I was twenty-one years old when my well-orchestrated Plan A fell apart. Since then I’ve been living (often reluctantly) in a Plan B, an alternative I fought against and then spent too many years resenting. That’s why the title of Pete Wilson’s new book intrigued me from first glimpse:

Plan B: What do you do when God doesn’t show up the way you thought he would?

That would be the question of all questions, yes?

I received Plan B as part of Thomas Nelson Inc’s Book Review Blogger program called Book Sneeze, in exchange for this here review. However, Twitter and a couple mutual friends had previously introduced me to this young husband/father/pastor at Cross Point Church in Nashville, TN. We’ve never met, and the previous two sentences are about the sum total of what I know about him. But the little I knew coupled with the title of his book piqued my interest enough to want to take an inside peak.

In name of honest disclosure I have to tell you I was skeptical from the first page. The reason is simple: I’m a lifelong church-going girl whose life did not turn out like ANYONE thought it would. Since then I’ve choked on about every Christian cliche and piece of jargon replicated by those who felt a need to either explain or fix my heartache. The last thing I wanted to read was another Christianese book minimizing the significant pain and heartache that accompanies real living. As I braved the first chapter, I found myself silently pleading with Pete: Please, for love of all the hurting people out there, don’t tie this up with a pretty red bow!

Thankfully (HUGE exhale here), he didn’t. With a combination of personal story and biblical precedent, Pete walks through the mire of faith and difficult circumstances. He offers hope without platitudes, truth without condescension, presence without over-simplified answers. And for that, Pete Wilson, I thank you.