As I look back over the past seven and half years, I find myself is awe and wonder at how God has led me, taught me, disciplined me, and been faithful to me as I have tried to “Listen and Obey”.

I compare the way that I write today to the way that I wrote when God first asked me to “Write a blog” seven years ago. I had no idea what obeying Him by writing that first blog would lead to. One blog became two blogs and two blogs became 1 book and 1 book became 10 books and then 10 books became 100 books.

What seemed impossible in the beginning to me I have now seen is quite possible with God. God taught me to write. God taught me in those early years of listening and being obedient how to listen to Him and then to obey. That same process, the process of listening to His voice and then obeying His instruction, is actually the same process that He taught me to use when I sit down to write the books.

I’ve been posting the chapters of Part 72: Where All Journey Grow as I have written them, posting the first drafts of the chapters daily on this blog as God instructed me to do. Last night as I lay in bed trying to fall asleep and thinking about the book God spoke to me so clearly. He said, “The book is finished.” And just like that I realized that I had, without knowing it, written the last chapter of the book. I saw it so clearly. You see I had been wrestling with what happens next in the story. Once God told me that it was complete I realized why the Holy Spirit wasn’t speaking story lines to me as He had the days before. It was because there wasn’t any more story to this book. It was complete.

I just love how God works.

I want to try to explain the way in which God taught me to write. I’m not sure I can do it, but I’m going to try…

We all understand what it’s like to sit and imagine something, to picture something in our minds. This act of imagining, of creating in our minds, is very familiar to me since I’ve been at artist most of my life. Creating things in my mind is very natural to me. Coming up with artwork or systems for my video games is done by me engaging my imagination and drawing from all my life experiences to create something.

Writing with God is a totally different process. I had to learn that over the years as God took me from place to place and guided me how to write.

I should point out that it took an awfully long time for Him to get this through to me as I’m and incredibly stubborn and willful man.

When God rescued me, He said, “This is finished. Now you are going to listen and obey.” So I began, tried to do my best to do just that, and that story is written in the book series. It was like God was trying to get me to understand that it wasn’t at all about me or anything I possessed. I thought it was. He insisted it wasn’t over and over again. He told me so many times, “Your calling isn’t about you.” I didn’t get it at first. How could one’s calling not be about them?

It was as if God was saying gently to me, “I need you to get out of My way so that I can work through you.”

Well, that simply sounded ridiculous to me. But God was patient with me. He tried this way and then He tried that way. He led me this way and then He took me that way. Around the world I went. Across the country I went. Into Solitude and then out of it. Back and forth. Back and forth. Here and there. I just wasn’t getting the lesson.

How could I possibly get out of God’s way so that He could work through me?

He had me change my name 5 times… with 2 more times on the way. Why? He has been trying to get me to see that it is not about me building a name for myself. But each time I would obey and change my name I went right back to trying to build that new name up for myself. I wanted to been known. I wanted recognition. I wanted glory. Ouch…

I’m still on that journey. I have a very long way to go still. But God is faithful. He is always faithful.

Now I understand a little more about how to get out of God’s way and allow Him to work through me, which is actually Him working with me.

I no longer engage my imagination to create the words for the books. I have learned to empty myself and to allow God’s Holy Spirit to work through me. The process is fascinating and a complete mystery really.

Take the chapters I’ve been posting. God instructed me to write one chapter a day and post it on this blog. I could not write ahead. I would wake in the mornings and pray, giving God all that I was and asking Him to fill my mouth with words as I sat to write. I didn’t worry about what would happen next in the story, I just listened… and God poured out each chapter one after another. While sitting and actually writing the chapters I wasn’t fully present, well listening to God and writing takes you away from being present and puts you into this place of silent abandon. But the key is trusting that He is doing what He said He would do.

The verse that He leads me back to most often is this one:

"But when they hand you over, do not worry about how or what you are to say; for what you are to say will be given you within that [very] hour;" - Matthew 10:19

Do you see it?

What you are to say (or write down) will be given you within that very hour.

This is how God and I write the books together now. I have learned to trust Him through many, many years of Him gently trying to teach me this process.

I’m still learning, still growing, still making mistakes, still falling to selfish ways, but always God picks me back up and sets me back on the path with Him.

He constantly has me go back and read what I wrote in a previous book of the book series, just to show me that He is working in it all for His glory. It is not about me, it is all about Him: His Name and His glory.

God has led me to my own death countless times. Each time He asked me to give everything away, I died. Each time He asked me to change my name, I died. Each time He sent me somewhere new, I died. I look back and understand that each time He asked something of me along the way He was asking me to “Lay down my life and pick up my cross and follow after Him.”

I want to encourage you today to seek God and keep seeking Him. Listen and obey as best you can. If you fall, God is faithful, He will pick you up and set you again on the path He has laid out for you.

A week ago God instructed me to begin editing the chapters of Part 72: Where All Journeys Grow and I realized something. This book shows you how I have always perceived and interacted with the spiritual world since I was a child. The interaction with the Dark One (Satan) come directly from my encounters with demonic forces in my life over the years. The interactions with Jesus come directly from my daily interactions with Him over the years.

I was praying about this, asking God the purpose for a book such as this for others, and He reminded me of books that I had read when I was a kid such as “The Shining Sword” and “Lamper’s Meadow”. Reading those books as a child gave me context for the spiritual things that I was perceiving as I grew up hearing God’s voice and encountering the spiritual world around me.

The purpose of the “Where All Journeys” books of this book series is to give you a taste of what it’s like to have your spiritual eyes and ears open in this world.

I am working to get Part 72: Where All Journeys Grow editing and published. When that’s done I’ll post again to announce its release.