Contemplating the yes, no, and not yets…

Instant, yes and comfort showers our daily lives.

Fast food. Flip of a switch. Push of a button.

And voila! Hunger dismissed. Room’s alight. TV blares.

It appears as if we humans thrive on easy and convenient.  We are so spoiled that waiting and not yet are foreign words. Though instant might make life easier, some of them aren’t necessarily better. We gobble up unhealthy food. Throw tantrums when something doesn’t happen instantly. Baking a cake from scratch? Oh the horror!  Why cook a meal on a stove if shoving it in the microwave is so much quicker? In a world flocked with instant and yeses, what about patience? Where does God’s instruction for us to be patient come in?

Have you ever approached the Lord for something, and out of His abundant love, He favored you with it? Yup. It's happened to me as well. There had been events where He said yes, even before I needed to inquire. I will be straightforward, those are the best times. But, God has also said no to me. I'm not very enamored with a no, particularly not when it's a no to something I truly want. But, in the end, I know it's for my own good. The same way I'll need to say no one day to my son when he wants dessert, yet declines to have veggies, or wants to avoid his shower in the wake of playing outside. It might not be comfortable to hear a no, but rather it is fundamental.

Sadly, I battle with the not yets. I can deal with a yes and a no. Since the starting and the end is clear for both. Yes you can. Yes, pull out all the stops. No you can't. No, don't. But, the not yet? What do you do with that? What about a time span, Lord? It would be ideal if You'd be somewhat more specific? Not yet? Whenever then? In a day? A year? More painfully, what do I do meanwhile?

Of course everyone experiences a not yet or perhaps several. A dear friend of mine has been in the not yet for a husband for a long time, another one for a baby. My own life's peppered with the not yets.  I try to hide my not yets, tuck them away because they are oh-so-tender. But what if I’m handling my not yets wrong? What if those not yets need room to breathe? What if I need to stop acting as if I’ve been struck with a batch of the incurable-unnamable-deadly-disease called not yet’? I suspect many of my other friends are in the same boat as me, hiding their not yets from the world. Hoping no one would notice or that it would go away.

My longest stretch of not yet is with my writing journey. And it’s discouraging when I look around me and my fellow writers aren’t in the not yets with their writing. Disheartened I try to speed up the process. I try another route or method, and even attempt to negotiate with the Lord. Obviously, none of those work. Recently, I started meditating on my not yet – I can’t help to wonder if I shouldn’t change my vantage point. God’s delay might just be a delay and not denial. Just because I haven’t snatched up a publishing contract, haven’t had a ‘this is perfect’, doesn’t mean God’s not going to answer me, or that He’s ignoring or forgotten about me.  After all, God gave me the desire to write. He’s the giver of dreams, talents and gifts.

Learning to plow through the not yet is part of maturing in Christ.  It’s not necessarily easy, but it’s possible. Sarah’s not yet lasted twenty-five years. The Israelites wandered the desert for forty years. If you’re struggling with discouragement because your not yet feels like forever, remember God might be teaching you patience. A quality that I think is declining in our fast paced lives. He can transform your discouragement into patience, you need only ask. So take heart, wander your not yet. God is perfecting the good work He started in you.

"Be strong and courageous! Do not be afraid or discouraged.

For the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.” -Joshua 1:9

Part Two of Four Interviews

This world is a remarkable place. We four writers met through ACFW, which is to say we only know each other electronically. Though our commonalities (the Lord and our passion for writing) brought us together, we are distinct. We live all over the world. Our paths to and through this writing life vary. You're invited to get to know us better as we get to know each other better through a series of four interviews. You can read the first here.

This week Jebraun Clifford is interviewing Robin Scobee.

What inspired your current project?

The group we now call Pilgrims always seemed cartoonish to me. Big black hats with yellow buckles above the round brim. White coifs, stiff collars, Puritan sternness. Only Squanto, with his fish and corn and generosity brought a warmth, a humanness, to this cardboard group of people.

That is, until I read a nonfiction book called The Light and the Glory by Peter Marshall and David Manuel, lent to me by a friend at church. I learned more American history in two days of reading that book than in years of public school and undergrad education.

