Thanks to all of you for registering for the Book Giveaway. A drawing was held just outside our church building this afternoon. The young man in the picture eagerly drew the names. The two people who will receive an autographed copy of Stone Crossings are:
Doug Young
Darlene Kyser
Congratulations! Again, thanks to all of you. Some of you may wish to purchase the book. You can do so here. You might enjoy keeping up with L. L. and her writing at her blog: "Seedlings and Stone." You can find her blog here.
L. L. was asked, in another recent giveaway, to say a few words on ‘award day.’ Here’s what she said and I thought it would also be apt to repeat it here at "A Place for the God-Hungry."
I thought about what I might say to the winner (and anyone else who decides to read Stone Crossings: Finding Grace in Hard and Hidden Places after learning about it here). Nothing seemed quite right. Then I remembered a story.
Well, actually two stories. Or maybe it really is one story (Forgive my vacillation!) that began long ago and found a new chapter this past year.
In Stone Crossings, I tell a small tale of loss; when I was a child, my stepfather threw a rock-tumbling project out the window. I’d been trying to polish some stones to amber, jade and purple perfection. That project ended abruptly with his hostile action. Funny how we carry things like this with us into adulthood, but I remembered the incident well enough to poignantly pen it into Stone Crossings.
When the book was published, I sent a copy to my third stepmother as a thank-you for letting me tell her part of our family history. To my great surprise, she wrote me a five-paged, single-spaced letter about her regrets and her love. And, with the letter, she sent a velvet green bag of polished stones. They looked much like the stones I’d been hoping to produce in that childhood project long ago. Okay, do you blame me … I held those stones, touched their smoothness and cried for a long time.
Which is to say that sometimes our grace stories take years to unfold. And we are startled to find, after all, grace in hard and hidden places.
I was very moved by your story. Sometimes it’s hard to bring them up, yet for me it’s always healing.
Congratulations, Doug and Darlene!
Janice, thank you. There is often healing in the telling, yes.