A Review of Beth Guckenberger’s “Start with Amen”

Amen to That

When you think of the word “amen”, which means “so be it”, you probably will tend to think about endings. Amen is typically said at the end of a prayer. It is a form of posture that is one of submissiveness. So maybe it’s no surprise that with her new book, Start with Amen, Beth Guckenberger advises that the word should be the very first thing to emerge from one’s lips in prayer to God. It’s all about putting God’s will ahead of your will, or so seems to argue Guckenberger.

While the revelation seems new and fresh from this Christian’s standpoint, anyone familiar with Step Three of Alcoholics Anonymous’ 12 Step Program should be familiar with what Guckenberger is proposing. Basically, the idea is to get someone suffering from addiction and who is on the road to recovery to turn their will and lives over to God. Everything must go. The desire to drink. Any expectations (which Guckenberger calls “premeditated resentments”). Your career path. It’s all up for grabs and on the table.

Regardless if you’re a recovering alcoholic or not, the book is a pretty powerful one. I didn’t agree with everything Guckenberger says or her brand of Christianity, but I found the words had a lulling effect. Guckenberger draws from both her personal life as a biological, foster and adoptive mom and the Bible’s background to frame her spiritual beliefs. Sometimes, as another reviewer online has pointed out, the personal tales don’t seem to make much sense to what she’s proposing.

Other times, Guckenberger comes off as the very thing she seems to be railing against, and that is being selfish. For instance, there’s a tale near the end of the book where a young Guckenberger manages to get all porn off the shelves of the independent video store she was working in via a petition. It’s like she’s saying that the work was all her own doing, even if that’s not what she’s intending to do, when God probably would have wanted people to have a choice when it came to video rentals, and, had she been listening, maybe would have realized that working at Blockbuster (RIP), which didn’t have a porn section, might have been better suited to her.

Despite these lapses, this is an important and evocative book. I’m struggling right now about being less selfish and controlling, and trying to put my will on the backburner and let God’s come to the front. If you’re looking for a how-to guide, the book may disappoint — aside from the fact that it keeps coming back to using the word “amen” to open prayers rather than close them. Start with Amen is all about opening oneself to God and His way. (Oh, another thing, Guckenberger uses the lower-capitalized pronoun “he” when talking about God and Jesus, which I found a little odd. The capitalization must be a Catholic thing or something, because capitalizing the pronoun is something I grew up with.)

Start with Amen is a little disjointed in its narrative arc, but I didn’t mind that so much. However, if you’re the type to scratch your head over why a hysterectomy is performed before the author gives birth to one of her children, you may be bothered by the timelines posed in the book. Indeed, it’s a little hard to tell when certain events have taken place, but the shuffling of events is probably linked to memory and not being sure when things happened on a timeline for the most part. Also, it would break the thematic of the book’s chapters.

However, the whole “start with amen” thing has its appeal, and that’s the book’s simplistic strength. As Guckenberger puts it: “When I am in conversation with Jesus, I really do want my first soul steps to be, “Yes, so be it. It is as you say … .” Otherwise, I can too easily start down a path where I am whining or begging or negotiating or accusing. Beginning with amen set my pace as I go down that path; it stills my heart and reminds me with whom I am talking.”

If that kind of approach appeals to you, then you will — as I did — sometimes put down the book and reflect on what the author is trying to say, rather than race through the book as fast as you can to gobble up all of the theology you can muster. Many of the Bible passages are obscure, or were to me, so there’s new learnings to be found in Start with Amen. Again, coming back to the “start with amen” theme, even the Bible seems to agree with that assessment: “Cursed is the one who trusts in man, who draws strength from mere flesh,” goes one Bible verse quoted. I paused at that, and made a bookmark to myself in my Kindle as a mental note to return to the passage because it may be an important one for my own spiritual journey.

Guckenberger also spends a great deal of real estate reminding us that God is good, even if the evidence she has for that can be viewed as circumstantial at best. (But she addresses that, so I didn’t really count it as a harm or foul.) Still, Guckenberger’s teachings from her personal life hinge at times on embarrassment (I don’t know too many mothers who would admit to a large audience that she lost a child in a crowd for an extended period of time as she does here.) That’s what makes them so profound. Start with Amen bares all, and that’s why it is ultimately so agreeable.

“I am not good enough,” Guckenberger admits, “and I am not kind enough to treat someone on my own in a way that shows them Jesus. … That kind of love is a supernatural work that requires a supernatural source.” That kind of honesty and deep reflection puts Start with Amen over top of many spiritual books. It’s not perfect and it has its warts, but, overall, the message is good and the book will get you thinking, which is something we all need to do as we walk in Jesus’ path. Amen to that. Amen, indeed.

Beth Guckenberger’s Start with Amen: How I Learned to Surrender by Keeping the End in Mind was published by Thomas Nelson on May 9, 2017.

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