Field Notes for the Wilderness:

Practices for an Evolving Faith

by Sarah Bessey

BESTSELLER

Field Notes for the Wilderness: Practices for an Evolving Faith is officially a bestseller!

⭐️ The Globe and Mail
⭐️ USA Today
⭐️ Publishers Weekly
⭐️ Bookshop.org
⭐️ Indie Booksellers
⭐️ McNally Robinson

What people are saying

“In a space where nothing can make sense, Bessey offers guidance and direction that feels like a true hug and high-five from God. And by offering it, the wilderness does not feel so wild and lonely after all. For the moments when I wanted to give life the side-eye, I needed this book. I am so grateful we all have it now.”

Candice Marie Benbow, author of Red Lip Theology
“I have had a lot of fathers in faith, but never a mother—at least until I met Sarah Bessey. Now she is the writer I recommend to anyone who needs to be seen, loved, and held before they ever say why. Reading her new book is like opening a boxed lunch in the wilderness packed by someone who knew just what would get you through—along with a note that says, ‘Your soul is just fine.’ The only difference is that this book keeps feeding you after you have finished the last page (the one you hoped would never come). Take heart! You can start all over again whenever you want, safe in the embrace of a very wise mum.”

Barbara Brown Taylor, author of An Altar in the World and Learning to Walk in the Dark
“In a time when so many of us feel like we are spiritual wanderers, Sarah Bessey reaches out a hand and offers wise and careful company on the journey. Through the tenderness and intimacy of letters, this book shows us the many ways we might survive together in the liminal.”

Cole Arthur Riley, New York Times bestselling author of This Here Flesh and creator of Black Liturgies
“Sarah Bessey shines. A book full of gentle wisdom and stunning empathy for all those of us who are bruised by the faithful but want to keep our faith. Faithful without being pious. Useful without being bossy. This is the perfect guide for all those of who need to be reintroduced to a faith full of grace, mercy, and love.”

Kate Bowler, New York Times bestselling author of Good Enough
“If you forced me to pick one book in the whole world to walk someone gently through their faith evolution—one writer, one thinker, one human being out of all the marvelous leaders who’ve done this hard and holy work—it would be Sarah Bessey’s Field Notes for the Wilderness. A gorgeous, expansive offering from beginning to end; a love song to God and every searching heart.”

Jen Hatmaker, New York Times bestselling author of For the Love and Of Mess and Moxie and host of the For the Love podcast

A nurturing and hopeful collection of principles, prayers, and practices to help an emerging generation of Christians reconnect to their faith, find inner healing, and build spiritual community—from Glennon Doyle's "favourite faith writer," and the New York Times bestselling author of Jesus Feminist and A Rhythm of Prayer

It’s hard to leave a faith that has raised us. Maybe even harder to stay. But what can feel impossible is living in the tension. Living with a faith that evolves.

Sarah Bessey is an expert at faithfully stumbling forward. As a New York Times bestselling author and co-founder of Evolving Faith, the foremost community for progressive Christians, she has been trusted by thousands of people to pursue a reconstruction of faith centered on compassion, truth, and inclusion. Bessey has found a deeply underserved and underestimated remnant in the wilderness of Christianity, who are still devoted to Jesus, deeply rooted in the Gospel, fascinated with Scripture, and committed to reimagining their faith.

Field Notes for the Wilderness guides the reader through multiple principles to live by for an evolving faith, including:

Practicing wonder and curiosity as spiritual disciplines
Mothering ourselves with compassion and empathy
Making space for lament and righteous rage
How to find good spiritual teachers
Discovering what we are for in this life, and moving in that direction

In this groundbreaking and nurturing book, Bessey has given us a table for our questions, a shepherd for our curiosity, tools to cultivate what we crave, and a blessing for what was—even as we leave it behind.

Order Now