Christ The Lord Out Of Egypt

I recently finished a fictional novel called Christ the Lord Out of Egypt by Anne Rice. (Thanks to Taya Gray for the borrow. Incidentally, check out Taya’s husband’s music, we are on tour with Jason Gray right now!) Just hearing about the concept of this book and seeing a friend moved to tears while reading it made me interested.

The story is written from Jesus’ perspective and is about the time from his childhood when his family left Egypt to return to Nazareth. That sounded to me like a pretty bold story to try to write so I was curious to see how the author pulled it off.

Obviously this is all fictional and the author had to make some guesses about how it all went down. That is what fiction means but when someone is writing about Jesus I just feel like this reminder is necessary.

What I enjoyed about the book is how it reminded me of Jesus’ humanness. The author takes you through what may have been going through his mind as he experiences different things. Things like people being hurt and even killed, dealing with a sick family member, saying good-bye to close friends and family, and being uprooted and moving a long way away.

It also tells of the sacrifice Mary and Joseph would have had to make to keep Jesus and raise him as their son. Having a child out of wedlock back then would have been a huge deal and a bit of a disgrace to Mary and her family. When they return to their hometown it’s interesting how everyone reacts to them and to Jesus. Another interesting thing is that Jesus only calls Joseph by his name. It’s never Father or Daddy.

Anyway, that gives you an idea of what the book is about. Even though it’s a novel I think it’s still a great read as it can help to get you more in touch with the humanity of Jesus.

GL