Encounters With Polar Bears, Macaws, and Other Writing Adventures

By Lynn Hare

I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land.

Ezekiel 36:24, ESV

I threw off the cold rainfall of Portland, Oregon last fall on a plane that touched down on a tarmac lined with palm trees in ninety-two degree Anaheim summer. At the hotel, the pool’s chlorine-laden mist beckoned with tendrils of playful wonder. A boy wearing a coontail hat dashed through the lobby, fists filled with Disneyabilia and Adventureloot.

For years, you and I have traveled many lands, praying for a regenerative spirit over truth-laden stories. Daily we accept the challenge for adventure from the Holy Spirit and transform Christendom—one chapter, one page, one word at a time.

Our passionate words of strength renew readers’ hope. Every time our keyboard hums, we offer a fresh encounter with a Jesus the world has never known. Through our diverse experiences, we explore ways to open hearts and minds to uncharted expanses of revelatory freedom. And as God crafts and shapes our voices, He releases creative ways for others to renew relationship with Him.

Our Pilot has dropped us (sometimes with parachutes and other times without) into the most unlikely terrain. This tribe of writers has braved the North Pole of frosty polar bear attacks in ice storms of rejection. We’ve conquered the parched trek of barren Sahara plains as sand filled our shoes when words would not come. We’ve cupped palms to our mouths and hurled questions at God across raging ravines and His Word has relentlessly echoed back.

We rush forward, drawn to the call of the vibrant-banded macaw in the heart of the Amazon rainforest of lush growth. Then we linger in the virtual aisles of Amazon.com, discovering volumes to devour, one plantain after another. Forerunners of grace, we become atmosphere changers, no matter what surprises the latitudes and longitudes of the future hold.

I pray that you and I forgive each other loudly and often. Let’s joyfully forgive and laugh at our own mistakes—and revel in them. May our readers catch and multiply His grace as it renews hearts, souls, and homes.

And as we peer through the binoculars from this vista, let’s ask, “Holy Spirit, where to next?”