An unlikely author
For many years, people asked if I was interested in writing a book, and I was able to give an honest no. I’ve been writing for years primarily for people who I actually know in real life, and that has felt like a sacred privilege to me, and I was content in that. I felt a change in the winds, though, at a writers’s conference in 2024, and had my first rumblings of desire to write a book in the weeks following that. I was open to it in a way I was not before.
But as I considered what it would take to make this happen, the obstacles seemed formidable: I didn’t have an enormous social media following, which tends to be an important part of increasing an agent or a publisher’s interest in you as a writer. I also didn’t have the margin or the innate desire to throw myself into increasing those numbers in this season. I had very few free hours with four young children to give to writing (which is still true). My natural writing style and cadence tends to produce pieces that are much shorter than a typical book chapter, and I knew I’d need to take time to stretch myself a writer and increase the length of what I write. I didn’t have a network in the publishing world that would give me a chance at overcoming these hurdles.
In short, I recognized the truth that with the norms of the publishing industry and my platform and my writing as it is, I was a very weak candidate to publish a book.
And so I prayed, “God, if this is not to be, I am at peace with that. But if this is a dream that you are growing, if this is the work that you have given me to do, please give me the grace to wait with patience (I assumed this would take years or even decades, if at all!), and in the waiting don’t let one single thing you intended to do in me go undone because of any resistance or impatience in me. If we’re going to do this, I want it to make me more like Christ. And if it won’t, I don’t want to do it.” And I left it at that.
Several months later, Lancia Smith, who is the founder and executive director of Cultivating Oaks Press, an amazing writer, leader, mentor, a friend through our beloved Anselm Society, invited me to join her for an afternoon cup of tea. I went to her house thinking that we’d have tea and chat and enjoy the lovely weather. And we did do all those things. But then she asked me a question that writerly types will often ask each other just for fun: “If you could write any book, what would it be about?”
I paused, and took a deep breath, and told her about a vision I had a for a book about how God makes the invisible realities of his presence and kingdom visible through the nothing-special moments of our days. I wanted to share stories of God coming near to me in the cracks and crevices of my day, and how he didn’t stop with just a knowledge of his presence with me, but began lifting my eyes to see how he is bringing his kingdom on earth and bringing his renewal right where I am.
I went on for a while. I’d like to think that most of it made sense and wasn’t just incoherent rambling. But after I finally finished. Lancia paused, took a deep breath, and said, “Well, I’d like you to write that book for me.”
You could have knocked me over with a feather. She went on to tell me, while I gripped the table for stability, of her vision to publish books in a way that was not only a blessing to the reader, but spiritually formative and healthy for the writer (Whaaat?! A rarity to be sure.). She wanted longer writing timelines to honor the other callings and commitments of her writers, smaller quantities of her books to take the pressure off selling selling selling!, beautifully published books that you wanted to carry around with you and give as gifts. She planned to publish shorter volumes with shorter chapters that offered great spiritual depth so that, instead of bemoaning the short attention spans and lack of leisure time of “readers these days,” we could offer beauty, truth, and hope that meets them in those short attention spans and little time to dedicate to reading.
Nearly all of my reservations and disqualifications were put to rest in the span of a single conversation. It was honestly an offer beyond my wildest imaginings.
I had resigned myself to the impossibility of publishing (and with good reason!), and God made a way anyway. Now I am certainly not saying that the way things happened for me is “better” or “holier” than more traditional roads to publishing good books or any such nonsense. Many of my friends have walked with faithfulness and perseverance and have borne witness beautifully to God’s goodness and grace on a longer journey to publishing their books. I have seen God do the impossible through these more normative means. He has been glorified in it, and we have rejoiced together at all he has done.
AND it is also true that sometimes God inexplicably moves swiftly and decisively in our weakness to accomplish in us and for us things that—at least on paper—we have no business expecting or asking for. Sometimes, in our smallness and not-ready-ness, he moves in an unexpected way where only he can get the glory. And I am here to testify that this is what he has done for this unlikely author.
Writing this book has been one of the most challenging things I have ever done. And it has been good. God has met me in it and I know him more fully through it. And where I would ordinarily grasp for some feeling of control or stability when wading into uncharted waters, the way that God has brought this all about has actually allowed me to be open-handed with this book, not in an “I don’t care what happens” kind of way, but in a wonder-filled sort of way. I know for a fact that he has done it all, and has turned my meager offering into what I sincerely hope will be a feast for weary souls who just want to see the Risen Christ coming for them and bringing the radiance of his Kingdom in his hands, right where they are.
I’m honored to have you with me on this journey. I’ll send updates in my email newsletter, including info about pre-orders when the time comes (The book will release in Spring 2026.). You can sign up for that here.