Who is this Child?

Fiction Story: Over the Christmas weekend I read Honored, by Roberta Kells Dorr. The first notable thing about this book is its size. It’s small. Really, it might actually be a short story. There are eighty-six pages in the hard copy I found in my church library. Each page has just seventeen lines of text and the lines are shorter than a typical book. Don’t start to think I’m speaking poorly about it though; anyone who’s been here before will know that I favor the shorts and novellas. No, I just tell you because it might be disappointing for anyone who would purchase the book online without knowing its brevity.

The fictional story is a depiction of Luke (the Greek physician who wrote the book of Luke) interviewing Mary, the mother of Jesus before writing his account of the gospel. During the process, Luke learns a few Jewish customs and that Jesus's seamless tunic was sewn by Mary herself. After a question and answer dialog that rehashes the events of the holy conception and Mary’s pregnancy, they take a trip to Bethlehem to visit the birth place of Jesus. When there, they meet an old sheppard who was in the fields the night the angles announced the savior's birth.

Luke also gets the fortunate chance to interview another Mary, the sister of Lazarus, and hears the story of how Jesus openly forgave her sins in front of a crowd of religious leaders. More on that in the Gospel Story section below.

Due to the books truncated length, there is inherently a lack of character development. It kind of felt like reading an excerpt lifted out of a bigger story.

Gospel Story: I have not read any other works by Roberta Kells Dorr, but judging by Honored, she is a trustworthy Christian Fiction writer. This short book stayed sharply on the point of honoring both Christ and his mother, Mary. It highlighted the deity of Christ and upheld the integrity of the virgin birth.

My favorite part was the interview with Lazarus's sister. The story was told about how she anointed Jesus's feet with oil and cleaned them with her hair in front of a crowd at a party. Then Jesus declared her sins forgiven and every one was astonished. They asked each other, "Who is this man who even forgives sins?" Of course, Jesus is 100% man but also 100% God. This is an awesome display of Christ showing his deity.

You can read the story starting at Luke chapter 7: verse 36

Since the book is short, I’ll follow suit and keep this review short. I do recommend it as a quick, edifying read. But try to find it at a library. In this reader’s opinion, it’s a bit too short to pay the asking price.

Roberta Kells Dorr has a good collection of other works. I downloaded the sample of David and Bathseba, her most notable and best selling book. I think I’ll do a sample review on it... so look for that.

Until then, remember Christ, the author of our faith and the reader of our hearts.