An Interview with Dale Cramer

Today I'm hosting Dale Cramer today, the author of Levi's Will, Summer of Light, and most recently, Paradise Valley and Captive Heart, a series about the Amish in Mexico. I look forward to each of Dale's books, so it's an honor to have him here.

On Writing

You didn’t publish until later in life. Did you write for your own pleasure before that?

No… well, only for a year or so when I was learning. I mean, I knew when I was a kid that I'd like to write a book someday, and I sort of suspected that I could pull it off, but doesn't everybody? And then I grew up. I had to make a living, and I never managed to go to college, so over the years I forgot about writing the great American novel. I didn't write a word for twenty-five years. Then, when I accidentally stayed home with my kids for a summer I accidentally wrote an article that got published, and accidentally stumbled across a Compuserve writers forum where people wrote and shared stories for fun. I posted short stories on the forum for a year or so, and even published a few in literary magazines. But shorts don't pay anything. Novels do, and the odds of publishing a novel are actually better than the odds of publishing a short story. (It's true— look it up and do the math.) So I wrote a novel. At the time it just seemed like a lark, like I was playing.

You seem so laid-back on your blog, but I know the writing life can have a lot of pressure. What gets you through it?

I do my best to decline pressure. For someone else to put pressure on you, you have to allow it and participate in it. I just don't, for the most part. I do everything in my power to make my deadlines and produce viable manuscripts. Do that, and there's no reason to allow anybody to pressure you. Early on in my construction career I learned that it's not fun to be dressed down for cause, so I made sure I produced. It works. Over the years I trained a number of apprentices, and I always told them, "If you do your job you don't have to take anything off anybody."

On the Daughters of Caleb Bender Series

Why a story about the Amish in Mexico?

Why not? The story has everything. It's original— there's never been an Amish series set in Mexico before. It's exciting— there are bandits and rattlesnakes. And it's romantic— the Benders have seven daughters, several of them eligible. Throw in lush mountain landscapes, remote canyons, a few crimson sunsets, and off you go. And there really were Amish in Paradise Valley, Mexico in the 1920s. My father was born there. A couple years ago I asked him how it was that an Amishman came to be born in Mexico and this whole big story came out, all about mandatory school attendance, fathers being arrested, children taken away and abused, and a bunch of Amish eventually moving south of the border to escape the persecution in Ohio. It's a great story with underlying issues of church versus state and important questions about pacifism that nobody ever asks. I just couldn't turn that down.

Paradise Valley seems to center on Rachel’s story, but I understand that the part that resonated most with a lot of your readers was Miriam and Domingo’s story. Did that catch you by surprise? And why do you think their story captured reader interest?

The reader reaction didn't surprise me at all because the Christian fiction readership is mostly women, mostly romance-oriented, and Miriam/Domingo is a classic romance. What did catch me by surprise was Domingo himself. I knew by the time I finished writing Paradise Valley that Domingo and Miriam were going to be the focal point of the whole trilogy and readers were going to love them. But I honestly didn't know who Domingo was when he first showed up at Agua Nueva, and when he spoke to the girls in German I literally laughed out loud because I didn't see it coming. I didn't plan Domingo, so nearly everything he did surprised me. Best thing to do with a character like that is follow him around and write down what he does.

A theme that runs through both books is non-violence vs. living by the sword. Is this something you’ve had to work out in your own life at all?

Not really, but it looms large for the Amish. I was eligible for the draft during Vietnam, though I was never drafted. If I had been I would have gone without complaint and done whatever was required— I owe that to my country. But these days I can't help wondering if the Christian right shouldn't be a bit less hawkish. I personally believe the Church needs to be very careful about taking an official political stance of any kind, especially where war is involved. It just seems to me that our Christian citizenship and our mandate to be peacemakers ought to transcend borders and political ideologies. For me it's an intriguing question.

While the Amish in the story are stoutly against lifting a hand against the bandits, they don’t see a conflict in asking Mexican soldiers to use arms to protect them. Why do you suppose that is?

If you're getting mugged, you expect the corner policeman to invervene, even if you've done nothing to defend yourself. We all expect the government to protect us from outlaws as a natural benefit of our citizenship, a part of the social contract. The chaos that was post-revolution Mexico didn't provide much protection, but from a writer's point of view it seems plausible that people raised in America would have expected it anyway. Still, it's a valid and perceptive question, and the hypocrisy inherent in the Amish perspective is not really addressed until a generation later in Levi's Will, when Will (son of Levi and Emma Mullet) is contemplating joining the army during World War II. He ponders the very conflict you mention.

