A sweet surprise this week felt like a stream in the desert. GraceLaced: Discovering Timeless Truths Through Seasons of the Heart, my first book, was named winner of the 2018 Christian Book Award in Devotion & Gift by the ECPA.
I received the news while running errands alone at the store, and I just stood in the aisle with my cart and cried. It's been a long journey, and the stories that accompany the seasons in GraceLaced were (and are) some of the most difficult soil to sow and grow in. But God. He wastes nothing. This award echoes these words in Isaiah 41:
"...that they may see and know,
may consider and understand together,
that the hand of the Lord has done this,
the Holy One of Israel has created it."
Because God’s timing for hopes revealed are rarely ours; because He taught me to make these art and writing giftings HIS instead of mine; because this book represents some of the deepest valleys and seasons we never expect to walk; because you really don’t have to be blooming to be growing...
...because of all this, and more, I’m celebrating what He has done with a simple heart, words, and brush.
Thank you, dear readers and friends who have supported this labor of love. It has certainly exceeded all that I hoped or imagined. Soli deo gloria.
This post was originally featured on Instagram on May 1, 2018 and in our newsletter. If you are not subscribed yet to the newsletter, you can receive occasional updates, letters from me and shoppe news by completing the form below.
Because of grace,
