I Don't Wait Anymore: Letting Go of Expectations and Grasping God's Adventure for You

I Dont Wait Anymore (written by Grace Thornton, published by Zondervan) is a good book.

The subtitle of this slick hardback Letting Go of Expectations and Grasping Gods Adventure for You is a perfect description of the content youll likely be challenged and inspired by when reading it.

Thornton lines the pages of this book with golden nuggets of wisdom that comes from growing through letting go of deeply-rooted expectations for her life and learning how to embrace the real life God has in store for her. The publisher describes Thorntons story like this:

She had dreams, plans, and ideas for what life should look like. For one, she thought shed be married. She thought shed have kids. She thought God would bring her the life shed been waiting for because she knew He was good and she tried to be obedient. But thats not what happened. Not at all.

So many people could easily relate to the experience of life just not turning out like they expected or wanted; the insights Thornton shares of her facing unfulfilled dreams and expectations are thought-provoking and stirring learning opportunities for the rest of us wrestling with similar experiences.

The book itself is designed to encourage personal exploration of your own thoughts as you read through it. Its a stiff hardback with thick, glossy pages and each chapter concludes with a single question for self-reflection and space to write in your responses. The writer wants you to get something out of this book, and the lessons she shares from both her own life and from the Bible should provide opportunity for any reader to learn and be challenged.

Like I said, its a good book but with a story-telling flaw.

First, even though I have just read this book cover-to-cover, I still dont have an accurate idea of who Grace Thornton is. Oddly enough, this book does not contain a page or paragraph anywhere introducing us to the author. Not a single blurb! This omission leaves the reader wondering, Who in the world is Grace Thornton?!

The main flaw in Thorntons story-telling is that she uses such small slices of her personal story to tell a larger story that the overall story-telling is choppy. Were led to some great nuggets of wisdom through these snippets of her story, but theres such editing as to the telling of her story it doesnt all come together. The experience the reader is left with is one of feeling as though the author picked just portions of her story, which means there are gaps. Obviously, when writing your story, you dont include every single detail, but you can also not share enough for a story to be a whole.

The writing quality is excellent, but youre almost left feeling the writer cared so much about the silky-smooth ease of reading that the wholeness of her story suffered.

This book has good writing, an interesting story many readers can relate to, and valuable insights we can apply to our own lives, its just lacking in details in the telling of its story.

But dont let that stop you from buying it and reading it.

It really is a good book!

I received this book free from the publisher in exchange for this review. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commissions 16 CFR, Part 255: Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.

I have followed Grace Thornton's blog for a very long time. Something about her honesty and story telling abilities just hits my spirit in a good way. Her ability to take ordinary events and show the hand of the Lord in them is something admirable to me.



Well, of course, when I found out she was writing a book titled, I Don't Wait Anymore, I knew I was definitely going to get it.

I have not been let down at all by this book. The same wonderful writing that accompanies Grace's blog is also found within this book. She is witty, funny, faith-filled and passionate. Her heart is threaded neatly throughout this book. She tells stories of messes and God's hand in them and dogs in fields and leading the way home and travelling and there isn't much else to desire within this book to be honest.

To top it off, the layout of this book is beautiful and trendy with tribal printed arrows on each page as well as crisp, clear font on beautiful lily-white pages. (To some this won't matter, to my book friends out there, I know you get this. ;) )

If you're looking for a summer read that's deep but not too deep and filled with adventure, well you've found it. Don't wait (pun intended) to get this book. It's so good!

Note: I received a copy in exchange for a review.

Several weeks ago, I signed up to read Grace Thornton's new book I Don't Wait Anymore. Thanks to another fabulous delivery debacle tied to our recent move, the book didn't make it to me, but Zondervan was kind enough to try a second time, and I just got the book earlier this week. Because I'm up against a time crunch to tell you about this, I did not get to sit and savor every page like I dearly wanted to, but that's okay; I'll just read it again!