The setting is drawn so vividly. Did you travel to Mexico to do any on-site research?

No, I didn't, mostly because the chaos that is present-day Mexico doesn't provide much protection from outlaws. I probably would have gotten kidnapped, since everybody knows American authors are rich, and kidnapping is kind of a cottage industry in Mexico. That said, I did do an enormous amount of research— some online, but also a ton of books and a number of interviews with people who know that part of the country.

The men in the story learn from each other how to be men, and especially how to live with honor. Have you had such a mentor in your life?

Dozens. I spent thirty years doing construction work. If you've ever watched TV you've been programmed to see guys in hardhats a certain way, but like most stereotypes, it's bogus. The stereotype might be accurate for a very small percentage, but the overwhelming majority of construction workers are decent, hardworking, honorable men. They generally do the right thing, even if it costs them, and they look out for each other. Those were the people who taught me most of what I know, and even now almost all of my friends are blue collar.

How many more sequels can we expect in the series?

One more book. I guess we should have made it clear from the start that The Daughters of Caleb Bender was going to be a trilogy; Bk 1- Paradise Valley, Bk 2- The Captive Heart, and Bk 3- as yet untitled. Book 3 (the final installment) will release sometime in December 2012… hopefully before the 21st. There was some talk at one point about a fourth book, if necessary, but by the time I was halfway through the series it became clear that I wouldn't need a fourth book to finish the story. One other thing I'd like to point out is that The Daughters of Caleb Bender is one story— it just happens to be over a thousand pages long. It's a big story. The series is not (as many trilogies are) three separate stories about the same set of characters. The Daughters of Caleb Bender is one long story, the same way The Lord of the Rings was one long story even though it was three books long. The Captive Heart leaves a few loose ends in precisely the same way The Fellowship of the Ring left a few loose ends.

On Dale Cramer

You’ve said something along the lines that your experience with God has not been a Sunday school type of experience, but instead is a working man’s faith. Can you explain that?

Not without using a lot of words (maybe I should write a book). It's just that the Damascus Road experiences in my life all happened someplace other than church, like a mile underground on a mining project, in the burn unit of an urban hospital, driving through Atlanta in a pickup truck, or cruising the western slope of the Appalachians in a sailplane. Real faith finds you wherever it wants; it wraps itself in the fabric of your own unique life experience, and it produces justice, mercy and humility. Once you get beyond yourself, faith means true freedom, true joy. The test of it has nothing to do with rules and everything to do with how we treat other people. We are the arms of God.

What is the favorite book you’ve read this last year?

The Help.

At the end of your life, what would you most like to be remembered for?

I think probably Levi's Will. If you read the book, and the afterword, you'll understand why. What happened with that book was a God thing. Not many people get to be part of something that literally changes lives and restores relationships. If I died right now I'd be content with that.

Any last words?

Wait a minute… first you ask what I want to be remembered for, and then you ask if I have any last words. Do you know something I don't? Have you been talking to my doctor? My wife?

Seriously, is she planning to poison my oatmeal again?

LOL. I guess I should watch my phrasing. Thanks, Dale. This was a lot of fun, and I loved your answers.

When The Call Comes

Sometimes it’s dramatic. It comes in a blinding flash of light, and God asks you to give up everything you’ve known. Sell your possessions. Go to another continent. Know that I am God. And know nothing else. Your life looks like it belongs in the Book of Acts.

Truth be told, we don’t see enough of that. And it’s probably due to our own lack of faith.

And yet, so often, when God calls your name, it’s a quiet whisper. He delivers a simple reminder that He knit you together. He made you for a purpose. It may be a quiet purpose, but it fits you like a glove.

Recently I had the opportunity to take a tour of a research lab where DNA gets modified. The lab manager showed us a DNA construct with the letters identifying it. Since we were all non-scientists, she explained it in simple terms. “My name is Samar. My name tells who I am. But suppose, we change a letter of my name. Suppose I take out the “r” and replace it with a “t.” Samat does not have the same identity as Samar. Samat behaves differently than Samar.”

And I couldn’t help but think of the special name God has given us, will give us when we turn to Him. Perhaps it will even look similar to the name we already knew – encoded in it might be the same talents, the same appearance, more or less the same personality, the same history. But when we turn to Him for our identity, He alters our DNA by a smidge or by a yard, and we find there’s a brimming-over of life, which we didn’t have before.

