As a depressed teenager, a neighbour give me his old issues of ‘Guideposts.’ I read the faith stories and they held me together, especially as I struggled with wanting to be like others.
Imagine my surprise to discover that now they offer a writers’ course for would-be contributors. I couldn’t comprehend their generosity, that is, until I read this quote:
‘Your jealousy—yes, you will be jealous of other writers’ success and talent—will melt away when you’ve been generous… Want to be a writer? Be someone else’s good reader. Believe in someone else. Be their friend, their fan. Expand your world. No doubt you’ll find there are many people who believe in you. .’*
And just as Guideposts cheers me on, I am doing the same. It erases the need to compare myself with others. My heart is for them to succeed.
*Rick Hamlin, ‘Called to Write’, published by Guideposts, 2019, pg 51-52.
(image found onhttps://www.etsy.com/listing/1560178915/vintage-guideposts-magazines-1972-7)
Why 143 revisions over 7 years? God isn’t in a hurry when working in our hearts. It took all those years to find the laugh. Enjoy my bio below…
Rich girl, poor girl, beggar girl, Leaf…
Eva Leaf was born in the USA to World War II refugees – a RICH girl – with family and chilling escape stories from Eastern Europe. But Eva’s Pa got spooked and fled again – a POOR girl – to an isolated place in the Ozark mountains.
Next came homelessness in tents and a barn – a BEGGAR girl – with nothing but a cardboard box of clothes and a borrowed guitar. But God stepped in to rescue in an unexpected way. She could finally go to college and study Religious Education in Canada. After getting a degree, she became a teacher on the Mexican/USA border.
Later, an English gentleman, by the name of LEAF, found her and whisked her away. Together, they worked for a charity in England and Portugal. They have now set up home in an English village, where Eva mentors and writes.
She did dream of becoming a doctor, pilot, a commander-in-chief – she has four grown children instead – RICH girl!
The beauty of being human is that each of us has inherent privileges. In the beginning, God lavished Adam and Eve with ones which gave them emotional life. Love and friendship. To make their own choices and speak their mind. The privilege to learn from mistakes and grow wiser. To work creatively and have faith… Each one is essential in God’s eye.
Now, if any one of these was forcibly removed from our lives, the way God created us to function would die in that area. And this is a death. It will affect every other area in life.
If my freedom to speak is torn from me, it affects my friendships, choices, and my opportunities to grow. It affects my decisions…
In May we published Eva Leaf’s This Crown of Comfort. Eva searched the Bible for years to discover places where God spoke to women and one rainy day in a tent, she reread Isaiah. ‘I finally found it,’ she writes, ‘I read an outpouring of God’s heart towards a city called Jerusalem. He called her a beloved woman!’ Many years, and 33 drafts later, This Crown of Comfort was completed. ‘With each new draft, I saw a bit more clearly that even in our brokenness we can be whole with God, and that whatever our grief, he is there to comfort us.’
‘I read an outpouring of God’s heart towards a city called Jerusalem. He called her a beloved woman!’
Drawing on the seven calls of God in the book of Isaiah, Eva writes out of searing experience – her own, and that of the many women who spoke to her for the book – and concludes, ‘Despite everything we go through, God’s seven calls are relevant today. For in his tender love, he shows us our beauty and worth. In his powerful love, he gives us strength.’
One of the women who generously shared her story with Eva is known as ‘Becks’ in the book. She has written this blog:
‘In This Crown of Comfort, Eva Leaf takes us on a personal journey through one of the most difficult and incomprehensible realities of existence: the pain and suffering that we encounter and experience in our lifetime. Society today may emphasize the responsibility for us to create happiness by following our hearts to the point where we tend to feel guilty when we are unhappy. This book, however, tells another story: life can be breaking us, circumstances crush us, people hurt us, feelings of sadness, pain, anger, and loneliness completely overwhelm us.
And yet, this is a book of hope!
