Living life in colour
Graham Beynon

• Hart Publishing, 2011
• £ 8.99 Pb 176 pp
• ISBN 978-1-84474-589-0

'Emotions are unimportant', or so I once famously remarked as a somewhat naive medical student, probably in reaction to what I perceived as excesses in the opposite direction. God soon disabused me of this notion through a variety of interesting circumstances, but this book would have been really helpful at the time. Emotions may not be everything, but they are certainly not nothing. Graham Beynon's easy and accessible writing style is matched by biblically-balanced content, to help us think through the important issue of our feelings. Through ten chapters he establishes some basics about emotions, leading on to a consideration of various practical issues.

In addition to focusing our attention on Jesus as the perfect man, with feelings as God intended, he also addresses areas such as depression, and emotions in worship. He seeks to help us liberate and celebrate the God-given emotional aspects of our lives, that we might become redeemed whole people with integrated thoughts, feelings and actions, and that we might respond to God with all that we are.

I found this book very useful in addressing some of my unbalanced theology, and encouraging in helping me to regard feelings in a more positive and Godhonouring way. I recommend it.

Everett Julyan is a psychiatrist in Ayrshire.