Last week I picked up writing after weeks of not being able to get to it. And I hate to say it. It sounds too lofty. But with each word I typed, each phrase I edited, I felt God’s whisper. This is who you are. This is how I made you. Why have you stayed away? I have something for you to do here. I can meet you here.

What is it for you that brings God’s whisper –I breathed this joy into you when I breathed life into you?

Maybe it’s something ordinary such as cooking dinner for your family or crunching numbers. Or maybe it’s something identity-shaking such as going, full-time, to take the good news to the street people of Albania.

What good thing did God give you to do to build up His kingdom? God made each saint different in their saintliness, after all. It may involve self-sacrifice. It may be all joy. But you’ll know it because though God’s call comes tiptoeing into your life, He’s written your name on it.

Repost: Faith is a Story

We’re a society that likes to measure things – cancer cells, presidential approval ratings, UV rays and income levels to name a few. But many things – the most important ones I’d say – can’t be reduced to paper.

Even our churches follow the trend. It's understandable. They want data like the rest of the world. So they put a statement of faith on their website. And they ask for a confession before they baptize a convert. But faith, what faith really is, won't show up in a sentence or a paragraph, not even on a page.

Faith might be belief in Jesus Christ, an antidote to sin or a ticket to Heaven. But that would be a thin definition. It is something much, much larger and better.

Faith is a story. It begins with God making a beautiful garden and Eve taking the first bite out of forbidden fruit. It continues with her children, sons and daughters who become warriors and fiery-eyed prophets, prostitutes and mothers, kings and poets, saints and sinners. Her children start wars, break idols, become enslaved and with God’s help, break free again. They commit heinous sins, repent and find God’s mercy. They beg their townspeople to listen to God’s wisdom, or they turn their back on Him completely.

It is a story where God reveals himself in Eve’s finest Son. Born in a stable alongside the smell of manure and wet donkey fur, he goes on to bring hope to the broken, the sinful and the hungry. It looks like the story ends as he dies a bloody death at the hands of Roman torture. But instead, he returns with life and a new kind of hope.

No, faith can’t be reduced to a formula. It can’t even be reduced to believing in a story. Faith only happens when you join the story.

Maybe you join the story when you first sing a Sunday school song with hand motions. Possibly when you look through a telescope and realize you’re seeing a star that died before Copernicus was born. Or maybe only when you realize you’ve wrecked your life and reach out with desperate relief to the God who is infinite enough to make sense of your mess.

You continue the story as you mow the lawn for your elderly neighbor and when you turn away from an argument when your son calls you ugly names, when you spend the afternoon reading through the Book of Luke, and when you take time to talk to the guy panhandling in front of the store.

The story is still getting written when you look into the sunset, hoping God is still there, even though it feels like you're on your own. And when you decide you won’t pray anymore because God clearly isn’t going to answer your prayers. Only you find yourself praying anyway, this time with a raised fist and words you know you shouldn’t say to the Almighty. The story isn’t done when, dry-eyed and with a heart gone numb, you face a sin you thought you were too big to commit. Words have abandoned you, and yet you search for the strength to ask for forgiveness.

You’re still living out your faith story when, with a blessing, you welcome your baby granddaughter into the world, wet and pink and screaming. And when your mother takes her last breath with you looking up to see if you can sense her spirit leaving with the angels.

Faith is a life. Try putting faith into a formula. Try putting it on paper. Try reducing it to evidence. But it can’t be done. All you can do is live it out

A Christmas Meditation: It is More Blessed to Give than to Receive

My daughter said to me yesterday, “I know this sounds crazy, but opening all the presents and spending money makes me feel fat.” Christmas has always been something of a binge at our house. It’s no different than at just about any other American home. But I get why it makes her feel fat. When it’s all done, I’m ready to start living like a monk.

This December I found a little lump in the pit of my stomach and with every shopping trip it grew. All the buying and splurging made me uneasy. I began saying a prayer every time I entered the stores with the throngs of shoppers: “Next year, may my family be the kind of family that celebrates Christmas in a Christlike way.”

I worry I’m being a killjoy, but honestly, spending money on toy after toy and luxury after luxury seems out of sync with celebrating the one who said, “It is more blessed to give than to receive” and told his listeners more than once to sell their possessions and give the money to the poor.