I learned that these stalwart people were exiled first to Holland before they traveled on the Mayflower. I learned about one of their leaders, William Bradford, whose words are preserved in letters and journals. I read a portion of his letter in which he gave his reasons for leaving Holland in 1620. The hardness of the life they had chosen was so extreme almost none were coming from England to join them. Their labor was debilitating, especially for the aged, who were being so worn down, he feared they might not be able to physically remove when the time came. But most alarming (to me) is what this lifestyle was doing to their children. In Bradford's words, "many were being drawn away by the lures of the world around them." (p. 109)

I read that sentence over and over. How odd, I thought. How...human. That's my struggle as a parent.

What if...  Those wonderful words that are the foundation of all stories danced in my imagination.

What if...a young woman...raised by faithful parents (who were stern to a fault) found herself in Holland, but...but she didn't want to be there? What if she rebelled? What if she found love outside the fold of her faithful community? What would they do? How would she get free from them? What would become of her? Would she miss out on that wonderful destiny of being a Pilgrim?

And a story was born.

I understand your series is about sisters who came to American on the Mayflower. It must be challenging to write about a real event. What kind of research have you done for your novels? And are your characters built on any real person?

Research is difficult. Many traditional reference materials have been written with an anti-Christian bias, and I don't feel they accurately portray who these people were. I seek out materials that quote the journals and letters written by actual Mayflower passengers. There is a surprising archive of primary source writings; much of it accessible for free on the web.


The Smithsonian offers an excellent source of trustworthy information.
This website for the Pilgrim museum in Leiden is my absolute favorite. It is a dream of mine to visit Leiden and meet Dr. Bangs to hear him tell this history he knows so well.


I also like to study works of art painted during that time period. Jan Steen, who was born in 1626 in Leiden, and educated in Leiden University (as well as one of the fictional characters in my novel!) offers a fascinating picture of every day Dutch life. We can see the way people dressed, what they ate, what their musical instruments looked like, how their homes were decorated, what animals they kept as pets. He shows us people praying, sleeping, laughing, "merrymaking," even little boys getting their hands smacked by their schoolmaster. What a treasure! I use so many details from his paintings in the pages of my writing.

"Peasant family at Meal-Time (Grace Before Meat)" 1665

My main characters are not based on real people. I could have given them names of actual Mayflower passengers, but I chose not to out of deference to the estimated 20 million people who claim to be descended from them. My characters are complex, rife with flaws as well as strengths, and it seemed rude to ascribe imaginary flaws to ancestors of living people.

Real people do occasionally make appearances in the story (Bradford, for instance), and I generally try to make them seem flattering based on what I know of their actual character.

Are you a pantser or a plotter?

Definitely a pantser! I have paid for this in whole chapters having to be deleted during revisions, but I can't seem to do it any other way. My characters grow and change and surprise me during the writing, so I let them. Perhaps as I continue to learn about writing, and become more skillful, I may evolve into more of a plotter.

Describe your ideal writing environment (music you listen to, snacks to nibble on, at home? in a cafe? morning? evening? midnight, lol?)

Ideally, I like to have my mini-HP netbook in my lap, sitting in my cushy recliner, feet out, coffee on the bookshelf next to me, blinds raised so I can stare at the goings on outside, as I often do while I write. I can't have food near me. I munch instead of write.

When life is normal, I limit my writing to the quiet hours while my husband is at work and the kids are at school. My husband is in the Army, so he is away from home sometimes for weeks or months at a time. Although my life is better when he's home, I get a lot more writing accomplished when he's away because I can write morning, noon, or night. Or all three. Whatever. My muse is not picky. I have trained my mind to prepare for those quiet hours, whenever they happen to come.

Music is tricky. Sometimes it helps me know a character better. Sometimes it distracts. If I listen to anything, I pick an artist I like and listen to their playlist on Youtube, or their channel on Slacker Radio.

Who's an author who has influenced you?

I have to say Laura Ingalls Wilder. My mom read the "Little House" books to my sister and me when we were young, and I've read them to my daughters. I didn't realize until I was an adult that she lived in a small town not far from where I grew up. I had an opportunity to visit her home last summer when we went back to Missouri for a visit to my family.


