As best as I can tell, the book that I am holding does not exist. What I mean is that, other than the route through which I got it, I can find no other mention of it on the Internet.

However, it is a 2013 book published by Hallmark, and since Hallmark does not release their books through the standard book markets, they don’t have to give forewarning of them. As such, this is probably a book that Hallmark is about to come out with, may already be in the back room of some Hallmark stores, and someone made it available perhaps before it was meant to be released.

Or maybe it’s all a sham.

Anyway, The Pastor Is In: A Thirty-Day Faith Devotional Inspired by Peanuts presents thirty Peanuts strips (either dailies run on half a page, or Sundays run across a page and a half), and follows each with a message, a two page sermon by minister Rigel J. Dawson (North Central Church of Christ, Flint, Michigan), built around the themes expressed in the strip. Some are more general personal advise, some are very focused on a Christian message (and it seems like the further into the book you go, the more religiously coached it all is.) This is not a book to sell one on Christianity, but to help those already Christian to navigate life.

I suspect that it really was “inspired by Peanuts”, in that the author found strips that reflected some aspect of life worth reflecting further upon, rather than starting with some pre-written materials and trying to dig up a strip for it. And the strips are good ones, of course. They’re all from the period of 1959-1964, which may reflect where Schulz was in his life and what he was choosing to reflect in the strip at the time… but may just as well reflect what books Dawson has in his Peanuts collection.

The one strip choice I found curious was a Great Pumpkin strip being chosen for a discussion of faith. Yes, of course the Great Pumpkin can be seen on reflecting on faith. However, Dawson’s text uses it to promote the importance of faith in Christ and for a call to ignore those who pass of the claimed miracles as mere fairytale impossibilities. Is that really a message of the Great Pumpkin strips? Aren’t those who scorn the belief in the Great Pumpkin correct? Does Linus’s seldom-wavering faith grant him the rewards he is expecting? Sure, the faith grants him hope at times, but it is a false hope; his faith never grants him satisfaction.

The book itself is well built, with good design work, a nice embossed hardcover, one of those built-in ribbon bookmarks, and nice color endpapers. The reproduction of a couple of the strips is a little sketchy, with fine lines disappearing, but if your central goal is to get well-reproduced Peanuts strips, this probably isn’t the book you’re looking for anyway.

(Dang, since I took the first pass at writing this, I find another reference to the book appearing on the Internet. That means that what I have isn’t a rare book from another dimension that just slipped through a wormhole. I still don’t see anywhere where one can buy it now, however.)

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