Why “A Different Story”?

Once upon a time I really wanted to write. Just ask my college friends. I was to have a syndicated column and a best seller by the time I was 40.

Things have a way of not happening sometimes.

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Now and again I seem to have brief midlife crises that arise from not doing this thing I so much wanted to do. I’m doing all kinds of other things I totally want to do. I have the best husband I could imagine, and kids I adore. I love being in my orbit around my family. I am part of a church that seeks after God and allows me to be involved in ministry in more ways than I can count.

But even so there is often this sense that I’m not doing something that just frankly seems in me to do. Every time I’ve thought about writing, I’ve become intimidated by the prospect. Downright scared, really.

Who would want to read what I write?

How can I possibly arrange my life to make it happen?

How do I make it accessible without thrusting it at people?

There’s a lot of exposure in putting oneself out there like that. And so I’ve made a career of finding reasons that the dream maybe just wasn’t meant to be. The closest I ever got to my best seller was my Exodus project, and there are less than a dozen copies floating around, largely unread.

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Life has a way of making us face things we’d rather avoid.

I lost a good friend and coworker in the last couple of weeks. One who had a love for Jesus that came clear from her toes, and who, among other things, had a way of keeping me on track when I would lose my way at work. When I would forget that my job was less about adjusting claims than it was about advancing the kingdom.

In the midst of all that her loss means to so many people, one of the things that I can’t shake is the sense of how she lived her life in such a way that Jesus flowed visibly and comfortably from her. She has now had the humble privilege of falling into her Redeemer’s embrace and hearing the Father speak over her, “Well done, good and faithful servant. Come share My joy.”

And while I too love Jesus from my toes, I sometimes have to wonder if I am truly doing all that is in me to do for Jesus’ sake.

And so here comes this writing thing again.

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For some reasons I don’t fully understand, I’ve been encouraged and challenged to put pen to paper in recent weeks. That thought, while intriguing, frightened and intimidated me all over again. Sure, I already write a lot. But I don’t usually actually show it to anyone. That’s too scary.

So when I sat down to do my daily reading the other day, I felt like a grasshopper. The kind of grasshoppers the Israelites thought they were when the spies came back from Canaan and said it was impossible. There were giants and they were ferocious, and the people of God saw themselves as mere grasshoppers.

But this Caleb, this man of God, stood and said “We can do it.” And the difference, from what God said, was that Caleb was a guy who followed God passionately. It gave him the faith to set foot into the giant’s land and possess what God had for him.

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That’s what A Different Story is about. Reading Caleb’s story, how he was in and of himself a “different story,” made me take hold of this as something I need to pursue. I want to passionately follow God, and step my little grasshopper foot into this land of giants.

Out of that reading came the entry titled “A Different Story.” Read it to learn more about Caleb and his passion to follow God.

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You should know I’m no Bible theologian. I’m a wife, mom, friend and claim adjuster, but most importantly, a follower of Jesus. I like to go into His Word and break it apart into little pieces I can understand. What you’ll read here is what happens when I do that.

It’s certainly not scholarly. But sometimes when the Word and life collide, like they are supposed to, it strikes me in a little different way.

I know application is always important when we look at the Word, but I’ll really try not to tell you what to do. It’s not at all up to me what you do with it.

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God’s going to do His own work there, in both of us.

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