How God Thinks: Revealing God’s Heart Through The Language of Symbolism

How God Thinks: Revealing God’s Heart Through the Language of Symbolism explores a fundamental aspect of Christianity: uncovering the possible inner workings of God’s mind. David Vancelette, a fairly recent convert to Christianity, has performed extensive research and presents his findings alongside stories from childhood and the Bible. Like a true researcher, he backs up his thoughts and discoveries with Scripture, explained in both layman’s terms as well as theologically to appeal to a wide audience.

Most casual Christians familiar with the Bible will be familiar with the symbolism spread throughout. In the Old Testament, God speaks to the Israelites personally and through his prophets using figures of speech. In the New Testament, Jesus tells parables and makes announcements through symbolism as well. To someone who isn’t familiar, reading between the lines might not be something they expect to do; taking words at face value is more typical in our society. Vancelette presents the symbolism in the Bible that might have gone unnoticed by the average reader. As a Christian, I learned things through moments of symbolism that I had not heard of before.

Nobody said, most especially Jesus, that being a Christian would be easy. Vancelette shows the symbolism between God’s proclamations in the Old Testament and how our Western society is behaving, certainly not gaining him any brownie points with worldly people. Discussing the symbolic illustration in a Christian marriage between one man and woman versus homosexuality, divorce, polygamy, and polyandry, he continues to dive deeper into what it means to be a man and a woman in the eyes of God. Additional topics include wives submitting to their husbands, beauty, sexuality, and abortion, which are covered in detail from the Biblical and feminist perspectives. The final chapter in the book discusses Jesus’s crucifixion and how Jewish culture views the event, with some talk about Judgement day and Revelation.

As previously mentioned, I felt that I learned some things about some of How God Thinks. I am familiar with the symbolism used throughout Scripture but had not heard of the example of Abraham, Isaac, and his servant. I am familiar with the explanation of marriage, but with Vancelette’s repetition of this and other topics throughout the book, I felt a more profound understanding through God’s eyes. Vancelette has a talent for presenting sensitive (to a non-believer) information in a respectful and informative way that I believe can make anyone respect the information he discloses. While this book can be read by anyone, Christian or not, believers might notice differences in explanations of Scripture belonging to the author versus other denominations. This reviewer took note but did not feel that this detracted from the overall purpose of the book.