Hilton, “God’s Wake Up Call 71 Short Stories Each With A Moral Parables of Our Times, Modern Psalms” (reviewed by Trudy Thompson)

Review
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Title: God’s Wake Up Call 71 Short Stories Each With A Moral Parables of Our Times, Modern Psalms
Authors: Nancy Goldberg Hilton E-book Editor: Lynn M. Hilton, PhD
Publisher: Hilton Books 141 West 1820 South, Perry, Utah 84302
Genre: Inspirational
Year Published: 2011
Number of Pages: 146
Binding: Softcover
ISBN: 9780977640386
Price: $9.95

Reviewed by Trudy Thompson for the Association For Mormon Letters

Who are you? Do you have a purpose on this earth? Do your actions affect others? What is the mystery of God?

In “God’s Wake Up Call,” author Nancy Goldberg Hilton begins by describing her journey from Judaism to Jesus Christ. As a young Jewish girl, she sang the Hebrew songs, practiced her religion, went to the synagogue with her family maybe twice a year, and celebrated all of the Jewish holidays. She was of a questioning nature, but at the same time, she did not think she had all the spiritual answers, but just believed she did not need help from any religious source.

After college, she went to work in a field she felt she could excel in. Along the path she had chosen for herself, she worked harder and harder and longer and longer hours. She states, “I kept on this ugly pace for years and years.” She was promoted over and over again, changed companies and grew in stature and attained all her goals.

She found herself building walls of safety around her to protect her from feeling much and to help her focus only on her work. Eventually, the walls began moving in closer and closer and she soon felt an unexplained emptiness within. She began to question her reasons for working so hard, and asked if the money she made was truly everything. In the midst of this internal turmoil, she decided to take a vacation. It was on this vacation where a spiritual experience during a heavy thunderstorm instantly opened her mind and heart to the reality of God and his son Jesus Christ. The author goes on to vividly describe her ongoing spiritual journey, what she has learned, and how the light she sought to fill the darkness of her limited understanding has brought her peace, and opened her mind to the miracles of God.

The ensuing 71 short stories in the book, penned by the author, each contain a moral and are written like parables for our time and modern psalms.

Some of the titles of these short stories include: The Noble House, The Angelic Choir, A Side of Fries, What Can You Buy?, Endless Clouds, and Autumn Leaves, The Choice to Sin, and many others. The wide ranging subjects yield a wealth of interesting morals and parables to grant the reader many opportunities to “think outside the box.”

Some of the ones I thought were most poignant include:

The Mended Fence: John and Cindy had been married for twenty years. They had two teenagers and an eight year old daughter. The lived in a modest home and John worked as a salesman and Cindy was a school teacher. Every weekend Cindy had a list of jobs to be done at home and assigned everyone in the family their tasks. She gave John the task of mending the fence every weekend. John tried to find time to shop for the necessary supplies, but he never completed his assigned task. One day the dog got loose and ran away because of the large gap in the fence. Every day they had to chase him. The hole got larger and larger, but John continued to put off getting the job done. One day a stray cat crawled through the fence and went after the dog. The dog chased the cat, the cat rain into the house, the little girl screamed, and the chase left a path of destruction everywhere. The lamp, the china vase, and many other household objects were broken and destroyed. John ran into the garage and grabbed a piece of scrap wood and nails and a hammer and mended the hole in the fence. Cindy came home and saw the mess and asked what happened. With a sheepish grin the man said, “Well, I finally mended the fence.” The moral of this story is that apologies can be difficult, so do not procrastinate and do what is necessary to get your lives in order.

Frozen in Prayer: A young man is driving down a road in stormy weather and is frantically leaning forward to see a few feet in front of his car, but could not. His passenger was singing along to the music on the radio and bouncing up and down. The passenger becomes angry when the driver turns off the radio to concentrate on the road. The driver explains that the radio and his friend’s singing were major distractions to navigating through the ice storm they were in. The windshield wipers stopped because the ice had become so thick that the windshield was frozen solid. The driver pulled off to the side of the road and stopped the car and explained that all they could do was wait for help. They had taken a short cut and no one knew where they were. The ice and snow continued to pile up. They unsuccessfully tried to open doors, and soon realized they were trapped in ice. The driver had run away from home the year before, and was drifting from one job and one place to another. He had gotten tired of his mother warning him about various things and felt he would do better not having to live by her “silly rules.” He had never called her during that year. The driver reflected on his life and tried to remember the good things he had done, but could only remember a few. He regretted the choices he had made and decided the only thing left for him to do then was to pray.

The story ends with a police officer finding the car a week later. The officer is deeply saddened by the fact that he was witnessing this over and over again: young kids not learning to live wholesome lives before it was too late. When the officer opened the door, he found the passenger frozen with fear upon his face. The driver was frozen in prayer. As he carefully lifted them out of the car, the sun came out and reflected on the frozen tears of both of the boys.

Each story in “God’s Wake Up Call” deals with different issues in our lives and encourages us all to take a step back, re-evaluate our lives, and seek answers to the questions such as why are we here, what is our purpose, are we of value, what is our potential, and how do our actions affect others? These stories encompass all of humankind’s struggles and choices and trials, our successes and failures, and are meant to increase our spiritual understanding of how God truly sees us.

The author encourages us to “take a journey through these stories and then write your own story.” The thought provoking stories in this volume will help you do just that.

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