Almost exactly one year after meeting Terry Glaspey of Harvest House, they have offered me a contract to publish “Radically Normal”!
Here is what he said about the book, “I’m very enthusiastic about your book. One of the best new projects I’ve pitched in a while. Great message and very strong writing.”
I can’t get over the fact that I am a first time author and my book was accepted with nary a rejection letter. Wow. God is so good.
Now the real work begins!
Josh
My editor, Terry Glaspey, informed me that their meeting got postponed to next Thursday, which is par for course in this industry!
He also encouraged me by saying, “Relax, I am guardedly optimistic. You’ve got a great idea and your execution is terrific. I’m praying too!”
Not a bad thing to hear!
My editor pitched my idea to the publication committee and handed out my proposal. They should make a final decision late next week.
Please keep praying!
Hey all,
Terry Glaspey, the Acquisitions Editor at Harvest House, is planning to present my proposal the publication committee this week, so I should know very soon if Harvest will offer to publish “Radically Normal.” He reiterated that if they pass, he will help me find another publisher.
Please pray that God guide them and his will be done!
Josh
This is the second part in a series of posts about the night I spent at Mount Vernon’s homeless shelter, Friendship House, where I serve as a board member. Click here to read the previous post.
After meeting with the House Manager, Kristie, I was handed me off to one of the House Assistants. Rich* gave me an orientation and walked me through the “contract.” House Assistants are residents who have been at Friendship House for a while and help keep things running smoothly. They are not “in charge,” but have increased responsibilities around the house.
There were two of us getting an orientation that day. The other guy was a young man named Tim.* Rich didn’t know that I was there “undercover” to learn more about how Friendship House operates, so as he talked through the rules like “no drugs” and “no pornography,” I just nodded and initialed the contract.
Another rule was that you have to take a daily shower and wear clean clothes. Check. But Tim interrupted, “What if I don’t have any other clothes?” All he had was what he was wearing.
Without batting an eye, Rich said, “Don’t worry, we’ll find some for you in the clothing bank.” Rich’s genuine concern for Tim really impressed me. In fact, the biggest surprise that day was seeing the kindness demonstrated by the residents for each other.
C. S. Lewis once described the church as a field hospital where the less wounded care for the more wounded. If you think like that, there is no room for self-righteousness or arrogance. Like I said last week, we are all broken people in desperate need of God’s grace and love.
As I watched how these men interacted, I realized that I was watching Lewis’ words played out. These guys didn’t have any pretence about having their act together or being better than everyone else. I guess that’s kind of hard to do when you are at a homeless shelter.
I don’t want to give a rose-colored perspective on these guys; they wouldn’t be here if they had their life together perfectly. But their compassion and camaraderie weren’t just encouraging, they were infectious.
I wonder – if all of us “healthy” people spent less time acting like we had our act together, would we have more energy to spend on being instruments of Jesus’ grace? Would we be able to receive the grace that we so desperately need? Just a thought.
Throughout the rest of afternoon, I spent time getting to know the guys and hearing their stories. More on that next week.
I recently spent a night at the Friendship House, Mount Vernon’s homeless shelter. No, my wife hadn’t me kicked out of the house. I am on the board of directors and wanted to see how Friendship House works from the inside.
In the days leading up to my stay, I began to get nervous. Not about my safety (our shelter is well run and very safe), I was simply scared of the unknown. What would it be like to spend the night with a bunch of homeless guys? I also had to fight my pride. What would people think when they saw me walk up to the Friendship House? Would they think I was one of “them”?
It was too late to back out, so when the day arrived, I packed a backpack with the bare essentials, kissed my wife and daughters good-bye, swallowed my pride and fears, and walked up to the front door.
I had decided to arrive “Undercover Boss” style; while the house manager, Kristie, was in on the secret, the residents assumed I was just some guy who needed a place for the night. I knocked on the door and Kristie invited me into her office and walked me through the process everyone goes through.
“Why do you need to stay at the Friendship House?” Kristie asked with a wink. She said that single question reveals quite a bit about the visitors.
“Let’s say I need a place for the night because I am heading to Seattle in the morning,” I said. “Is that a common reason?”
“Very,” she said. “Because we are on the I-5 corridor, many people just stop here on the way to somewhere else.”
I asked Kristie to describe the average Friendship House resident. She responded by telling me stories of previous and current residents. I used to have a mental picture of the average homeless person, maybe you do to. Whatever that image is, get rid of it. There is no “typical” homeless person.
The Friendship House has been a home to all kinds of people. Some are hard working people who have fallen on difficult times. Some of them are lazy and are trying to milk the system. Many are victims of their own sin; many are the victims of other people’s sin. Some are mentally or physically disabled. Some are very capable people – one of our residents had been a lawyer until his addictions destroyed his life. Another one left Friendship House to become a successful businesswoman and now serves on our board of directors. On the other hand, many people leave Friendship House and sink back into old patterns of self-destructive sin.
All of our residences have one thing in common: They are deeply broken people that Jesus desperately loves. In other words, they are just like you and me.
Sure, our brokenness may be more socially acceptable than that of the local panhandler, but we are all broken and sinful nonetheless. You may not struggle with chemical dependency, but your self-dependency is even more dangerous to your soul. You may not be trying to manipulate the system, but maybe you manipulate family members instead. You may not smell of body odor, but your pride is an even greater odor to God.
Last year, I read an excellent book called “When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting the Poor . . . and Yourself.” It showed how easily we develop an “us” verses “them” mentality – “they” are the needy people and “we” are the nice people who help them. This faulty thinking is doubly destructive: it harms the poor by stealing their dignity as children of God and it harms us by masking our need of him.
Don’t misunderstand me –you may be more socially responsible and emotionally healthy than many of our residents and it would be disingenuous to pretend otherwise. But you (and I) need God’s grace just as desperately as every one of them. Just as importantly, Jesus deeply loves all of us. I’d argue that failure to grasp that truth is at the root of most of our self-destructive behavior.
As I listened to Kristie tell stories of past and current residents, I heard a lot of success stories. I also heard a lot of sad stories – just that morning they had to kick out a well-loved resident because he had started drinking again. I was impressed by Kristie’s ability to maintain her hope and humor day in and day out.
Next, I wanted to hear more about what makes the Friendship House so different than many of the shelters in bigger cities. As she talked, I became more and more proud of what we are doing here, but I’ll save that for my next post.
Has it really been four months since my last update? For shame.
It has not been for lack of news. Terry Glaspey, the Acquisitions Editor at Harvest House (a well known and respected Christian publisher), loved the proposal. He said that he would do everything he could to see HH publish Radically Normal and would even help me “find another publisher if Harvest House is foolish enough to say no!” (direct quote). Folks, this is a big deal.
Based on Terry’s recommendation, I just completed a significant re-write of my sample chapters of Radically Normal, designed to make the book much more story-driven. Basically, I am building the teaching of the book around the story of my time as a bi-vocational pastor working at Starbucks. I have sent this new version to Terry about 20 minutes ago and am waiting to hear what he thinks.
One more thing: Let me know if you would be interested in reading the sample chapters – I would love to get them to you.
Josh