I read about a couple of families who celebrated Christmas by buying or making presents for Jesus. The presents they opened were confirmation of a new well they’d purchased for an African village or sponsoring a child through World Vision, a poem someone had written for him and so on. Their celebrations centered on a candlelight service, reading the Christmas story, and baking for their neighbors.

Am I the only one who reads something like that and drinks it in like a sweet breath of fresh air?

There’s absolutely nothing wrong with exchanging a few presents. But if it feels like a binge, even to a 12-year old, there’s something off. I’m guessing it will take a year or two before my kids could possibly see giving as a better celebration than getting. And for it to really click, they need to see it in action in the adults around them.

Last year I had a theme for my life: God’s love. And I have to say it gave me a lot of comfort in some trying times. This year, I’d like to have another theme: It is more blessed to give than to receive.

So much of my life focuses on me: my goals, my comfort, my time. I want to receive that blessing of givng other people the chance to focus on their goals and their comfort for a change. I want to understand what it means to be blessed through giving. And so I’m thinking of it as a present to be opened at every opportunity: giving wherever possible. It’s a lofty goal for someone like me. It will be a learning experience for sure. But by Christmas 2012, with God’s grace, my family might be ready to open that present of giving too.

Best of Christian Fiction 2011

I'm looking at favorites from my reading log this year. This week I'm taking a peek at CBA fiction, or novels geared to a Christian audience.

Book of Dreams by Davis Bunn
When Elena Burroughs is given a precious prayer book hundreds of years old, her prayer life opens up, casting her into an unexpected role. She knows people’s dreams and can interpret them. Her senses become alert to danger. She is given messages for others. In other words, she becomes a modern-day prophet. And it’s not so easy being a prophet, especially if you come into a conflict with the global banking system. This is both a page-turning suspense and a novel full of gems on prayer and spiritual life.

Kiss by Ted Dekker and Erin Healy
Shauna McAllister wakes from a coma, unable to remember the last six months. Her trusted brother is brain-damaged, she has a boyfriend she doesn’t remember, her estranged father is running for president, AND she finds she has the ability to steal people’s memories. A great thriller that keeps you guessing, a little romance, and some supernatural fun.

Paradise Valley by Dale Cramer
When Ohio forces all children to attend public school in the 1920’s, an Amish family heads to Mexico. The land is fertile, but bandits still roam the land after a civil war. Caleb, the family’s patriarch is brought face to face with what turning the other cheek really means. His daughter Rachel mourns for Jake left behind in Ohio, but comes into her own. Miriam, on the brink of spinsterhood, begins to feel things for their Indian hand Domingo that she knows she shouldn’t. Cramer’s writing is graceful and masculine, and his story, which is both simple and passionate, has stayed with me long after I’ve read it.

Shadowed in Silk by Christine Lindsay
I’m honored to call Christine my friend, but I’m not biased in saying that this is a lovely story, and well researched. Abby Fraser joins her husband in the British Raj just after WWI, but finds that he isn’t the man she thought she married. As tensions rise between India and the British colonists, Abby isn’t sure where to turn. Major Geoff Richards, scarred in the war, keeps turning up just when she needs him though, and she finds solace with his friend, the saintly Indian Miriam who runs a home for orphans. There is plenty of action, romance and historical detail in this story and you’ll feel as if you’ve walked the streets of 1918 India when you’re done. See Christine’s trailer here.


Worthy Mentions:

Lost Mission by Athol Dickson
Two stories. A Spanish party of priests and their Indian captives build a mission in 17th century California. A modern developer makes plans to build a community on the same site. What I especially liked about this story is the powerful distinction it draws between people who are busy for God and those who have given themselves over to God, heart and soul.

This Fine Life by Eva Marie Everson
The story of a woman who marries for love, and finds herself unexpectedly becoming a preacher’s wife. Mariette’s life is told through the ups and downs of her marriage and her relationships with the church community. It's a quiet story, but it draws the reader right along.

To Die For by Sandra Byrd
Meg Wyatt, best friend to Anne Boleyn, finds her life changed when Anne draws the eye of King Henry. Meg’s hopes rise and fall and rise again as the intrigues of royal life intertwine with the story of the English Reformation.

Favorite Novels of 2011

This week I’m sharing my favorite novels from the general market this year. Next week, I’ll talk about Christian fiction.

