At the author's table.(Quick Takes)(Stephen Simpson)(Interview)

"When I discovered that a relationship with Christ wasn't always warm and fuzzy, I became frightened," recalls Stephen Simpson in Assaulted by Joy (Zondervan). "Then I got mad. Then I stopped caring."

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Though he became a Christian at the age of seven, painful experiences in church as a teen and the death of a close friend turned Simpson into a self-proclaimed cynic. He shares his struggle with faith and how God responded by "assaulting" him with joy--blessing him and his wife with quadruplets--until he had no choice but to surrender and submit.

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How does the church bring out a Christian's …