the prelude to a grander symphony, a promise of unadulterated joy to come. … I regard the tulip tree outside my kitchen window and learn from it. … and I feel enfolded in a story so much greater than my own.”

As the Rev. Nadia Bolz-Weber writes in her Afterword, Rachel never settled for platitudes or easy answers. Faith was her first language. “She turned an assignment into an anthem.” No wonder, Nadia adds, quoting Daniel Evans, Rachel’s life was “a gift to us all.”