577,693
I already shared some thoughts on this on Instagram, but I’ve been waiting for the right words to share here and finally decided to just give it a shot.
On May 30, I finished a writing contract I’ve been on for the past 19 months. I wrote seven books and accompanying leader guides, one for every grade 6-12, for Kingsland’s student ministry. Two of the books I heavily revised — good bones, some quality content that could be edited and restructured, things like that. One I ended up building on the foundation of another. The rest, though, were from total scratch. I added it up on May 31st, and from start to finish, I wrote 577,693 words and 1,274 pages.
The week after, people kept asking me, “How does it feel?!”
And it felt great, but it also kind of felt like… nothing. I think a project this big needs more distance before I can really process it. I always expect creative projects to feel truly finished when I’m finished with them — to come to some glorious, satisfactory resting place — but with this one, because of its sheer size, it didn’t. It felt like I could keep tweaking these books on into eternity, always refining words and language and illustrations. When the thing you’re writing about is the thing you’ve based your entire life on, it takes on a different tenor.
I do know that I’m really proud of completing the project. I’m humbled that I was asked to do it in the first place. I’m honored that I got to work with a team of people I call friends and mentors to craft something so meaningful, something with so much hope attached to it. I kept a post-it note attached to my computer for a while that said, “YOU ARE GETTING PAID A LIVING WAGE TO DISCIPLE YOUR FAVORITE TEENAGERS IN THE WORLD.” In moments when I wanted to bang my head against the wall or couldn’t seem to find quite the right words or felt like I was drowning in my dad’s seminary textbooks, I would read it and remember just how awe-inspiring it was that this is what I was doing. That this was what I got to be a part of.
I love writing for a lot of reasons, which is a whole different discussion. But I think one of the primary reasons is that it’s just the medium of language I feel most fluent in. I know, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that I can communicate exactly what I’m thinking, feeling, seeing with my written words. I’ve spent years honing this one craft, and there is a comfort and confidence that comes with that. I haven’t mastered it, to be sure. I doubt I ever will. I’m not sure you even can.
But I love that for the past two years, I’ve had the chance to give the best of my words to the God I believe in and students I want to know him. Not know about him. Not know their parents’ ideas, not know the cultural ideas of Christianity that get thrown around in the American everyday, not the things Jesus gets blamed for that even the most casual reading of his Word would tell you he would have nothing to do with, not some vague theological ideas. My greatest prayer is that the words I’ve written — all 577,000 of them — would guide students to reckon with the reality of God, of faith, and of Scripture. To get to know him for themselves. Him. How good he is, how big he is, how holy he is, how loving he is, how just he is, how beautiful he is; and how much he loves them, and who they are in light of him. I hope they make honest decisions based on that, walk in a way that lines up with it. I hope they really examine what they believe, own it for themselves, and love God and others well. I hope, like Paul said, they “live life worthy of the Gospel of Christ.” That’s my prayer for myself. It’s my prayer for all of us. Abundance in the fullest sense of the word.
I’ll be honest, I’m also tired — ha — and have a feeling I will be for a little bit. I’m trying to let that creative muscle relax for a while, get a proper rest before I move to another project. But beyond being excited for how the curriculum will be used and pride in being a part of it, I’m honestly just satisfied just to see that I could do that. I know I can write books now. I did it. Sometimes the job felt so huge and daunting I couldn’t imagine getting it done, but we made it. That’s fun. It broadened my scope of possibility for myself. I’m curious where that leads.
Big grateful for all the people involved in the project and who invited me to be a part of it in the first place. When I moved back to Katy for this job in 2018, I never imagined all the goodness that would follow. Can’t wait to see what lies ahead. And with that, I’m going to sign off this stream-of-consciousness post. I’ll let y’all know when I get bored and go ahead and find something else to write. (We all know I won’t make it long.)
