Amazing Reads: Mercy Never Sleeps

Mercy Never Sleeps: Sleepless Thoughts on Faith, Heaven, and the Fear of Heights

By Jamie Blaine

Does life ever just not go the way you planned it? That's exactly what happened to the author, Jamie Blaine. After a series of oddball jobs that didn't really seem to pan out, he became a late-night psychiatric crisis guy. He walks us through some of his calls. The book description on the back cover says "Jamie travels time to untangle his own story of God through the wilderness, battling alligators, acrophobia, anaphylactic shock, Christian tricksters, Christmas, insomnia zombies, hymn-singing bridge jumpers, preteen bullies, paranoid ER patients armed with knives, hatchet-wielding housewives, septuagenarian pugilists, locust swarms, and ghosts of the present, future, and past. Jamie Blaine's life isn't exactly going as planned. When a twist of fate places the late-night psychiatric crisis guy on 24/7 call, his insomnia ramps up to desperate stages as he veers closer to becoming the very kind of person he's trying to save." If that doesn't say it, I don't know what will. I consider it a tale of self discovery. Discovering who he is, not only in his faith, but also as a human being. Although it was not my favorite read of the summer, it was cool to hear someone else's story, to hear how their life went nowhere close to their plan.

Favorite Quotes:

-"I’m working a dead-end dangerous job in the middle of the night for not much money and no place for advancement. My social circle consists of junkies and schizophrenics, inmates, suicidal housewives, cops and ER docs, and convenience store clerks on graveyard shift. In one sense I am alone in the wilderness, the best possible place to meet God. In another I am drifting too far, needing to settle down and get serious about making a life. Am I lost? Or found? I wish I knew." -Jamie Blaine

-"Nothing gets easier; we just find better ways to admit how vulnerable we are." -Sean Beaudoin (Jamie Blaine used this quote to begin a chapter)

-"Truth came from a lot of strange places in the Bible. Misfits and loners and loose women. Outcasts, outlaws, oddballs, and thieves. Jesus ran with a rough crown. And he warned the religious about labels and easy assumptions. Those people you're calling lost might be closer to the kingdom of God than you." -Jamie Blaine

-"There is a mystery in the darkness that connects us. Beyond matter and energy, gravity and time. Maybe there really is just one secret to life." -Jamie Blaine

-"I am thankful for the wind and the still, small voice. For grace and mercy, each day's chance to start again. The stars are thick, and the path endless." -Jamie Blaine