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 Title: Dropped!
Author: Gee Jae Arnold
Genre: Autobiographical Encouragement
Publisher: Tate Publishing, LLC
Copyright: 2005
ISBN: 1-5988613-4-4
Reviewer: Linda Germain
Available through:
Amazon.com
Barnes & Noble
Tate Publishing & Enterprises, LLC.
Dictionaries are full of words to describe what we feel, but it is difficult to find a word that expresses how we feel. The picture on the cover of this book speaks volumes about its contents. Like fragile eggs tumbling from a safe nest, all humans will be exposed to the consequences of a condition G.J. Arnold has so aptly labeled: Dropped.
This beautiful and anointed offering gives fresh insight to the theory that people who have suffered emotional hurts respond by hurting others. The author has coined the perfect term to describe those painful, sometimes gut-wrenching reactions common to every person. Her autobiographical perspective is sure to cause an "ah-ha" moment for many readers.
She relates Biblical accounts of dysfunctional groups and individuals in an attempt to highlight the universal and age-old dropped experience. Using Abraham’s family as a prototype, she chronicles the events, one hurt leading to another, all the way through his bloodline to Jesus.
G.J. Arnold was born in Guatemala, Central America. She came to the USA when she was twelve years old to join her mother who had been forced to leave her with adults who dropped her on a regular basis. From a tender age she experienced hardship and pain that caused her to feel like an emotional and spiritual cripple. She was sure her mother had abandoned her, when in reality the trusting parent, unaware of the little girl’s circumstances, was working hard to make the money to send for her. The perceived feeling of betrayal, of being dropped, spawned years of errant behavior until a dramatic turning point borne of truth and forgiveness changed everything for mother and daughter.
Getting a grasp of the dropped concept redirects our thinking about interpersonal relationships, especially in the family. Until we acknowledge our condition and call it what it is (sin), the destructive pattern will continue, ever immune to our feeble attempts to change it. Ms. Arnold suggests we should strive to react out of the wholeness found in a relationship with God rather than from niceness, political correctness, and the human tendency to respond in the same old ways that are often generated from hurt.
This small, 133-page, easy-to-read book is a heart-felt and candid account of one woman’s journey from what she calls her "shipwreck" experiences to a place of restoration in Jesus. She reminds us that healing only begins when we acknowledge the dropped condition and the need to forgive and change. That means, "accepting the responsibility for our actions and taking the necessary corrective steps."
She approaches an old theme with the clarity of spiritual maturity. Her profound testimony encourages us to recognize and put an end to "the casual, almost careless way that people handle each other’s feelings."
Dropped! is an inspiration, a revelation, and a wake-up call.
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