With the publication of I Bought a Pearl quickly approaching (September 4, 2024), I am a mix of all the emotions you might expect. I am excited, relieved, and nervous. I also find myself reflecting on my path as an author, how I ended up here and what things might look like in the future.

My experience as a Christian author has been interesting. I write about trauma and relationship with God and the church, which positions me awkwardly in terms of audiences. If I were to boil down the preferences of potential audiences, I would say that Christians generally tend to wish my work would be more inspirational (read: “avoiding negativity”) and traumatized people outside of the church wish I would acknowledge the wrongs of the church by severing my connection with it. My convictions prevent me from doing either.

Regarding my continued relationship with the church, I must say that I am very in touch with the exasperation and anger that would lead a person to sever ties with their spiritual community. The church has been, in much of my experience, a place of bullying and abuse of power. That said, my discipline of loving the church is rooted in my admiration of its Redeemer, whom I consider the closest of my friends and for whom I harbor a love that is interwoven with my very being. It is this Redeemer who says that in order to have him in his fullness, I must be a part of his Body, the Body that he is redeeming. So, I choose to love the church because I must have my Redeemer. However, I do also believe that true love calls out wrongs in order for right relationship to be restored. I make my best attempt at this in my work.

With respect to the issue of being inspirational, I would say that my work is inspirational, but it is not a shield against pain. My work can inspire those who are isolated by trauma and abuse of power exactly because it exposes these things for what they are and takes away some of their power. My work can bring encouragement to those who have tried and failed to use positivity as a shield. And I believe inspiration and encouragement consist in this: Jesus––Immanuel, God with us––is with us in the most horrific emotional, physical, and spiritual places.

It is good news to me that God is not afraid of negativity or wounding or pain. Others flee or buckle under the weight of these things, but the God I know gently asks to enter these spaces with us. And our openness to God’s presence enables redemption to ignite like a tiny spark that will one day become a roaring flame.

So, I write about distress and wounds and fear and pain and seemingly unrecoverable loss because I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that God is more than willing to be present with me in these things. It is my way of opening the gates of my heart to invite God in to commune with me. I cultivate a hope that while we commune, my perspective will change and my heart will heal. I have that same hope for my readers as I invite them to read my words––words which most faithful Christians dare not even think in the presence of a perfect God. I throw myself on this God’s mercy, knowing that the healing and truth that emanate from God’s heart are greater than the wounds and deception that have bound me. I seek that spark of redemption!

When I look to the future, I am unsure of whether I’ll focus my energy on helping my work to find the right audience or on helping more of the church to know that I think they are the right audience. At the end of the day, I do write for an audience of One. That’s probably why I get such a strong reaction from some readers. But hey, the One I write for is kind of an acquired taste as well. So, maybe I’ll just continue on this path and see where it leads. 😉