God is also your Loving Father

I was working at a law firm in Austin the first time I realized that many people, of many faiths, do not think of God as a loving being.  I was talking about my faith with a friend and she marveled when I told her that I consider Jesus to be my older (and perfect) brother, who loves me, and that I consider God to be my loving and caring Heavenly Father.  She commented that it was an interesting way to look at things, and that it must be comforting to believe that Heavenly Fathers loves you and will take care of you.

Sometimes I forget.

I've been struggling for the past ten years or so with something that I think is a good and appropriate goal.  It was about ten years ago that I began writing in earnest.  I finally finished my first novel about eight years ago.

It stunk.

No, I mean, it was really, terribly, horribly awful.

I revised it about fifteen times.  Seriously.  It got longer.  It improved.  It was still really, truly bad.  I wrote another (very bad) book.  I spent untold hours trying to find an agent to pitch these books to editors so they could be published.  I daydreamed that I would be an author, not just a writer.

I received hundreds and hundreds of form rejections.  I wanted to give up.  But finally, a small press showed an interest.  They asked me to read a book on self-editing and give my first novel a little spiff up.  I did that.  They still passed.  They told me to send them anything else I came up with in the future.

Write another book?  After I'd already done two?  I thought they must be kidding, but I did it anyway.  This time, I did some research, and read a few books on how to write a novel.  This third book was better.  Much better.

It was still pretty bad.  I went to a conference with it.  I found a lot of agents who wanted to read it.  They ultimately all passed.  I wrote yet another book.  (Book four, in case you're keeping track.)  I wrote half of book five.  I kept revising book three, the mediocre one.  It improved.  I kept trying to get an agent.

Finally, in January of last year, I landed an agent.  I was over the  moon.  My time had finally come.  I could almost feel the many copies of my book I would buy once it was in print.  I could sense that success was just around the corner!! I worked with my agent to do two more major overhauls of mediocre book three.  I knew that with this book, I would break out.  She submitted it to a great list of up and coming editors.

No one wanted it.

The saddest part?  After that book flopped, I sent my agent book four, and a newly revised book six.  (Book five is still only half written...)  My agent didn't like books four or six very well.  I sunk into a book-writing depression.  I basically took six months to mope.  My book hadn't sold, and my agent wasn't excited about my other projects.  After spending countless hours, and writing not one, not two, not three or four, or even four and a half, but FIVE full books... I still had absolutely ZERO to show for it.  Forget about how I felt every time a friend asked why I wasn't published yet.  I wanted to yell at them: because I'm a HUGE LOSER, duh!

I was in the process of moving out here to League City when I received a very strong prompting.  God offered me a deal.  The Holy Ghost whispered to my heart that I had been working on books for myself, but that God needed me to start a blog and share my ability to write (limited though it obviously is) to bear my testimony.  He promised me that if I would do this, I would find success in my other writing endeavors.

I did it.  I started this blog last year, because I had faith that He would follow through on his promise. Of course, God's timeframe is not our timeframe, but I had faith it would happen.

I took the time to revise books four and six.  I reworked them over, and over, and over.  I have probably done more than a dozen rounds of revisions on each book.  I hired an editor to help.  I have made every single change I could think of (or my agent and editor could think of).

Those two books both went on submission to editors this spring.  I was so optimistic.  Surely this was my moment, the time when I would get something published.  I told friends and family that they were on submission and to pray for me and/or cross their fingers.  I got busy early this summer and wrote book seven.  My hopes and faith were high.

Then I found out that five out of six editors considering book four had passed, all for the same reason (not relevant.)  My agent and I talked and I was tasked to go back and revise it.  Again.  I have done that, but somewhere in the middle of those revisions, I got pretty low.  I was crying, I was whining, and I was generally feeling pretty sorry for myself.  Whitney (my husband) tried to cheer me up, and he offered me a Priesthood blessing.

I turned him down flat.

I told him I have had faith for ten years, and look where it's gotten me.  I had no faith left.  I said that I wasn't sure if faith could really help me, because after ten years of faith and a lot of hard work, I was still at square one.  I meant every single word.  I was having a crisis of faith (like a little baby) over not getting exactly what I wanted on my timeframe.  I was angry and depressed at the same time.  I alternated between feeling like a failure, and feeling upset that I had worked so hard and God hadn't fulfilled His end of our bargain.

The very next night, I sat down to read scriptures with my son, Eli, and my daughter Dora.  Of course, we read Moroni chapter seven.  I was merrily reading along when I reached verse 26.  "And as surely as Christ liveth he spake these words unto our fathers, saying: Whatsoever thing ye shall ask the Father in my name, which is good, in faith believing that ye shall receive, behold it shall be done unto you."  I know James has a similar verse in the New Testament.

That verse hit me like a ton of bricks.  If I'm asking for something good, and I have faith, I will receive it.  I believe my goal is a good one.  That means either my faith is lacking (clearly!) or it's not time yet.  Last night, I received an answer to a prayer I never sent up to heaven.  I felt as though a loving Heavenly Father reached his hand down to me and patted me on my unbelieving and unworthy little head.  He knows I'm impatient.  He knows I'm not perfect, but He's willing to work with me anyway.

I do not know what timeframe God is on with my writing, and I don't know what He will ask of me yet, but I will just keep plodding along, doing the best that I can and trying to improve my faith, and I do believe that God will help me to reach my goal of one day being published!  I have renewed faith that He has a plan for me.  I promise you that whatever your struggle today, tomorrow or next week, God loves you too.  He is up in heaven, just hoping you will call.  Kneel down today and do it.  He will reassure you through the power of the Holy Ghost that He loves you, and that with a little faith, and with His help, all things are possible.