"The wilderness is not where your faith goes to die, but where it finally learns to breathe."

Most of us inherited a faith we didn't build-a structure of rigid rules, exhausting performance, and brittle certainty. But what happens when the roof caves in? What happens when the "Empire of Force" demands a version of you that you can no longer provide?

Wilderness & Wonder is not a book about trying harder. It is a 40-day Lenten survival guide for the spiritually displaced, the tired, and those standing in religious wreckage. Through honest, gritty, and trauma-aware reflections, Gregory Simpson invites you to leave behind the "God of the Ledger" and meet the God who is actually there.

Is this book for you? This journey is designed for those who:

• Feel "homeless" within their own religious traditions.
• Are navigating the messy middle of spiritual deconstruction.
• Crave a faith transition that values questions more than easy answers.
• Are exhausted by the "Empire of Performance" and seek mortal relief.
• Desire a spirituality rooted in liberation theology and social justice.

Following a weekly arc of transformation, this guide offers a path through:

• Breaking the Addiction to Performance: Moving from adrenaline to grace.
• Dismantling Systems: Confronting the toxic "Bouncers of Belonging."
• Economic Irrationality: Discovering a Kingdom built on wonder and plenty.
• Embodied Resistance: Moving from beautiful ideas to embodied action.

Warning: This journey includes friction. It will ask you to drop your mask, fire the bouncers in your head, and look at the things you are terrified to see. But you will not go alone. Through forty days of daily Lenten reflections, you will discover that the wilderness is not a place of abandonment, but the space where you finally become free.

About the Author Gregory Simpson is a minister and former software developer who lives at the intersection of ancient faith and modern wreckage. Currently serving in Chatham, Ontario, he provides a voice of flinchless grace for those wandering outside the gates of traditional certainty.