A Portrait of Jesus by Joseph F. Girzone


First published in 1999.

Retired Catholic priest Joseph F. Girzone is most famous for his 1983 book Joshua (which also became a movie) which features Jesus coming to a modern-day American small town and the influence he has just be being himself - no great announcements, just Jesus being Jesus.

A Portrait of Jesus builds on that same idea but it looks at what the New Testament records about the life of Jesus and how he related to everyone around him. Girzone writes movingly about how Jesus preached compassion above all and he demonstrates it again and again in this book. His description of Jesus and his emphasis on relationships over law and the descriptions of how that worked then and how it can work now were profound when I first read them 10 years ago. I re-read the book after doing a deep cleaning of the book shelves. I was considering selling it to a used book store but I decided that the book was so powerful that I would keep it on the shelf and re-read it again in 10 years or so.

 I rate this book 5 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: A Portrait of Jesus by Joseph F. Girzone.

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