Meeting the Author

Guest lecturer: Kristin Tubb it said in the syllabus. Assigned reading for the week: Selling Hope by Kristin Tubb. Ok, I thought. That'd be interesting. The author's coming to speak to us. Did I hear an oh wow coming from someone? Two weeks ago, Julie Donelson (Jules), author of Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast, came to guest lecture too. You're so lucky! Did someone say?

To be honest, I was not as excited as it might be imagined I'd be. For one thing, I was not familiar with Kristin Tubb's books. I needed to know what I thought of her books first, so that I could carefully measure just the right amount of excitement to feel about her visit. What if I didn't like her books? Then having her come would really be just so-so. As for Jule's visit, well, she is a blogger, not an author. At that point, I was still weighing in my mind if blogging was a respectable genre, or not. I'm still thinking that no, there is a big difference between writing a blog, and writing a book. I must be honest - there is something weighty about having written a great book that makes me go oh wow.

And I'm sure that's not an uncommon sentiment. Oh wows were audibly heard today when Kristin shared with us today that she had the chance to interview Madeleine L'Engle over the phone as a sixth grader. I mean, it was the Madeleine L'Engle she was talking about.

In no way do I mean that we should attribute differentiated amounts of respect to people because of their achievements. But I do think I understand what makes us go oh wow when an author of a great book comes to visit. Books are little worlds in their own entities; to escape into a book is a phrase often heard used. For an hour or two, we are conscious not to the reality in which we are a part of, but the created reality of the book. For a great book, this is truer than true. And so, the respect, the wow factor, is given because of the world imagined, created.

Or is it? Because authors don't create the actual worlds, they only imagine them to be, and write them into a book. But we would, for a time, believe in the reality of their worlds, we would be awed by them. We would go so far as to feel oh wow.

And yet. What about this world we live in? What about the epic proportion of its story? What about the characters upon characters, each complex beyond description? What about the backdrop for each anticipated scene, each on the perfect setting? Why do we not have more respect for its creator? Is it because it is beyond what we can comprehend? Is it because we cannot grasp it with our hands, and dictate its workings the way we can with a book? Is it a great story only when all goes according to our will? Only when we can somehow wrap our minds around it?

Dear Heavenly Father, I want to approach you with oh wow all the time. This story you have written, the pages of which I am walking in, is beyond my grasp. I fail to read between the lines, I do not realize my motivations or those of others. I fail to have faith that you know the plans you have for me. I worry that I'd ruin those plans. Let the limitedness of my own mind never keep my spirit from breathing oh wow at a limitless God.