Walking from East to West : God in the Shadows

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Format: Hardcover
Pub. Date: 2006-03-01
Publisher(s): Zondervan
List Price: $19.99

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Summary

"Outside were stray animals and people, each about some pursuit. Sometimes it was a beggar at the door, sometimes a leprous hand reaching for a handout with a plea for compassion. Life with all its hurts and pains squinted at you, squatted before you, and stared you down daily. This was the street where I grew up." Ravi Zacharias has lived an extraordinary life. He has walked with great leaders, slept in the villages and homes of the poor, and crossed continents to bring the good news of the gospel to the world. Already a man of two worlds by the time he was twenty, Ravi never dreamed that God would lead him from his birth home in India to Canada and the United States, and eventually to a platform on the world stage. For thirty-three years he has spoken all over the world. He has addressed writers of the peace accord in South Africa, the president's cabinet and parliament in Peru, and military officers at the Lenin Military Academy and the Center for Geopolitical Strategy in Moscow. He has given the keynote address at the National Day of Prayer in Washington, DC, and has spoken twice at the Annual Prayer Breakfast at the United Nations in New York. Walking from East to West is Ravi's life story, a deeply personal journey into his past. Dr. Zacharias invites you back to the southern India of his early childhood, and into his troubled youth in the sophisticated capital city of Delhi. He recalls the importance of a mother's love and his difficult relationship with his father. He tells about his long search for truth in wrestling with Eastern thought and the newer ideas of Christianity, the cry for help in a dark moment when he tried to take his own life-and the dramatic turning point that led to a life lived for Christ. Zacharias recalls his early days as a new convert, what it was like to find a new life in the Western world, and the eventual birth and growth of a worldwide ministry. This is a story about an amazing man. Yet it is also everyone's story about belief-how it begins, how it grows, and the struggles associated with it. Walking from East to West is a heartfelt personal story of one man's discovery that God is the author of our destinies, no matter how dark the shadows that hide the light.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments 9(2)
Preface 11(4)
PART 1: CAST
1. A Life Out of Nothing
15(14)
2. Long Shadows
29(12)
3. Hidden Gold
41(10)
4. My Father's House
51(12)
5. The Cricket Field
63(12)
6. Wedding Crashers and Ashes
75(10)
7. The Raj Path and the Assigned Way
85(16)
8. The Longest Shadow
101(8)
9. A Book on the Ash Heap
109(14)
10. Extraordinary Men
123(16)
PART 2: EAST TO WEST
11. The Girl in the Church
139(12)
12. "I Am Called to This"
151(22)
13. The Longest Journey
173(22)
14. Veritas
195(16)
15. One Destination
211(16)
PART 3: WEST TO EAST
16. Returning: God in the Shadows
227

Excerpts

Walking from East to West
Copyright © 2006 by Ravi Zacharias
This title is also available as a Zondervan ebook product.
Visit www.zondervan.com/ebooks for more information.
This title is also available as a Zondervan audio product.
Visit www.zondervan.com/audiopages for more information.
Requests for information should be addressed to:
Zondervan, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49530
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Zacharias, Ravi K.
Walking from east to west : God in the shadows / Ravi Zacharias
with R. S. Sawyer — 1st ed.
p. cm.
ISBN – 13: 978-0-310-25915-2
ISBN – 10: 0-310-25915-0
1. Zacharias, Ravi K. 2. Christian
biography — India. 3. Christian
biography — Canada. I. Sawyer, Scott. II. Title.
BR1725.Z33A3 2006
269'.2'092 — dc22
2005020433
This edition printed on acid-free paper.
All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible: New International
Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by
permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system,
or transmitted in any form or by any means — electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or
any other — except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the
publisher.
Published in association with the literary agency of Wolgemuth and Associates, Inc.
Part 3 title page photos by Tigert Communications, Nashville, TN, USA
Interior design by Beth Shagene
Printed in the United States of America

We want to hear from you. Please send your comments about this
book to us in care of zreview@zondervan.com. Thank you.

