BLOG TOUR | Closer Than Your Skin
By editor on Feb 25, 2008 in Book Blog Tours, Interviews
Susan, describe yourself for our visitors.
I like to paint Van Gogh reproductions, and my favorite music includes various artists like Jimmy Needham, Kevin Prosch, Eva Cassidy and Sarah Brightman. I’m deeply involved in my husband’s ministry which is all about building orphan homes in Uganda for AIDS and war orphans. In the last five years we have done 26 projects–all on donations from ordinary people. One Montana family contacted all their extended family and agreed to skip giving Christmas presents one year so they could build an orphanage with us! That really moved my heart.
How do you find time to connect with God?
Morning is a good time to get quiet, worship, and let God fill me up. But actually, I find points of contact with God all day long and I’m not a hyper-religious person. It’s more like paying attention to small ways God is moving, speaking, inviting me to pray for someone, stop and give thanks. It’s what my book is all about.
Who are your favorite authors? Favorite books?
I love Don Miller’s book BLUE LIKE JAZZ. Actually his book inspired me to write mine. I also love TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD and PEACE LIKE A RIVER.
Tell us about your journey to publication.
Well, I’ve been journaling a long time, but never saw myself as a writer. Then I lost my physical ability to write. The condition is called ‘Writer’s Cramp’ and is a known disability where your hand just freezes up. Doctors said it would never get better. One morning, I was reading my Bible and asked God to let me write down my thoughts. For two hours I could write perfectly!! But later my hand froze up again. I asked my pastor why God would give me that little miracle? He said…to raise my faith that God could heal my hand. He also thought that God was giving me a message that He wanted me to write.
After struggling with the disability for many years, God just decided to heal my hand! Now ‘Writer’s Cramp’ is a funny little joke between me and God. Yet it still took me NINE years (give that girl a dope slap!) to get the picture and send something in for publication! The whole story is too much to tell here, but you can read it in Chapter 13 of the book.
Tell us about your current book?
Everywhere I go, I meet people who say they have all the ingredients of their faith—they pray, attend church, read the Bible, and give money to the poor. Yet, their cake isn’t baked because they don’t know God. And what’s worse, they don’t know how to know God.
If Christianity is a story about restoring relationship with God, there must be more to it. Yet when I look at all our literature, tapes, college curriculums, sermons, and camp programs, the relational aspect of the Christian faith seems sorely underdeveloped. We give it lip service, telling others our faith is “not a religion, but a relationship with God,†but we fail to unpack the cliché. Honest seekers are left hanging.
In Closer Than Your Skin, I tell authentic and transparent stories about my unfolding discovery that God is real and can be known. I write not as an authority, but as one sharing my notes along the way.
Sensing the inklings of God’s presence and learning to hear his voice was like learning a new language—I started with the basics and gradually picked up more nuances. God was in the crises, but also the mundane events of my life. Soon, intimacy with God was no longer a myth. He was available, responsive and interested in making contact. I only had to ask and believe it was possible in the first place. After all, God, himself said:
“You will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart. And I will be found by you.†(Jeremiah 29:13-14a)
My hope is that through my stories, you will find something beyond the familiar and the formulaic, and experience relationship with God for yourself.
How did you come up with ideas for this book?
The book is all true stories from my life.
Whatʼs next for you?
Not sure, but I know I’ll keep writing
Where can visitors find you online?
The Web site for the book is www.closerthanyourskin.com. Check out the photo gallery to see the stories in color! The Web site has an expansive study guide if you want to read it with a group of friends. Also I put a great French River Blueberry Cobbler recipe on there which goes with Chapter 11.
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