Because this, my friends, is a sit-and-savor book. Grace and I are, in some ways, long lost twin sisters. I have a feeling we are practically the same age, we both grew up with crazy end-times fears, we both longed for love, we both deeply resisted winter driving on the interstate, and we both wrestled over how to live the story God had written for us, even if His plot didn't match the ones we designed for ourselves. Yes, we could certainly be twins

Grace has one up on me, though, when it comes to adventure. She's been more of a world traveler than I will ever be, and that is absolutely okay, because that's part of her story in ways I doubt it will ever be part of mine. Yet both our stories are uniquely lovely.

I Don't Wait Anymore is Grace's story {and the tender urging of her heart toward the hearts of all her readers} of giving up the wait for life to turn out as expected and to instead believe that God could have so much more beauty wrapped up in plots we couldn't even dream up for ourselves. And not even to believe that truth, but to embrace it and to let it embrace back.

Because so much of Grace's waiting and longing centered around a love story and a husband, I so identified with her heart-wrestling. Her thoughts and prayers absolutely mirrored many of my own from the pre-husbanddays. She asked questions of God like, "How do I get to the point where You are really all I need?" Yes. And she learned truths like "God should be the prize of marriage rather than marriage the prize we get from God." Yes.

Our stories have diverged, Grace's and mine. For reasons I don't know because I'm not the Author of stories, God wrote a leading man into mine and hasn't into hers. At least not yet. But just because that detail has changed doesn't mean that I don't need the reminder that I should not settle.

This is the crux of what she urges in the book. The whole of our lives, the everyday of our lives, should always be about whatever God has planned. That might mean taking in a foster kid or quitting a job or moving to another country or being okay without a husband. God's plan is never settling, and ours quite often might be, unfortunately.

Never settle.

Don't sit and wait for your version of the right way to show up. Jump in and let God's grand story take place in your days. His grand story, by the way, might not be huge and magnificent in the way we've been taught to view "grand story." It might be something tiny and obscure to those around. But my goodness. In the light of eternity, it is grand.

This book is loaded with snippets of story, well-crafted phrases, and so many things that made me think. That's why it was hard for me to read it so quickly. It's written in such a way that I can't rush. I must think about her experiences and how they relate to my own. Even now, as my husband and I look to the next part of our future, in a new town, we wonder what God has for us. And this book reminded me not to settle for quick answers made up in our own minds. To stop waiting for what we expect/need to happen to take place and to, instead, let go of all our own ideas and let God give us His grand adventure.

I can't wait to read it again. Slowly, this time, sipping the words and finding even more of their flavor.

Thanks, Zondervan, for providing a copy of this book for me in exchange for a review.

Are you constantly worried about what you "should be" doing? Have your plans for your life been changed over and over due to what's been thrown at you? Do you worry about what you're going to do next?

Well, I Don't Wait Anymore by Grace Thornton is a book written sraight for your heart, from her heart after God's heart. Grace is a young woman from Alabama. She had everything planned out, she had many expectations, and she wasn't settling for anything less. Grace was holding onto things that weren't even promised to her.

That's when Grace's world took a spin towards the unexpected. Everything she planned for, disappeared after one big change in her life. The man that she thought she was going to spend the rest of her life with, broke her heart. She felt empty and scared of the unknown plans that she hadn't prepared for.

Then this happened, "The big became big, and the small became small. I began to know Him and see His bigness in light of His faithfulness, in light of His love and the story of redemption He so beautifully crafted since the beginning of time."

Grace began looking at everything around her through God's eyes. She began searching for God and all of His glory through everything. That's what got her through this big change in her "life plan"; giving her plans and life over to God. Only then was she able to get pass all of the pain and hurt her emptiness caused her. She let go of her expectations and grasped on to God's adventure for her!

I Don't Wait Anymore is beautifully written, with such insight that you can't help but to relate to in all of it's beauty. God shines through the pages and every seam of this book.

To make it even better, the pages are nice and there's a ribbon bookmark connected on the spine so it's easy for me to keep my spot, when I have to pause. Also, at the end of each chapter, there's a question or two that helps you ponder what the chapter was about and it helps you relate it to your own life. Underneath the question, there's lines, a place for you to answer the question in the book.

I'd highly recommend this to anyone that feels like they don't know what to do next in their life. Especially, the young single women who feel empty and lonely.

"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." -Jeremiah 29:11

I was given a free copy of this book from booklookbloggers in exchange for an honest review.