This book is a meditation on the dual drives of Christian faith: toward God and toward Jesus. How do we get to God and, more importantly, how do we get back? How do we contact the vitality of Jesus that generated the Christian movement and what happens to us once contact is made? Faith has the reputation of being a chameleon word. Its meaning changes with the environment. But no matter what transformations occur, God and Jesus are the contant center...

In intention, and I hope in execution, this book is pastoral. In the theological world of today that remark might be more confusing than clarifying. In this context it means the approach to faith in this book comes from the bumps and prods that go on in the homes I party in, the streets I wander through, the classrooms I puzzle in. Although the theological literature has been consulted, this is not an attempt to contribute to the discussion. Academic brilliance is often imported because light is a scarce commodity and whatever illumines is welcome. But the audience in mind is not the journal readers. It is ministers, teachers, students, parents, and all who find the question of God unavoidable and the attraction of Jesus irresistible.