Candace Paul
- Spotlight
- September 11, 2019
- 3 views
“Kingdom work is the only thing I want to do”, Meet Author Ann Lenaers!
You’re a Christian author, how important is it that your faith be reflected in the work you produce? My faith in Christ is my identity, so kingdom work is the only thing I want to do. God put a call on my life to raise up the children of God into maturity by aiding in the development of the communication skills and emotional intelligence necessary for love and peace to be lived in balanced truth and grace. All work I do aims to bring the Word to life through fostering understanding and calling people to action in faith. Tell us about your book! “Perfect Love: A Hero’s Journey” is a Biblical workbook designed to guide you through the Christian walk using the 17 step hero’s journey discovered by Joseph Campbell. It covers the whole spectrum from accepting Jesus in faith through being a leader for him. Each step is yoked alongside my own raw, personal testimony. I believe we can each become better heroes than the ones we idolize on television when we follow the Spirit to model our lives after the greatest hero – Jesus Christ. Tell us about the process – how long did it take you to write your book from start to finish? This book poured out of me in approximately six weeks. I was fully confident in the message! However, as I received feedback I took my time making revisions to polish it up. My message has never changed, but I spent a good bit of time refining the delivery to be certain complex concepts are able to be clearly understood by any reader. Whenever I speak to writers there’s usually a fascinating back story that led to a career in writing, what’s yours? I’ve always been a creative person who loves to dig deeper. My passion for writing first surfaced when I lost a dear friend to suicide. I wrote a book about a trip we took to California as part of my coping process. Not long after that I cried out to God looking for answers and healing having experienced the loss of 6 other people over the course of that year. I had a supernatural encounter with Jesus and have been passionate about faith ever since. Everything I learned from the Lord, my study, and my struggles in life all needed to come out, and I felt God gave me the words and the drive to use it all to help people. Writing became a natural way for me to tie it all up with a bow. How has your family supported your desire to write? My family has been great about allowing me the quiet time to myself so I can get writing done. They encourage me often! What were some unexpected challenges you encountered on the path toward getting published? The day I finished the last word of my first draft I was instantly hit with a panic to revise everything, worrying I left things out. I backed up the draft then spent the next month messing it all up. I was almost done and out of nowhere my computer…