The Language of Flowers by Vanessa Diffenbaugh

At eighteen, it’s time for Victoria to leave foster care. She has no plan. In fact, she goes out of her way not to have a plan, and soon finds herself living in a San Francisco park, with only her love of flowers and their hidden meanings to take her through her days. Until she works up the courage to speak with the neighborhood florist. Diffenbaugh tells her story in two parallel plots: 18-year old Victoria’s struggle to make a life and 10-year old Victoria’s “last chance” at a real home. How can you not love a spunky character like Victoria whose life has taught her not to hope, not to care, but who is determined to foster the growth of flowers?

The Lost Wife by Alyson Richman

A novel with a zinger of a prologue. An old man thinks that the grandmother of the bride seems vaguely familiar. She insists she doesn’t know him. But then he pieces it together: she was his wife sixty years before. (The first chapter is based on a real life conversation the author overheard retold in the hair salon, by the way.) The novel steps back in time to Prague of the 1930’s. Lenka is an artist, Josef a medical student. When war separates the couple, Lenka is determined to use her artistic talent, even in a concentration camp. Josef meanwhile attempts to rebuild his life in America. The artistic viewpoint adds a beautiful lyrical quality to the writing. At night, I am tucked in by a mother who tells me to close my eyes. “Imagine the color of water,” she whispers into my ear and Long branches of light come from the gas lanterns; our faces are half gold, half shadow.

Still Missing by Chevy Stevens

Annie begins her story by telling her therapist about her abduction by a psychopath, and her year-long captivity. It’s a story that is both twisted and captivating. Interspersed, we learn of Annie’s gradual healing and many setbacks. She sees an old picture of herself under the missing persons, and realizes that she’s still missing – the person who was abducted from Vancouver Island never truly returned. About half way through when I was beginning to think this was the whole story, strange new things begin to happen, revealing that perhaps her abduction was more than a chance encounter with a deranged man, and Annie begins to suspect everyone she once trusted. I don’t read a lot of thrillers or mysteries because they’re so easily forgotten, but this is one with a lot of heart and character to it, and will be long remembered.

When Tito Loved Clara by Jon Michaud

Tito still pines for his high school crush, Clara, though it’s been fifteen years. When a chance encounter with a mutual acquaintance brings news of her, he seeks her out. Tito, though is still living with his parents in their immigrant New Jersey neighborhood while Clara’s got a professional job and lives in suburbia with her husband and son. I hesitated to post this one, because it is really gritty – child abuse, teenage pregnancies, affairs, language and more. But I was really moved by this book, by what I felt was a truly redemptive at core. Most of the reviews I read focused on the immigrant story, but what I found most compelling was the theme of what trust is made of, and the many ways, both subtly and directly, that it can be broken.

The Winter Sea by Susannah Kearsley

When novelist, Carrie McClelland, relocates to the Scottish coast, her writing takes off, but somehow her story is dredging up facts about her Jacobite ancestor she couldn’t possibly know. What is it about double-stories? But I do love them. On one level, this is a fantasy and a romance. But it ran deeper than that, largely due to the depth of the characters, particularly the 18th century ones, and also due to the wonderful writing. It’s rare that I buy a book based on the first page, but I knew from line 1 (It wasn’t chance. There wasn’t any part of it that happened just by chance) to the end of the page (My father always told me that the sea was in my blood. I had been born and raised beside it on the shores of Nova Scotia, and I never could resist its siren pull) that I was in the hands of master storyteller.

Non-Fiction Favorites 2011

It’s time to look at the favorites from my reading log this year. This week I’m looking at non-fiction. Over the next couple of weeks I’ll look at fiction.

Bonhoeffer: Pastor,Martyr, Prophet, Spy by Eric Metaxas

An in-depth look at a Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a theologian who wasn’t afraid to get his hands dirty in the real life struggle against the Nazis. The many excerpts from Bonhoeffer’s own letters, journals and books carry the story. I especially loved reading of how Bonhoeffer trained men and women in his underground seminary to transform their lives through prayer.

King’s Cross by Timothy Keller

While billed as a devotional, it’s more of a meandering journey through the book of Mark. I’ve heard Keller described as a man who speaks to skeptics and the questioning. I see why. He has such a way of making sense of difficult areas of the Bible.

Man’s Search forMeaning by Viktor Frankl

Frankl, a Jewish psychiatrist sent to Auschwitz by the Nazis, observed that those who survived the camps were not the best, the strongest or those who had it the easiest. It was the ones who had some meaning to focus their energies on who were most likely to keep going. He takes this idea and apples it to life in general.

