My Takeaways & Quotes From Bo's Cafe By Lynch, Thrall, & McNicol
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For the past few months (and through half of 2020), I've been participating in a Gwinnett Church Leadership Development Group (LDG) as a stepping stone towards further involvement at our church.
It's a small group of guys with two leaders guiding us through an in-depth and genuine (as opposed to superficial) spiritual discovery of God, ourselves, and each other.
As part of the journey, we're reading a book (and sharing our takeaway) between each month's meeting, and this month's book is Bo's Cafe by John Lynch, Bill Thrall, and Bruce McNicol (affiliate link).
The fictional book follows the story of a man in a midlife crisis, primarily in the context of his marriage falling apart. The more he holds onto and attempts to fix his marriage and himself superficially, the more his relationship with his wife slips through his fingers. But, along the way, an older gentleman begins mentoring him. As he helps the main character navigate through the challenges, we move closer to the root problem that is causing all the chaos.
Much of the story reminded me of the difficult journey that followed after moving from Arizona to Atlanta in my own life and marriage.
Below, I share the lessons learned from the book, key insights, and highlighted quotes from the book.
Official Story Summary
Steven Kerner is a high-powered executive with a tightly wound life—until it all begins to crack. When a mysterious stranger named Andy enters his world, Steven is pulled into a series of redemptive conversations that challenge everything he thought he knew about success, identity, and grace.
Through raw honesty and surprising friendship, Bo’s Café invites readers into a different kind of life: one marked by trust, healing, and being truly known.
Lessons Learned Summary
Superficial solutions to deep problems only delay an inevitable destructive end. True changes come first through humility, asking for transformational help, receiving guidance from someone who has gone before us, and enduring patience to see the change unfold from the inside out.
Key Insights
- We humans are ticking time bombs, where people and conflict over time truly reveal the person looking back in the mirror.
- As much as we may need or even want help, often our ego prevents us from asking for it. And, with that ego, we also actively resist those who offer their help.
Personal Application
- This book is a helpful reminder of the journey I’ve been on and the moments that came along with it. It provides an appreciation for the “Andy“ in my life and the loving wife who endured the challenging seasons that unfolded in our journey.
- The book is also a reminder and an inspirational story to remember that others will follow our pathway and need help as we did. Coming through to the other side can lead to forgetting how hard it was to start and traverse the difficult journey.
- As much as we transform, we are not immune to falling back, facing new challenges, and simply meeting our own limits, depravity, and sinful desires. We must remain humble in understanding and owning our fallibility.
Meaningful Quotes
Note: Page numbers are from the first print.
- “The pattern doesn’t change.” p15
- “I’ve lost who I used to be. I don’t even recognize me anymore.” p16
- “And until you let someone shine a light into your room, nothing’s gonna change. Life’s gonna get more painful, more confusing, and darker.” p21
- “’m not a very good passenger. I drive; I don’t ride.” p28
- “We’re an entire population with spinach in our teeth -- and no one tells us.” p31
- “Or a high school student trapped by porn but too ashamed to let anybody know. So day after day, he wraps himself in increasing darkness that will follow him into his marriage and contaminate the family he’ll one day raise.” p32
- “Steven, people don’t ever get fixed. They either mature, or they just keep getting more bent up the rest of their lives.” p73
- “Carlos, what if there was a safe enough place where you could tell the worst about yourself and not be loved or respected less, but more?” p74
- “It’s a whisper that’s been there all my life.” p76
- “It takes a whole lot more than willpower to get anything done in the human heart.” p90
- “I’ve been dying inside these last few months, and no one sees it or wants to see it.” p101
- “So we fashion some fig leaves to protect ourselves.” p147
- “We have not learned how to trust what HE says is true about us.” p152
- “Control is an expression of superiority.” p156
- “So the gamble is whether she can hold out that long, whether she should hold out that long.” p202
Additional Resources From Trueface (The Organization Behind Bo's Cafe)
Trueface provides Grace-based relational discipleship resources, helping you experience deeper relationships with God and others.
I've had two Trueface staff members on the Share Life podcast, highlighted below.
From ISOLATION to COMMUNITY: Benjamin Crawshaw's Unexpected Story of Redemption
Director of Member Engagement at Truface shares his raw and honest journey through burnout, divorce, and rediscovering his faith. Learn how he rebuilt his identity beyond external validation, embraced the power of grief, and now helps others, especially Gen Z, encounter Jesus in a fresh, authentic way.
Benjamin Crawshaw co-authored the book with Bruce McNicol (co-author of Bo's Cafe), The Path: What if the Way of Jesus is Different than You Thought? You can click here to learn more about it on Amazon.
This Is What Complex PTSD Does To Your Body (And How Leslie Haynes Learned To Listen)
Leslie (Trueface's Systems & Processes Manager) and I discuss the profound impact of childhood trauma, its connection to physical symptoms like body paralysis and chronic pain, and how she's found healing by uncovering lies and embracing a new perspective on health, faith, and community.
The Cure
Trueface has a collection of books to help Christians navigate the challenges of life. One of the other books I read as part of the Leadership development group is called The Cure: What If God Isn't Who You Think He Is and Neither Are You.
Here is the official summary of the book.
The Cure gives the diagnosis of this century’s religious obsession with sin-management. It has poisoned the Church, obscuring the Original Good News and sending millions away-wounded, angry and cynical, from nearly any organized expression of faith. The Cure offers an authentic experience in Christ that frees some from a self-rewarded righteousness, and others from a beaten down striving for a righteousness they can never seem to attain. The Cure infuses a relational theology of grace and identity, which alone can heal, free and create sustainable, genuine, loving, life-giving communities.
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