Time

Time slips by so fast. I know it sounds cliché, but it’s true. Our lives are so short. Just the blink of an eye. How am I spending my time? Am I making the most of it? These questions are universal. I think it’s safe to say we’ve all asked them or will at some point in our lives. Our mortality guarantees that we ask questions like these. We have this hunger to be remembered, to make a difference, to really live.

We live, we die, that’s it right? If that’s all there is to life, then we are inconsequential. What a sad ending. But what if there was something more? What if there was something greater than this cycle of life and death? I believe that there is more and the more is Jesus Christ.

As we reflect back on April as May is almost over I think about Easter. It is the time to celebrate the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Who is this Jesus? He is the Son of God who came to live a perfect life on earth as a man, human just like us. God sent us his perfect, sinless, son because of his great love for us. We, His greatest creation, were separated from God by our disobedient, lying, cheating, lustful, hateful, and angry ways. Our evil came at a high price, short lives, death, and eternal separation from God.

But God had a plan. A payment for the sin and evil we had committed. He sent His perfect, sin free Son to die the death we deserved. Jesus was a willing sacrifice, taking all the punishment that we deserved upon Himself. He let Himself die a horrible death out of love for us. But that wasn’t the end. He didn’t stay dead. He rose again three days later conquering death. By His resurrection He gave us the opportunity to also live again. 

If we give our lives over to Jesus and repent of our sick, twisted, dying ways Jesus is faithful to forgive our sins. When we claim the gift Jesus offers us, we receive true life. We have purpose and hope. Our finite lives are no longer a breath on the wind. Instead our souls are given eternity to live with the one who loved us enough to lay down His life for us.

Talk about hope! It sure gives me a reason to live a purpose driven life. My goal is to
give glory to God no matter what. I have found that I am the happiest and most
fulfilled when I am centered on Him and serving Him. Proverbs 3:5-6 says,
“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.
In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will direct your paths.” I want this to
be the cry of my life as time ticks steadily on. I know that I have meaning,
value, and a purpose. I hope that you can know that too.

Mud

Today I came home, and my truck was covered from hood to tailgate in mud. A consequence of where I live. I live in Iowa where the soil is our most valuable resource. It provides the ground, literally, for a multimillion dollar industry called agriculture. This industry feeds the world. But for all its benefits, the resource of soil can every now and then become a bit hazardous.  

Iowa also happens to have all four seasons, Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter. With the onset of warm weather and a rainy Spring, soil turns to mud. The frost is pushing up out of the ground turning gravel roads into a boggy nightmare. Add some thunderstorms and you get ruts only the bravest dare to drive a low clearance car through. So if you have to drive anywhere on gravel you can forget keeping your vehicle clean.

As someone who spends a good deal of their time working outside it doesn’t take long to get dirty in the Spring. A splash here, a misstep there, and before you know it you’ve got mud all over. You get used to it after a while. Oftentimes I come home at the end of the day and look in the mirror to find that I’ve had mud spatters on my face all day! 

Mud reminds me of my mistakes in writing. I can start out with something fabulous, but if I let it get watered down then it can turn into a sticky situation. From an overthought storyline to the little spatters of poor punctuation, it can sneak up on you if you let yourself get used to it. 

Learning to see the mud in my writing has at times been a difficult process. But God has been gracious in allowing me to find people to help remove the mud from my writing. The bonus from this is that it keeps me honest in writing and it teaches me to become better at my craft. So thank you God for lessons learned from mud!

Names

Names have power. They are important. They shape our view of the named thing. I hadn’t realized their true significance until I started writing. Some names resonate deeply within us while others are reviled. Names come in all kinds of forms. They are an integral part of every culture we encounter. They range from sacred to flippant. Like the Hebrew name for God, Yaweh, which means I AM, is so holy it is not spoken by the Jews. Ranging to the other end of the spectrum is Gwyneth Paltrow’s daughter named Apple.

What names do you gravitate toward? Do you prefer strong and revered? Or are you a maverick who enjoys bucking the system? As I was writing my book I varied widely in my feelings over the names of my characters. The names of my main characters, Avana and Killian, were the product of much agonizing. Yet some of the other important people like Caleb and Finris, came without hesitation.

 So what do some of these names mean? Avana means, ‘beautiful flower,’ while Killian means, ‘spiritual or church’. Do their names play into my story? Not directly, but knowing the meaning affects my feelings toward my characters and hopefully my readers feelings about them. 

Names can make or break a story, marketing, or even a life. In my first post I talked about thievery. Stealing names is one of my favorite activities! There are so many lovely names out there. And what is it that makes names exciting to me? They tell a story. And I love a good story. So my friends, keep naming!