One Thousand Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are by Ann Voskamp

 A woman who has struggled with depression and anxiety attacks all her life finds her life changing when she begins writing down the blessings, even in the midst of darkness. Her idea to keep a written list of blessings is so simple, but I’ve found it to be life-changing (and I don’t say that lightly).

Sitting at the Feetof Rabbi Jesus: How the Jewishness of Jesus Can Transform Your Faith by Ann Spangler and Lois Tverberg

Looking at the old customs of Israel, ancient proverbs, and Hebrew idioms the authors shed light on much of what was going on in the Gospels.

The Violence of Love by Oscar Romero (ed. & translated by James Brockman)

Snippets of homilies from the Salvadoran archbishop assassinated during a Mass in 1980. The man’s humility and yet profound insights often come through like poetry (and actually are written in stanzas). Romero, having once believed that priests should generally stay out of politics, found himself in the unlikely position of addressing the nation’s wrongs, of becoming “the voice of a nation” and turning the light of the gospel on a fracturing country.

Whole LifeTransformation: Becoming the Change Your Church Needs by Keith Meyer

A harried pastor finds that he can do more for God by taking time to be with God rather than being constantly busy (and drained) in service for God. You can find a more detailed review here.

Giving Thanks

It’s traditional this time of year to remember what we’re thankful for. We tend to list the big ones – family, jobs found, or a roof over our head. But I started a new practice this year – writing down the things I’m thankful for day by day.

 

What I’ve noticed is that it’s the little things that make me content. I’m grateful for my family, but what really lights up my day is my daughter bringing me wildflowers or the four of us sitting on a blanket watching movies together or my husband or sister or mother listening to my rambling; It’s the moments that make me grateful for the word that captures it all – family or beauty or God.

 

I forget to write those moments down all too often. But even with my sporadic list-keeping, it’s been a life-changer Stopping to take note freezes the moment in time. As a writer I've learned to capture a scene on the page, but I had a habit of passing by the scenes in real life, oblivious to the beauty and emotion at my fingertips. Taking the time to write those moments down reminds me the joy is there. And the result is a current of contentment that runs through my day.

 

This year I’m grateful almost 300 little things like the ones below:

 

• My little girl singing “Joy to the World” all the way to school
• Street lights reflecting off the creek at night
• A mother egret spreading her wings to guard her chicks on the mud bank
• Wind chimes tinkling in the breeze
• Sharing gyros and baklava with my sister as we catch up on each others’ lives
• An insect – a grasshopper? – with designs as intricate as a butterfly
• Leaning into the curves as I drive to work
• An unexpected kiss from my husband
• The instrumental prelude to Elton John’s “Funeral for a Friend” – passion beyond words
• Heavy grey light that causes the freeway lights to switch on as a cold front blows in
• A moment of quiet & a passage of scripture opens up to me – peace
• Snuggling with my girls under the blanket on a rainy Saturday

 

Twenty Novel Quotes

I found a site recently on the 100 most beautiful words in English. I tended to disagree with their choices as they chose complicated words like “diaphanous” and “lassitude.” I think simple words are usually the most beautiful – “willow” or “murmurs” or “silvered.” But the beauty of a word is only really found in a sentence. It’s in context that words take on shape and rhythm, image and meaning.

When I first started writing fiction, I studied other novels, and kept note of some of the sentences that struck me, phrases with voice or sensory load or resonance. They’re full of what one writing teacher I know calls “power words.” I’ve added to the list from time to time. So it’s a bit random, and maybe only fellow writers will appreciate these bits of poetry snatched from their scenes. But here are a few of my favorites:

There was a sizzle and steam and a sound like a thousand muskets firing. And then the sheets of ore began to fall.
- Year of Wonders, Geraldine Brooks

She looked at him again, as if giving weight and bone to a ghost.
- The Lost Wife, Alyson Richman

The plan had been hatched far away, in cold, anonymous distance, but she was freshly aware it would be carried out here in the presence of aching flesh.
- At the Scent of Water, Linda Nichols

Two of the adults held lanterns aloft, and Kyra’s youngest boy flashed through the pool of light as Domingo tossed him into his mother’s arms.
- Paradise Valley, Dale Cramer

Snippets of prayers would come to him, like large flakes of snow drifting down soundlessly from the branches of his memory.
- The Covenant, Naomi Ragen

