WILL YOU WRITE A BOOK FOR ME? God Turning Trauma Into Testimony
Years ago, entering into the storm and entirely unaware of the darkness I’d soon experience, I was already heavily betrayed and disoriented.
We were on a routine drive from his parents' home—a 45-minute wilderness trek I had become accustomed to. Out of my raw pain, I turned and said to him:
“I’m going to write a book one day called Surviving Stockholm in the Basin Swampland.”
My anger spoke to the unvalidated distress I was experiencing, helplessly hoping he would finally see how alarming I found this new, unstable existence to be.
Had you told me then, “You really will write a book about this one day,” there is absolutely no wager you could have made that I wouldn’t have confidently, stubbornly opposed.
The Reluctant Writer: Finding Survival in the Silence
I was not a writer; I was a mother. I have always found expressing myself emotionally to be exhausting.
I am naturally social, but I am not one for the spotlight. If I find myself in it, I can't make a quick enough exit.
When something is deeply important, I write it down so I can communicate with certainty what my mind and mouth can never seem to coordinate. This didn't make me a writer—it was survival.
Even when God clearly asked me, “Will you write a book for Me?” I blankly looked around the room and assumed I simply had an urgent message to deliver to someone else.
I can still hear His words as clearly as the moment He first spoke them. They left an indelible imprint—the kind of quiet, steady whisper that never quite leaves you.
This was a bit different than when He had spoken before, though. He asked a question. I instantly recognized that and thought it must be because He was speaking to my author friend through me.
He is so polite and gentle, inviting us into companionship with Him. I know He knew I would take this message to my friend. So ultimately, He was also asking my friend, the author. I do hope I one day get to see what the Lord and the author publish together. The thought alone brings my spirit joy. What a beautiful moment and a beautiful work that will be.
Two and a half years later, He was still waiting… on me. Yet somehow, my time was up.
Narrowing the Road: When God Forces the Issue
At that point, He gently forced the issue.
An acquaintance from church, who had recently taken a staff position there because God had specifically called her to it, stood silently beside me, nervously rehearsing before service. Curious, I asked, “What are you doing?”
She laughed and said, “I have a pretty solid case of stage fright.”
I smiled. “I completely understand. I wouldn’t do it.” We both laughed as I jokingly sent her off to her doom.
After the service, I asked how it went.
“Fine,” she said, “but while I was there, I couldn’t stop thinking about you. As strange as this may sound, I feel like your anxiety is funny because I have a feeling you have something very special to share.”
Once again, my immediate response was, “No… can’t think of anything.”
Inside, though, my stomach was in knots. It took me another two weeks of processing before I found Him narrowing the road with such precision that I simply couldn’t escape through any other route.
I say that laughing because it really was that ridiculous. It wasn’t willful defiance. It was a complete, oblivious state of calling.
"Seriously?!"—Answering the Call to Share Your Trauma
When I finally woke up in recognition, I looked up and said:
“Seriously?!”
And then:
“I know I take up a lot of Your time with my endless chatter, but why are You pawning me off on people? What am I supposed to write? All I have is years of trauma… and You showing up. But honestly, to most people, You showing up sounds like a bunch of woo-woo superstition. Respectfully.”
(Please don’t take that personally. He wants us exactly the way we are.)
After a significant amount of chatter and ranting on my end, I finally grew quiet. I walked mile after mile along the sand until my mind became completely still out of sweet exhaustion.
Then He quietly said:
“Your notes.”
Oh, no. I have joked for years about my iPhone notes. I freely tell people that if I ever die and someone has to go through my phone, they will wholeheartedly certify me a lunatic. Every thought, feeling, frustration, hope, fear, question, and hard-earned lesson is played out real time in my notes. My notes is how I process my life.
This is where He laid down the ultimate checkmate. I realized everything He wanted, what He had asked, was already there.
Returning to Truth: There Are No Coincidences
Here are two certainties I have learned in all humility:
There are no coincidences.
If anything matters, then everything matters.
Maybe they are one and the same. I wonder sometimes—when I spoke those angry words in the car years ago, He had to have known, right? Was He planting a seed, or was that a super unlikely coincidence?
No one in this world would have bet against me writing a book more than the me sitting in that car back in 2019.
I am finding that our stories are rarely finished where our pain is the greatest. I certainly never imagined mine would include publishing a spiritual memoir. But God has a way of seeing our endings while we are still living inside the messy middle chapters.
If you are reading this today, I don't believe your story is over either.
We don’t know His exact plans for us tomorrow. If you are here, reading this, it is not by accident. Don’t lose hope, His Beloved.
He is with you. ❤️
Questions to Consider
What "unlikely seeds" has God planted in your past that you are currently ignoring?
Are you telling yourself you aren't equipped to share your story because of your flaws, fear, or anxiety?
What would happen if you stopped ranting, got still, and opened up your own "notes" to see what God has already helped you survive?
Prayer
Father,
Thank You for Your politeness, Your gentleness, and Your infinite patience with our rants, our doubts, and our questions. Thank You for seeing the end of our story while we are still struggling to survive the middle chapters.
Give us the courage to stop running from the calling You have placed on our lives. When we feel unequipped, weak, or embarrassed, remind us that You don't need our perfection—You just want our surrendered "yes."
Use our survival, our “notes”, and our healing to bring light to someone else's darkness.
Amen.
