Sir Gibbie

Among the millions of books produced in this world, there are to be found some very bad books (not worth reading), some good books (worth reading once), some very good books (worth reading ten times), and then, there are a few extraordinary books that put themselves in a league beyond all other human-produced literature. These are books written by a true master — one singularly gifted by God to communicate a message at an altogether different level than all the others. The reader picks up the book and reads a few pages, and almost immediately he discovers as Elizabeth Yates put it when she first read Sir Gibbie: “This is not only a book. It is an experience.” And, “I could not put the book down until it was finished, and yet I could not bear to come to its end.”

The faith of Sir Gibbie is a simple faith — core faith. Jesus died for our sins. He laid down His life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. All sins, drunkenness and greed included, are fit for the fire. More emphasis is placed on following Christ than rendering mere verbal assent to certain teachings about Him. Christ is presented more as a living Person than a dead letter. And, a faith without true repentance and Christ life, is reprobated by the author. Such teachings may serve as a tonic to those who have limited the faith to the memorization of a few doctrines and mere assent to a theological system of thought. While it is impossible to escape a set of propositions and emphases about God, sin, salvation, etc., the bigger problem for many Christians is their failure to love a Person, believe in a Person, and internalize the core faith at a heart level.

MacDonald conveys in the most poignant and powerful way how God abases the proud and exalts the humble. We discover how the wealth of the sinner is laid up for the righteous, and how the meek inherits the earth. Hardly any human story has ever portrayed so well how one loves his enemies, and how barriers in human relationship due to sin can be obliterated by the power and vitality of God’s love. The author’s goal is to incarnate the truths of Scripture for better understanding and application to life, in the form of illustration and story. This is well accomplished by Sir Gibbie. One cannot read a book like this without being profoundly impacted by it.

For this edition some of the more intense language has been softened, especially relating to the violent actions and language used by the malevolent characters in the story. This publisher would still exhort parents to review the material before sharing it with their children.