Her handwriting was impeccable, - small, soft and elegant numbers filled the pages of her account book. She wrote with the quiet deliberation of a court scribe.
- Snow Falling on Cedars, David Guterson

For three days we walked [Jerusalem’s] narrow streets, ate food from her bazaars, breathed the incense of her churches. We touched her walls and tasted her dust, and in the end we came away changed, to relinquish her to the night.
- The Beekeeper’s Apprentice, Laurie King

It was as if all the life had left his body to live in those extraordinary eyes.
- Colony, Anne River Siddons

I am Taliesin; I am a word in letters, a sound on the breath of the wind. I am a wave on the sea.
- Taliesin, Stephen Lawhead

I don't feel like a Psalm 1:3 sistah-a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth her fruit in her season. Her leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever she doeth shall prosper. And that was just the King James Version. Don't make me pull out my Amplified Bible and quote that Scripture three times fast.
- Zora and Nicky, Claudia Mair Burney

I had only human comparisons for such a look. Caesar and Brutus. Jesus and Judas.
- The Host, Stephenie Meyer

Bright flowers of fire sprang up from the wood and blossomed in orange and green and violet.
- The Far Pavilions, M. M. Kaye

The morning met me with streaks of sunkist cracking across the skyline.
- When Crickets Cry, Charles Martin

I reach forward and press my lips against his. We taste of heat, ashes, and misery. It’s a surprising flavor for such a gentle kiss.
- Mockingjay, Suzanne Collins

She found the gloves warm, and overlarge, and rough upon her fingers, but the feeling had a certain sinful pleasure to it, as though his own hands were closed round hers.
- Winter Sea, Susanna Kearsley

Blood boiled bright in his veins.
- The Morning River, W. Michael Gear

She could hear her heart, a sparrow no longer, but a raven with large, powerful wings beating within her chest.
- The Forgotten Garden, Kate Morton

She was god-born from her infancy. She sang in her cradle. She danced before she walked.
- Sarah, Scott Orson Card

I had drawn the outline of a strong old woman, her shoulders stooped from work and from denial. She had skin the shade of bootleg coffee, and crossing her back were the memories of lashed scars.
- Harvesting the Heart, Jodi Piccoult

There was an unearthly quality to the way he sang the melody that night – as if he were winging through unknown worlds in search of sources of strength beyond himself.
- My Name is Asher Lev, Chaim Potok

An Equation of Faith

I’ve often tried searching out God as if He were one of the geometry proofs I used to do in high school:

If A is true, then B

If B is true, then C

Until voilà there’s the answer in front of me.

Clear thinking is important of course, but God isn’t a logic puzzle. I won’t find Him by answering all the test questions right. He’s a Person, and a deeply passionate Person at that. If the parable of the sheep and goats, if 1 Corinthians 13 tells us anything it’s this: there’s only one question that leads to God: Am I living out His passion?

It’s hard for me to accept that. I’m a better thinker than a lover. The geometry proof is easier.

But God is love. And finding love doesn’t require complex thinking. Funnily enough, I’ve found that my faith has gone only very short distances from study. When has my little mustard seed of faith grown? When I focused on love, of course:

• When I closed my books to invest time in my family.
• When I spent a few extra minutes to prepare a bag of food for the old vet who spends his days under the bridge.
• When I got on my knees for the persecuted Christians in internment camps in North Korea.
• When I’ve read biographies of Christians who lived out of love
• Even when I wrote a story about love.

When have I felt most certain that God was present? Recently, it was when I walked a long, difficult road to forgive someone. I think I realized God’s presence there so profoundly because it was a time I chose to love when everything in me just wanted to walk away.

 I don’t say these things to brag. I’m not worth bragging about. I’m short on love and long on self. I only want to share what I know: God is in the experience. If you want to know Him, to sense His reality, you have to spend time in His reality. And that’s a place of deep-reaching, long-abiding, sacrificial love.

 It’s hard to reach God with our minds because God is beyond thought. He is beyond words. But never is He beyond love. He is love. And because He is, we can reach him with our hearts.

So, yes there’s a proof that works. If you want to find God, it’s simple (anyone can understand it) and yet, it’s so very challenging (you’ll only get there with the help of God). Here’s the little forumula:

 If I want to find God = I need to Love

 If want to know more of God = I  need to learn more about Love
 Therefore, when I Love à I will find God
& when I Love à  my Faith will grow