Writing "Identity Crisis: Reclaim the True You!"

Last January on one of my prayer days, I sensed the Lord calling me to write a book about identity.  Within 30 minutes, I had an outline, a personal story, Scriptures, illustrations and biblical stories for every chapter. 

I started to write it in mid-March, even though the only time that I could carve out for it as two to three hours on Friday morning.  However, I made great progress, finishing half the book by mid June.  My plan was to go to San Francisco for the month of July in hopes of finishing the whole book.

Amazingly, at the end of the three weeks that I stayed in San Francisco, I finished the manuscript.  When I added up the amount of hours that I spent writing the book, I realized that I had written it in less than 100 hours.  Wow!  I knew I could only have written it through being empowered by God's Spirit.

We don't often get to experience something so powerful in the Spirit, but I can honestly say that writing this book has been one of the most thrilling experiences in my life.  Some days I felt like Jesus was right next to me, giving me the words to write, as well as expressing his pleasure about its progress.

Before I left San Francisco, I sensed the Lord urging me to work towards getting it published by the end of 2011.  I gulped and thought that timeline seemed a bit impossible.  I know people spend years seeking to get their books published.

Once again, the Lord was present showing the way.  When I asked those who committed to pray for me to pray for direction for a publisher, my parents gave me a name.  When I prayed about it, I sensed the Lord's pleasure on it. 

When I approached them about it, www.tendrilpress.com, they were willing to by pass the submission process and take it on.  They agreed to have it published by early December.

Wow!  I got the call to write the book in January, started working on it in March, finished writing in July, and now am moving towards the first printing in November.

When I asked the question about the rapid way that this book came together, I sensed the Lord respond, "My people are discouraged and distracted because they don't know the truth about who they are, what I created them to do, and how to walk out their true identity that I gave them."

In other words, we are in an identity crisis:  letting the world or our own thoughts define our identity.  The word "reclaim" means to take back that which has been wasteland and make it productive again.  This is what God wants to do in our lives:  to reclaim the wasteland of our identity and to make it reflect the true glory that he deposited into us; his beloved children!

Read my next blog for ways that "Identity Crisis:  Reclaim the True You" can be used to help us all live into the places for which we were created!