And yet, this is a book of hope! Eva shows us the reality of pain and brokenness, but also the reality of a life-giving Companion. In Hebrews 12 the writer says: ‘Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith.’ The word ‘race’ in Greek is Agōn, which means ‘struggle, conflict’. This book looks that reality squarely in the eye: yes, life is hard and there is serious struggle going on, and the many stories are witness to that. But thank God, there is another truth: we are not alone, someone has gone before us, loves us and – in mysterious ways – is able to use our brokenness and pain to draw us closer to himself.
God called Jerusalem a ‘beloved woman’. And when she was badly broken, He draws her into a process of healing. She is to take seven vital steps in her journey of recovery and renewed intimacy with Him. As his children, we are also God’s beloved (wo)men. Through many personal examples, stories from friends and everyday encounters Eva shows us how to use these seven steps as we turn away from patterns of lies and dysfunction and embrace the truth that we truly are God’s beloved. And it all starts with comfort…
This Crown of Comfort is an encouragement for people who are confronted with pain and hardship as they go through life, for we are not alone. Suffering does not have the last word, Jesus does. This book is also for those who are looking to make sense of the journey they are travelling. Eva challenges us to look inward, make an honest inventory for ourselves, and choose the right path going forward. And this book is for those who have a friend or loved one going through crises and are wondering what to say and what to pray. Give them this book as a gift, and if you are able, offer to go through it together, perhaps an even greater gift for the both of you. This Crown of Comfort allows us to discover the love of God in a deeper way, the amazing intimacy with Jesus, our big Brother, and the presence of the great Comforter.
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Moving to another country isn’t easy. It means leaving the familiar. It means letting go of one identity and carving out another.
I experienced this when moving to England as a young wife. I didn’t understand the culture. Every person I met was new. And I wasn’t understood.
But as I walked the city of London in a daze, on every pub I passed, there was the same huge sign – “Take Courage”. Only later did I realise that Courage is a beer, but God used those two words to get me through.
God told a man called Paul, “Take courage! As you have testified about me in Jerusalem, so you must also testify in Rome.”* Whatever our transitions, God will give us strength.
It always amazes me how new insights can come years after a situation has passed…
I grew up with a lot of fear, and have worked hard over the decades to overcome it. Yet, a stark reality hit home as I read Proverbs 29:25, “Fear of man will prove to be a snare.”
The Bible called my past fears exactly what they were – traps. For this is what fear does – it captures us, makes us a prisoner, and we can’t escape.
But as I read the next part of that verse, I saw the key to that trap, one which took me years to find – “but whoever trusts in the Lord is kept safe.” For a trap has NO power as we trust in God. Our escape is real.
Some things frighten me – especially another’s anger. I can wake up in the night, my heart aching over how a person’s anger manipulates me and those I really care for. For anger actually blocks me from freedom of choice.
The other day I read how Jesus reacted. “Every day he was teaching at the temple. But the chief priests, the teachers of the law and the leaders among the people were trying to kill him” (Luke 20:47). Angry people opposed Jesus, but he didn’t crumble with fear. He lived with an audacity that surprised me.
He did what God wanted him to do. He sat where those leaders said he shouldn’t. He didn’t flinch.
It released me to live with the same audacity – to take bold risks despite the blocks.
We may have done everything properly as we grieved:
Gone through the five stages of denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance*.
Committed our broken hearts to God and asked him to heal us.
Trusted him for our future, that he would help us through.
We moved on… but then something happened to remind us. A conversation. A situation. An emotion. And we grieved yet again.
I have learned to lay each flashback at Jesus’ feet, to sit with him in the night for as long as I need. I have learned to accept his precious promises as my own. “The Lord, the King of Israel, is with you; never again will you fear any harm” (Zephaniah 3:15). We don’t have to be afraid. Jesus is with us. We can get up and live.
When I am broken-hearted. “The Lord is close to the broken-hearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit” (Psalm 34:18).
Whenever I am afraid and overwhelmed. “So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God…” (Isaiah 41:10).
When I am truthful in my prayers. “The Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth” (Psalm 145:18).
When I am sad over what I have done. God says, “…I live in a high and holy place, but also with the one who is contrite and lowly in spirit” (Isaiah 57:15).
When someone accuses me. “He who vindicates me is near. Who then can bring a charge against me?…” (Isaiah 50:8).
