Resurrection Year: Turning Broken Dreams Into New Beginnings

Those who suffer from infertility bear a special sort of cross, and it’s one that breaks my heart. It’s among the pain I wish I could bear for those I love. I don’t wish it on anyone.

Our world got so tiny, our vision got so small—confined to the walls of our problems.

For us it was an IVF clinic, an adoption office, a dining room table full of pills. For others it’s a law court, a singles’ site, or a curtained-off bed in a hospital ward. Those facing trials know how life can soon revolved around a particular room or place. And soon our world is reduced to those four walls, even when we walk out the door—our minds consumed with our longed-for, begged-for, not-yet-existent wish. Our world gets tiny. Our vision gets small. Everyday blessings are missed. We see the pixel and not the picture, the thorn and not the flower, the pebble and not the vista.

But life is much bigger.

In Resurrection Year: Turning Broken Dreams Into New Beginnings, Sheridan Voysey bares his life and shares an intimacy with readers that kept me turning the pages. It’s billed as part memoir and part love story, and that’s good marketing language (selling books is a good thing for an author!). What this book felt like to me, though, was a heart-to-heart conversation with an old friend.

I’ve never even heard of Sheridan Voysey before, so how can I feel like I should pray for him, thankful for the chance to have met him through his story? (Yes, I’m reading and listening to him now!)

Voysey takes what’s become a far too common story of suffering and struggle and made it into more. It’s not easy to read, but it’s hard not to keep reading. Somehow, through the Voyseys’ struggle with infertility, I caught a glimpse of myself, of my suffering, of my pain.

And I saw, thanks to the lens he gave me, that God is there. That God loves me. That there is hope.

It’s not that I didn’t know these things before, but that the discovery was so pleasant, which I know doesn’t make any sense, given the topic. Voysey writes poetically, giving you a look at the raw struggle and the real tears. He doesn’t leave out the laughs, the sacrifices, the unexpected.

I appreciated how this book made the topic of suffering applicable to all of us. Who doesn’t relate with struggling through life? Who hasn’t had some fist-shaking toward God? Who won’t nod in at least part of this book?

And the concept of a Resurrection Year: oh, I could go on. In fact, maybe I should recommend the book just on that basis. I can think of a couple of people who have earned a Resurrection Year. I can think of times in my life when that was just what I needed: a time to rest in the Lord, to be gentle in my bounceback, to intentionally approach the world from a resurrection mindset.

This is a book I’ll be sharing, as much for its topic as for its good writing.

Reviewed as part of the Patheos Book Club, where you can learn more about the book, read interviews, and check out other reviews.