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| The Pastor's Wife Wears Biker Boots by Karla Akins Purchase Link |
When I wrote the first drafts of my manuscript, The Pastor’s Wife Wears Biker Boots, I had no idea that it would find an agent and be released at the same time one of my sons would be arrested for drug charges.
Yes, you heard right. My son, the pastor’s son. Homeschooled. Nurtured and taught the Word of the Lord from conception, is now in prison because he was caught selling $50 worth of Meth to a friend.
It’s funny how God works. When I wrote my book, part of the story included a rebellious preacher’s son who gets in trouble for underage drinking. I never imagined at the time I created that scenario that my own son, in his late 20s, was slipping into drug addiction.
Oh. The heartache.
When I wrote about a man with Alzheimer’s in my book, I had no idea that my mother-in-law would come to live with us because she developed Alzheimer’s at about the same time my son went to prison. My household is not exactly a haven of serenity with Mama, adult twin sons with autism and another adult son on the autism spectrum living there.
I have to wonder—while I was writing this book—was God somehow preparing me for the worst storm I’d weathered yet?
But I keep writing. Writing is the one time I can escape into a blissful other-world. I refuse to let the devil steal from me anymore than he’s already tried to.
I’ve refused to see my son as he was—a drug addict and felon, and I’ve chosen to believe in what he will be on the other side of his incarceration. (You can read more about this experience on my prison ministry web page: http://www.karlaakins.com/prison-ministry.html ).
But it hasn’t been easy.
There are certainly days I want to curl up in a ball and hide from the world, but I know that’s exactly what the devil wants me to do. He hates me, my children, my message. He’ll do anything he can to stop it.
Satan hates you, your children and your message, too.
Don’t let him win.
Write anyway.
Supposedly the following poem by Mother Teresa in its original form is posted on an orphanage wall in Calcutta. (See original here). I’ve paraphrased it below as a poem of encouragement for writers:
When people are unreasonable, illogical and self-centered:
Write anyway.
When you are hurting, in pain, and feel like quitting:
Write anyway.
If you are kind, and people accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives:
Write anyway.
If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies:
Write anyway.
What you spend years writing, may be rejected and never be published.
Write anyway.
If you find serenity and happiness in writing, others may be jealous:
Write anyway.
The good writing you do today, people will often forget tomorrow.
Write anyway.
Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough.
Write anyway.
You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and your God.
It was never between you and them.
Write anyway.
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| Karla Akins |
Karla Akins is a pastor's wife who rides her own motorcycle. She is the mother of four boys and one step-daughter, and grandmother of five. She lives in North Manchester with her husband who is the pastor of Christian Fellowship Church, her twin teenage boys with autism, mother-in-law with Alzheimer's and three rambunctious dogs. Karla and her husband have been in ministry together for 30 years. You can contact Karla for speaking engagements via her website at KarlaAkins.com
