{"id":1432,"date":"2017-07-17T15:02:16","date_gmt":"2017-07-17T20:02:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.theauthorschair.com\/shopping\/?post_type=jetpack-testimonial&p=1432"},"modified":"2017-07-17T16:36:49","modified_gmt":"2017-07-17T21:36:49","slug":"deborah-h","status":"publish","type":"jetpack-testimonial","link":"https:\/\/www.theauthorschair.com\/shopping\/testimonial\/deborah-h\/","title":{"rendered":"Deborah H. – You are making a difference"},"content":{"rendered":"
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I know you probably get stuff like this all the time, but I would like to tell you that your books have meant a lot to me since I first started reading them at 15.\u00a0 I didn’t have a very happy teenage span.\u00a0 From early childhood I had been marked as “the church nerd,” and none of the other kids wanted anything to do with me.\u00a0 Eventually, the characters in books became my friends.\u00a0 Every once in a while, I’d peek out from behind the pages and make friends with someone who was new to the church; and after a long run of being used and abused by one such “friend” I finally found someone that I thought would be my best friend forever.\u00a0 I was wrong about that; she suddenly disappeared from my life without warning when I was 15.\u00a0 Before she went, though, the second to last email she ever sent me said simply “Try these books!\u00a0 The first one is Raising Dragons by Bryan Davis.” \u00a0I have to confess, when I first looked at the summary, I didn’t think it looked super great; but I was desperate for an escape.\u00a0 Contrary to my first impression, I was grabbed from the very first page, and an hour later, I was begging my mother to take me to the library again the next day.\u00a0 I put holds on all the rest of the books at the same time; and when I had no other responsibilities, my first go-to was your books.\u00a0 That was June of 2008.<\/p>\n

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Fast forward to September, and we suddenly and jarringly found out that my grandfather had bone cancer and wasn’t expected to live much longer.\u00a0 My brothers, the only people in my family that I felt really paid attention to me, had just returned to college (the same college I am attending now, 15 hours away from home).\u00a0 The stress in the family was high, and as the oldest child still at home, I took the brunt of it.\u00a0 At the same time, my church was in major tumult.\u00a0 I spent more time in tears that fall than I ever had before.\u00a0 If my relationship with the Lord had been what it should have been, maybe I would have been saved a lot of agony.\u00a0 Maybe that’s why your books always made me feel better.\u00a0 When I read them, I watched faith and trust being played out and rewarded–sure, not necessarily in the mundane situations I was facing, but in situations far, far worse than mine. \u00a0Last of the Nephilim<\/i>\u00a0has always been my favorite of the series, perhaps in part because I had just finished reading it when my grandfather passed away.\u00a0 However, one part that really stood out to me at the time was Sapphira’s emotional battle with the dagger.\u00a0 I was going through that same emotional battle at the time.\u00a0 The day I read that chapter, I had had a knife to myself earlier that day.\u00a0 God spoke to me through that scene.\u00a0 I truly believe it was a part of His game plan to save my life from myself.<\/div>\n
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That was when I made my decision that I was done with the shallowness of my faith.\u00a0 I started paying attention to Bible teaching a lot more, and doing a lot more study on my own.\u00a0 I started going to my daddy with Biblical questions, and I found that I wasn’t nearly as unloved as I’d selfishly thought.<\/div>\n
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Your answer to the question about the overall theme of the series really struck a chord with me.\u00a0 Right now, I’m preparing for my senior solo performance studies recital (which basically determines if I get to graduate with my degree or not).\u00a0 I’m performing The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe<\/i>, and when my instructor asked me last semester what theme I wanted to get across, I said without hesitation, “Christ’s sacrificial love.” \u00a0I think your message got through to me. ^_^<\/div>\n
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I know this was very long, and I don’t want to be a bother.\u00a0 But I do want to thank you properly for your books.\u00a0 They really did change my life, which is why ever since I came to college, I have been waiting for an opportunity to somehow perform at least a piece of one of them.\u00a0 Honestly.\u00a0 I know you probably hear that all the time, but please, know that you are making a difference to people who really need it.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I know you probably get stuff like this all the time, but I would like to tell you that your books have meant a lot to me since I first started reading them at 15.\u00a0 I didn’t have a very happy teenage span.\u00a0 From early childhood I had been marked as “the church nerd,” and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"menu_order":0,"template":"","class_list":["post-1432","jetpack-testimonial","type-jetpack-testimonial","status-publish","hentry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theauthorschair.com\/shopping\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/jetpack-testimonial\/1432","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theauthorschair.com\/shopping\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/jetpack-testimonial"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theauthorschair.com\/shopping\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/jetpack-testimonial"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.theauthorschair.com\/shopping\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/jetpack-testimonial\/1432\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1535,"href":"https:\/\/www.theauthorschair.com\/shopping\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/jetpack-testimonial\/1432\/revisions\/1535"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theauthorschair.com\/shopping\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1432"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}