In this startlingly original interpretation, Ford explores seven of the longer parables attributed to Jesus. Bypassing the assumption that the superior character represents God and the subordinate one the Christian believer, Ford focuses instead on how persons, long separated by inequality, are called upon to collaborate.

Drawing on his own psychotherapy training, Ford offers novel insights into ways the characters persist in their mutual misunderstandings. He then shows how Jesus' stories envelop listeners in these same distortions, only to lure them-and ourselves-into the work of imagining reconciliation.