A Believer-in-Waiting's First Encounters with God (2011)

A great book! And, a good follow on to Elizabeth Mahlou's first book, Blest Athiest.
I was thoroughly entranced with Blest Athiest and expected to also be entranced with this book. And, I was not disappointed. There was some duplication of stories though in different detail. They gave a different perspective of their impact on her life and particularly how God set up these encounters to eventually bring her to faith in Jesus Christ.
I recommend reading both books and in the order in which they were published. ( )

Description: A Believer in Waiting's First Encounters with God allows readers an entrée into the world of what might be called a modern-day mystic, a world where spirituality, contemplation, hierophany, and miracles unite. Good, evil, suffering, darkness, unknowing, and the unconditional love of God are the leitmotifs that bind the author’s experiences from the physical world to the spiritual realm

I received a complimentary copy of A Believer-in-Waiting's First Encounters with God by Elizabeth Mahlou.
Elizabeth was an atheist and became a Christian, a Catholic. The book is detailed with things that has happened in her life with people, family, religious people and many friends. This is like a diary of what happened her and ones she knows. She has many quotes from the Scriptures.
A mother of biological and foster children, she has given so much of herself to others. I learned a lot about the Church and appreciate the information she has written.
The only problem was the book kept falling apart and made it hard to re-read some chapters. It is a short book and sometimes detailed; it was confusing to me at times. This is a personal belief one has and so should be read this way.
Find Elizabeth Mahlou at : www.emahlou.blogspot.com ( )

Mahou recounts a number of incidents in her life that most would deem to be merely coincidences, but that she describes as encounters with God. often these encounters are the result of a challenge she has issued, for instance bargaining with "God" that if a prayer is answered then she will begin attending church. She is initially reluctant to acknowledge these encounters as being authentic, spiritual events, but gradually accepts that God is becoming and intrinsic part of her life.

This book follows her spiritual journey as she tries out different faith communities while seeking a closer relationship with the God whom she had initially refused to believe existed. it will appeal especially to those with more evangelical leanings. ( )

In this book Elizabeth Mahlou shares her experiences of God in her first years of faith following a long life of atheism. She relates her understanding of how God has met with her in many different places and times with clarity, recounting what she has experienced. However, this is more than a book of subjective anecdotes because she has reflected on these experiences with the aid of the Bible, more experienced Christians, and the writings of Christians through history.

I was encouraged by the humility and self deprecating nature of some of the stories shared, which provided a better balance than I found in Mahlou's previous book, "Blest Atheist".

On the negative side, I found that the physical presentation of the book (which may have been a pre-pub copy) a little challenging, with not enough white space on the pages, pages falling out on first reading, and a few typos which had evaded the editor.

Overall, though, a very encouraging book which I'm grateful for as I needed encouraging on the day that I read it. ( )

First, I did not recieve this book until about a month ago when I finally marked it as unreceived. I'm not sure what happened, perhaps my address was lost in limbo.

The story was unique and not at all what I expected. Like another reviewer remarked, I was somewhat disappointed to find out that the author's name was in fact a pseudonym but we all have our reasons for doing things.

It was an interesting read.