Review: When People Are Big and God Is Small by Edward Welch

The following is a book review I wrote a couple of weeks ago. It was the first assignment for the pastoral internship at Capitol Hill Baptist Church, which I'll be starting in a couple of weeks.

Edward Welch’s book When People Are Big and God Is Small: Overcoming Peer Pressure, Codependency, and the Fear of Man is an insightful, convicting, and thoroughly biblical treatment of a problem that affects every person and is of particular relevance for pastors and other Christians who are regularly involved in spiritual counseling. Welch does an excellent job of debunking many common unbiblical ideas about so-called “psychological issues” using a biblical perspective and showing that at the root of all self-esteem issues and relational difficulties lies one common problem: sin.
Welch describes a common issue that manifests itself in many ways, but generally involves a feeling of a lack of personal or relational fulfillment, a craving of love and attention from other people, and profound emotional trauma that results from rejection or stress in relationships. The common thread is that people affected by this problem—often called “codependency” or sometimes “peer pressure”—are all controlled by other people in their lives and emotions.

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