I like Nouwen a lot but find it pretty easy to underestimate him. He is humble enough to let himself be easy to dismiss; he writes the truth without dressing it up to yell loudly for your attention. It's an admirable skill. I have appreciated each book I've read from him, but perhaps none have moved and challenged me like this one – especially the third and fourth chapters.

"The beginning and end of all Christian leadership is to give your life for others. Thinking about martyrdom can be an escape unless we realize that real martyrdom means a witness that starts with the willingness to cry with those who cry, laugh with those who laugh, and to make one's own painful and joyful experiences available as sources of clarification and understanding."

”For the Spirit whose heart is greater than their own, whose eyes see more than their own, and whose hands can heal more than their own.”

Jag är så tacksam för denna bok, och för människan som rekommenderade den. ”The Wounded Healer” är en härlig blandning av teologi, psykologi, filosofi och sociologi. Hans sätt att skriva är nästan lite ”Wikströmskt”. Denna bok (eller liknande) borde vara obligatorisk läsning för alla som ska jobba i ministry, eller för de som vill leva ett liv där de finns till för sin nästa. Det är svårt att lyfta upp favorit citat när jag streckade under många, långa stycken.

”Human beings can keep their sanity and stay alive as long as there is at least one person waiting for them.”

”After so much stress has been laid on the necessity of leaders preventing their own personal feelings and attitudes from interfering in a helping relationship, it seems necessary to re-establish the basic principle that none of us can help anyone without becoming involved, without enetering with our whole person into the the painful situation, without taking the risk of becoming hurt, wounded, or even destroyed in the process.

The beginning and the end of all Christian leadership is to give your life for others.”

”Thus ministry can indeed be a witness to the living truth that the wound, which causes us to suffer now, will be revealed to us later as the place where God intimated a new creation.”

Orden i dessa bok är så vackra. De tröstar, uppmuntrar och utmanar. Teman som sår, ensamhet, döden, orken att fortsätta till imorgon tas upp. Tack för alla trogna helgon som gått före. Det gör det lättare att själv kunna gå framåt. Låt oss ta vara på den vishet och de insikter de fått av vår Far.

(Inte en hemskt konkret bok, första delen var väldigt sociologisk.)

I thought I’d finish this in a day or two at the beach. But Nouwen strikes again. I basically underlined the whole thing. The last chapter on hospitality is well-worth the build-up of the whole diagnosis of the modern mindset. This little book is so beautiful and so full of hope and so confrontational to market-influenced leadership training. I found myself writing “wow” in the margins more than a few times.

This is my first Nouwen book and I’m moved. He has a beautiful writing style that comes off as wise and tender. The main idea is that our suffering does not disqualify us to lead others but enables us. Understanding the human experience of suffering can give us a glimpse into the life to come and we have the opportunity to invite others into this vision. I also like his take on hospitality and community. I recommend

This short book focuses on the paradox of ministry in a society of alienated individuals and the need to embrace our own frailty to make ourselves useful to others. I found it very useful in unwinding some myths I had accepted about ministry.

The first half reads like a sociological biopsy report—a brilliant one at that. The second half, however, offers the most stunning cartography of human relation—of how souls truly reach souls—of how only our deepest parts, our loneliness and the suffering therein, can touch the deepest parts of others.

This is an older book, but a good one. Nouwen is examining the young generation in the 70’s who now are in their 70’s. It is truly fascinating how well he pinpoints that generation and its idiosyncrasies. I found this book to be insightful if not a bit over written at times. I also feel like looking back there are some aspects that he writes about that feel universal to most young people. I’m not sure that today’s gen z is so different from the generation he was writing about. There are certainly divergences. I found his advice for reaching the “next generation” to be fairly obvious even 50 years later. Overall this is an important book in the missiology field, but is outdated in some ways.

Love the way a message from the early 70s speaks to today—except for the heavily gendered language (which the author apologized about in the Afterward and has been revised in the latest edition). I especially like the last chapter: for its message on how to do hospitality and for revising the meaning of imitatio christi.

4.5 ✨— Nouwen is one of the most influential theologians for me and this iteration of his gentle and invitational approach to ministry absolutely hit the spot. I’m just really grateful he existed and I’m grateful for this text.

The first chapter of this book screams "I WAS WRITTEN DURING THE COLD WAR." But this dissipates, and I found Nouwen's perception of generational needs to have accuracy both generally and personally. I will chew on the examples he gives, but I sadly found this book to be rather bland... could very well be the fault of the reader not the writer though.

A good book on ministry in a post-modern world. Even though this was written in 1979, Nouwen’s insights are still incredibly relevant. For a generation that feels dislocated in time and history, the gospel that God entered into time and space to rescue us from our human condition of death and suffering does not have the same meaning as it did to those with a more clear picture of their place in the drama of history unfolding. Nouwen suggests the image of the “wounded healer,” the image of Christ, as the grounding focal point. For those who may not be able to see or understand our meaning or understand our place in the schema of the universe, we know what it means to suffer wounds and (hopefully we have been fortunate to experience) what it means for someone to enter in to our suffering and to be present. This is what Christ did in his life on earth and this is what he continues to do in the life of his church. We too have a vocation to participate as wounded healers, with the hope that one day the world will be as it should be: without suffering, death, and evil.

“...No one can help anyone without becoming involved, without entering his whole person into the painful situation, without taking the risk of becoming hurt, wounded, or even destroyed in the process. The beginning and end of all Christian leadership is to give your life for others.” (P. 72

This volume can be read in one sitting (and indeed I read it that way) but it is also conveniently broken up into four chapters and I suppose that’s a good way to tackle it as well.

As a Pastor this book was a great reminder of the depth of compassion and relationship we are called to with those we minister to. And a reminder that it's not out of our own strengths that we minister to others but out of a shared weakness that we find healing and hope. Go read this!!