"Tell the stories." These were the words God whispered repeatedly to my heart this time last year. I was three months into my sabbatical wilderness season, praying for direction and waiting in peace for God to say, "This is the way. Walk in it." (Isaiah 30:21) I've learned that when God drops a word in your spirit like that, it is almost always preceded by signs---a series of seemingly disconnected events, experiences and moments that the Holy Spirit uses to loosen and till the soil of your heart so that you are ready to receive that word in the right moment with the right awareness. For three months prior to this command to "tell the stories," the Holy Spirit navigated me through a series of checkpoints--moments when he stirred my spirit so deeply, when the experience was so tangible and tactile, that I knew without question he was telling me to pay attention and take note of it. To the person separated from this kind of active work of the Holy Spirit, either by unbelief or disbelief (yes, there is a difference), the events I experienced would hardly seem noteworthy, much less connected. But when we walk every day with the awareness that the Spirit of God himself abides within us, we have to learn to pay attention. And to recognize that there is reason he has been sent to dwell within us. “When He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth” (John 16:13). I can know the will of God for humanity, the Church, and for his people by reading the Bible. But I cannot know his will for my life without learning to recognize and respond to his active,living, and vocal Spirit within me. If you don't know what that looks and feels like in your daily life, consider my sequence of events below and how ultimately they all stitched together to bring command and confirmation to my heart and mind. In March of 2017, these events/scenarios all took place in seemingly random occurrence:March 1, 2017: I began a month-long study and meditation on the Book of Luke. I had finished a workbook-driven study on Thessalonians and felt a tug in my spirit to dive into the gospels. I bought several commentaries, read through all four gospels, and then camped out for most of the month in the Book of Luke, with my spirit powerfully and specifically stirred around the parables of Jesus and how he used storytelling to teach people about the Kingdom of God. March 4, 2017: I was sitting at my table in the late afternoon working on a Powerpoint presentation for work. Suddenly and without any preamble, warning, or personal meditation on the subject, God dropped the opening scene of Running from Monday on my heart. In fact, what I heard in a clearly audible voice in my spirit was "Delaney's eyelids fluttered open." Without giving any of the book away, I will just say that this is the opening line of the book and that the flashback scene that follows it--an intense and painful scene that sets the stage for the whole book--was downloaded to me verbatim by the Holy Spirit, and I could hardly open a Word document fast enough to transcribe what was being given to me. When I was done, I sat back with my hands trembling and my jaw hanging on the floor. Where in the world did this come from? What did it mean? My first thought was that I needed to blog it, but I had no idea what it meant or where it would lead. I read it out loud to my husband and he was both disturbed, riveted and impressed by it. "Sounds like a book," he said. Speak to me God? What are you saying? March 11, 2017: The movie The Shack came out. While I thought this was a good movie, I wouldn't have put it in the one-of-the-best-movies-I've-ever-seen category. I could see the theological gray areas others pointed out. But as I watched the film, I felt an overwhelming quickening in my spirit (and when I say this, I mean an emotional and physiological event-- inexplicable welling tears, increased heart rate, rolling chills, goosebumps, hairs on the back of the neck standing up, the whole nine yards). I've learned to sift these experiences to determine if they are solely my emotional response to something or the Holy Spirit is doing something entirely on his own. This experience fell in the latter category because, as I said, this movie did not have the power on its own to move me this way. God was speaking to me. I literally whispered out loud in the theater, "Okay, God, what are you trying to tell me?" His response: Pay attention to the dialogue. So I focused in on the conversations Mack and God were having about faith, and I even went home and fast-forwarded to those conversations later via the audiobook. They were inarguably powerful. I wasn't sure what it all meant for me, but I stored it up in my heart. It was important. I knew it without question. March 14, 2017: The TV series This is Us aired its finale episode. I had been avidly watching this show from the premier episode the previous September, and I could hardly put into words the impact that show was having on me. Obviously, all of America was tuning in and being emotionally drawn to the story and characters. But my spirit was stirred beyond imagining. Why? I questioned it so many times during those months. "What are you telling me God?" It was a fiction story of made-up characters who despite their fictive nature were as real, relatable and compelling as any I had ever seen on TV. They were showing America what it looks like to powerfully and beautifully deal with human struggle--how to wrestle with ghosts, confront addictions, extend difficult forgiveness, address family history and generational patterns, grieve well and embrace healing. Every week I would say out loud, "This is some of the best writing I've ever seen for TV."March 31, 2017: I was in prayer and meditation in a chair on my dock in the early morning. I raised my hands to heaven and said, "God, I know that you called me out of the role I was in, out into the wilderness and into this season so that I would take a new adventure with you, walk on the waters of courageous faith with you again. You emptied these hands so that they could be raised heavenward as an offering of surrender. However you want to fill these hands God, I am ready. Whatever you want to write, these hands are willing. These hands. This heart. This life. Do with it whatever you want to do." God answered loudly, clearly, and powerfully: "Tell the stories." From the parables of Jesus to the powerful dialogue of The Shack to the unprecedented writing of This is Us, God was pointing me toward the power of storytelling. I would be writing fiction. And it was going to tender hearts, break chains, and teach Kingdom. [INSERT IMAGE HERE: Me. Face to the floor. Weeping. Grateful. Overwhelmed.]I could transcribe my entire journal upon the space of this blog and still not be able to fully convey all the other ways, large and small, that the Holy Spirit connected dots and brought direction and confirmation to this journey. How he used Bobby Houston's book The Sisterhood: How the Power of the Feminine Heart Can Become a Catalyst for Change and Make the World a Better Placeto reignite my fire for rescuing women. How he pinned me to my seat with revelation and weeping in the movie Hidden Figures to tell me that speaking to injustice would be part of this new journey. There are so many ways that he MOVES and SPEAKS and STIRS if we are awake and paying attention!The first fruit of that journey--which really started two years ago with a deepened pursuit of the Holy Spirit--now buds upon the tree. Running from Monday will be out for "consumption" to feed and sow new seed into the hearts of women in just another week or two. It is the first of an anthology. Astoundingly and with inexplicable trust in me to steward it well, God spoke to me in the plural. He wants me to tell stories. Multiple. Many. And so it begins. In the coming days between now and the launch of this book, I will be blogging more about this journey---how it is and always has been much, much bigger than ME. Stay tuned. And thank you for reading.