~ The Borrowed Book ~: WWII

Thursday, September 3, 2015

Whose Plans Are Better?

by Sarah Sundin

Sarah Sundin and daughter, Anna

I had excellent plans for my children. I read to them from birth. We watched educational TV and videos. Their computer time was spent on clever learning games rather than shooting aliens. Our vacation time often included museums and historical sites. I volunteered in their classrooms and was actively involved in their schooling while refusing to be a “helicopter mom.”

Perfect recipe to send our children to excellent universities! We did everything right!

Except our daughter didn’t follow the path we laid out. She didn’t earn the grades she was capable of. We argued far too often, and one day she snapped at me: “At least I’m not pregnant, on drugs, or in jail!” True, and we were thankful. But why couldn’t she see we knew what was best for her?

She ended up at our local community college, determined to transfer. I was nervous. I’d heard too many stories about students unable to get their required courses, languishing, and dropping out. I wanted so much more for my girl!

But then God slapped me. And aren’t you glad so you don’t have to slap me yourself?

God always slaps in love. This time He slapped me twice within an hour, once from each side.

First, I was talking daughter problems with a friend. Her daughter had earned the grades and degrees…but wasn’t walking with the Lord. My friend’s anguish was palpable and put my concern in stunning perspective. My daughter was walking with the Lord, and isn’t that what matters most for eternity?

Yes, it is.

Chagrined, I began conversing with another lady about the same issue. With the most serene smile, she asked, “Sarah, whose plans are better? Yours, or the Lord’s?”

Oh.

I knew the answer to that question. God’s plans are always best. I’d already learned that lesson in my own life. But in my children’s lives? That’s different.

Oh no, it isn’t.

The Lord began a serious work in my heart that day. A work of trusting in His goodness and His care and His love, even when things don’t happen as we want them to. A work of humility, sloughing off my nasty pride and the bitter fruit it had produced. A work of relinquishing control I never had in the first place. A work of loving my daughter as God does and trusting her to make wise decisions. A work of resting in His sovereignty.

He showed me the truth He spoke in Isaiah 55:9-10: “‘For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,’ declares the Lord. ‘As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.’” In His sweet mercy, the Lord quickly showed me how much better His plans were than mine.

First, my daughter began working for a friend of mine and discovered a love for business, a perfect melding of her numerical sense and her people skills. Now she’s on track to transfer into an excellent business program. If she’d gone away to college, she never would have taken that job, and she would have wasted time—very expensive time—choosing her major. Score one for God!

Second, the extra time at home allowed my daughter and I to repair our relationship. As I relaxed and trusted her, and she gained maturity, we became close. I wouldn’t trade our deep talks for anything in the world. Score two for God!

Third, she found the love of her life. Her first semester she took a class with her big brother’s close friend—a young man who’d adored her since fourth grade, a young man she’d rejected countless times. Working together closely, she saw the depth of his character and found a match for her wit. She tumbled into love, and this July they were married. Game, set, match—to the Lord!

Whose plans were better for my daughter’s life? God’s! Absolutely God’s! And I’m left in awe of His sovereign goodness, His patience, and His mercy.

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Sarah Sundin is the author of seven historical novels, including Through Waters Deep (Revell, August 2015). Her novella “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” in Where Treetops Glisten is a 2015 Carol Award finalist. A mother of three, Sarah lives in California, works on-call as a hospital pharmacist, and teaches Sunday school. Connect with Sarah here:

Website: http://www.sarahsundin.com

Blog: http://www.sarahsundin.com/blog

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/SarahSundinAuthor

Twitter: http://twitter.com/sarahsundin

Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/sarahsundin

Revell, 2015

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Tuesday, September 1, 2015

Get to know a little more about author Sarah Sundin and how she works!

Sarah Sundin

Are you a morning person? A night owl? How do you arrange your schedule to allow the most efficient, productive time for writing?

I am definitely a night owl. Many writing teachers say you must write first thing every morning. No internet. Pure writing. That would be a disaster for me. My brain barely functions before nine o’clock, and creativity doesn’t kick in until noon. So I work with how God made me. In the morning, I take care of internet and social media first. For one thing, I live in California, and my publisher is three hours ahead of me. If they need something from me by the end of the day, I need to work on it immediately. Also, busywork allows my brain to wake up. After lunch, my creativity and energy burst in, and I can write nonstop until dinner—if life allows me. When I get an evening to myself (rare), I can really write! God made each of us unique, and the only “must” is we “must” find what works best for us.

When working on a manuscript, what do you do when you get stuck?

Because I outline my novels, I rarely get stuck in the rough draft. If I do, I review my notes for the chapter, read the previous chapter, and dive in. Most importantly, I give myself permission to write garbage, knowing I can delete it later. Just put something on the page. Ironically, those “garbage” beginnings often end up as my favorites.

Do you ever read your dialog aloud to see how it sounds? Have you ever performed an action you want one of your characters to carry out in order to help you visualize or describe it? Have you ever embarrassed yourself doing this?

Oh, yes! I read each novel out loud while editing. This is a great way to catch unnatural dialogue, awkward sentences, poor flow, boring parts, and repetitions. And I often act out bits, from body language to action. Recently I needed to know if my heroine could get up to standing on one leg with her hands tied behind her back, hop through a door, close it behind herself, and lock it—and fast. So I acted it out. Yes, I could do it! Yes, my family thinks I’m weird.

If you’re a plotter, have you ever tried pantsing it? If you’re a pantser, have you ever given plotting a try? Can you swing both ways, or are you a confirmed devotee of one of these methods?

I am a plotter. I wrote my first novel by the seat of the pants, and it was an overblown mess that required extensive editing and is still unpublishable. When I started attending writers’ conferences, I learned various methods of outlining—and the angels sang! Outlining fits my analytical, methodical personality, and I write faster, cleaner, and better with an outline. So I’m a confirmed plotter. But that’s what works for me. Some pantsers find outlines stifle their creativity, and they need to avoid them. For me, the structure of an outline actually unleashes my creativity.

Do you prefer writing the initial draft, or do you enjoy the revision process more? Do you revise as you write, or do you first produce a big mess that you later have to fix? If your first draft is rough, do you usually have to cut out a lot of dead wood, or add flesh to the bare bones?

While I enjoy most of the pre-writing and outlining phase, I adore the rough draft. Since the story is outlined in advance, my rough drafts are pretty clean, and the editing process is fast and smooth. The changes aren’t usually huge content issues, but smaller details—“add this historical fact,” “add in that bit about her sister,” “weave in the sailing theme,” “decrease internal monologue.” I don’t make the revisions during the rough draft phase—I just take notes. Then all the changes get made after the rough draft is complete.

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