Preface
Some books are difficult to write; others border on the almost
impossible. This one is in the latter category. Many friends and even
strangers over the years have asked if I would pen such a story, and
when Zondervan asked me to write a book of my memoirs, I concluded
that the time had come. The difficulty lies on many fronts.
First is that of accurate recall. How does one piece together all of the
past? How does one be truly objective when one’s own feelings are
locked in to the situation? Then arises a very personal matter. How
do you tell a story of such intimate issues and not at the same time
make someone else look unduly bad or good? That was the toughest
challenge of all. It is one thing for an individual to disclose his or her
own heart, but to do so for someone else runs an unfortunate risk. If
I have erred here, I sincerely hope it is not because of any personal ill
will but only because I know the story did not end as it had begun.
As I struggled with these issues, the publisher agreed to have me
tell the story to another writer, who would spend hours with me and
others to cull the material and then write it in the way it unfolded.
I took the narrative he penned and wrote the story line in my own
words, along with his. Throughout this process, the publisher asked
if I would keep it at a simple level of reach and not make it inaccessible
in content and depth. The goal was simple: “Tell us your story in
the simplest terms with your heart on your sleeve.” I suppose being
accustomed to writing on philosophical themes, this was a reminder
to me as “a word to the wise.”
So that has been the approach. Much more could have been said
and said at a lofty level portraying all my philosophical struggles and
so on. But we avoided that. Maybe some instances in the narrative
12 preface
need not have been shared, but were in order to show the backdrop
of what was shaping me all along. What I do know is that as I retraced
steps and memories, some of them were hard to relive, while others
brought a renewed sense of happiness; some memories brought the
depth of tears to the surface, and yet others brought to mind cherished
moments long forgotten. I have concluded that it is an exercise that
is well undertaken by everybody — to journal and write down one’s
thoughts at shorter intervals. Memories are good reminders of what
God has done and where we could have done better. I remember the
time an older man asked me when I was young, “Do you know what
you are doing now?” I thought it was some kind of trick question.
“Tell me,” I said.
“You are building your memories,” he replied, “so make them good
ones.”
If each reader would glean just that from the book, then it will
have been worth it.
But there is something greater here, and it is this: as life progresses,
you wish there were some safeguards you had taken along the way,
and even some different decisions you had made along the way. For
one, I wish I had talked more to my parents about their past and about
my ancestors. What did they know? What were the stories of their
lives? What made each one the way they were? Now it is too late for
that, for my parents have both passed away. I nevertheless come away
with the absolute certainty that God has ordered my steps and that
God was there, even in the darkest moments of my life. I know this
as surely as I know I exist. He never abandoned me and has brought
me by His grace and mercy this far. This is the most certain truth I
possess, and it is truly liberating.
One other great enrichment was to think back on my youth in
India, even as now the West has become home. India gave me much
that I can never repay. It really is an intriguing culture — weaknesses
and ironies notwithstanding. Now living first in Canada and then in
America, these countries have become home. I am so grateful to God
for the privilege of living here. Beyond my residences, the heart has
found its home in my faith and love for Jesus Christ. I sincerely hope
and pray that as you read these pages, you will feel Him near to you
and that you will be guided by His wisdom and kept by His grace.
Without Him, this story would not be worth telling or reading.
Part 1
East
Chapter 1
A Life Out of Nothing
One of my earliest memories is of the old man on my street, a mystic
who wore only a loincloth. He was tall, with matted hair and piercing
eyes, quite fearsome to look at. Mud was caked all over his bony frame,
his face was scarred by deep gashes that were self-inflicted from his
religious devotion, and his skin was burned by constant exposure to
the torrid heat of the midday sun. “How did he come to look like
this?” I wondered as a boy. “What had he done to himself?”
I found out soon enough. Two or three times each week he would
appear on our street; then, almost like a coiled rope unwinding, he
would lie down on that filthy road and begin his routine. Cow dung
and dog droppings littered the path, to say nothing of the stones or
sharp objects that cluttered it as well, yet he would roll down the
length of the street with a howl that sounded as if it came from the
depths of a cavern.
“Govinda! Govinda! Govinda!”
I had no clue what his cry was about — I only knew it terrified me.


Excerpted from Walking from East to West: God in the Shadows by Ravi Zacharias
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