I saw her writing desk, Jebraun. A little unassuming thing, probably built by Almanzo, with a tablet of paper and a pencil positioned on it, as if she had been just been there.


She was just a woman, like me, a former teacher, a Midwestern wife and mother, a nobody, who thought it would be a good idea to beginning writing things down. That makes me think maybe I'm not crazy to sit in my cushy chair, with my laptop open in my lap, staring out the window, imagining stories.

You write historical fiction, what's your favourite genre to read? 

I do love historical fiction probably more than any other. I grew up on it. My sister and I devoured historical romance during our teen years. I also tend to seek out literary fiction because I appreciate complexity and brilliance. I learn the most about writing from it.

Favourite scripture and why?

Ecclesiastes 7:13-14 "Accept the way God does things, for who can straighten what he has made crooked? Enjoy prosperity while you can, but when hard times strike, realize that both come from God. Remember that nothing is certain in this life."  I latched onto this verse during a difficult time for our family. My husband had lost his job 10 days before I gave birth to our third baby. A month later he wrecked his car on the way to a job interview. A month later my middle child was hospitalized with pneumonia. It seemed like everything was crooked, and I was weary from trying and failing to straighten things out. I couldn't make sense of the chaos. I found this verse, wrote it on a little white domino, and carried it around with me until that difficult season was past us. It did end, and God showed himself to us in remarkable ways. I still have the domino (it's faded now) displayed on a shelf near my writing chair.

Writing is Enough

By Robin


Some Mommas are called to work. Some Mommas are called to stay home.

I'm the latter. I gave up a teaching career to be a stay-at-home-mom. There is no scriptural command for this. It wasn't a black and white decision. It was obedience to a conviction deep in my conscience. Some call it a gut feeling. I believe it was the prompting of the Holy Spirit, guiding me in the absence of a black and white word on the page.

Obedience to that conviction has freed me to be obedient to another: the call to write. Maybe it's presumptuous to call it a "call." It began as an interest, a hobby, a passion. Now I can't not do it. I'm restless when I've been too long away from the screen or the page.

It's not a job. There's no editor, no deadline, and definitely no pay. It's just something I do. I've been thankful for the task, the way it's challenged me, grown me, and forced me to delve into the things of God.

A strange thing happened recently. After 10 years of having littles in the house, my youngest, my baby, went off to kindergarten. Suddenly I had whole, uninterrupted days to work on my craft. It should have been a writer's dream, but it didn't take long for insecurity and doubt to break through the loam of my confidence like obtrusive, tough-to-kill weeds.

Americans especially, but humans in general, are, I think, hardwired to produce. To do something useful with their time in this fast-paced, high-payoff society. Writing as a hobby with no foreseeable contribution to the family began to feel like it wasn't enough.

Our family's financial path has not been a smooth one. Today the paychecks come on time, and the pantry is always full. We have enough, and we are thankful every day for that. But over the years there have been job losses, months of unemployment, under-employment, and periods of uncertainty. The savings account is not where it should be.

Some days the compulsion to leave my home, my nest, my refuge, to work at a paying job is stronger than my conviction to stay home and write.

Just seeing that sentence makes my heart beat a little faster. Maybe I was mistaken all those years ago. Maybe it was only my gut, which is prone to be wrong, and not the Holy Spirit. Lots of women work. Work is good. Work is safe. Work is necessary. Would it really be so bad if I put down the pen and left my writing desk in pursuit of a much needed paycheck?

I've been bringing these thoughts to God for weeks. I've waited, avoided writing, avoided thoughts of a future without writing, just waited. Patient. Wondering. I've turned to my steady old friend, my bible studies, which keep me thinking on the things of God when I would rather be thinking on the things of Robin.

This morning my study took me to the first chapter of Daniel, in which Daniel and his friends have been recruited to serve the Babylonian king but refuse to eat the king's food or drink his wine. My commentary says the reason for the abstention isn't stated. God's people frequently eat meat and drink wine. It doesn't appear that they permanently abstain, so it's reasonable to conclude that the food is not bad or unclean. Many ate of it. It wasn't necessarily a sin to consume it.

All we know is that Daniel felt a deep conviction not to eat it. He wanted less. He would subsist on vegetables and water. For him to eat the king's richer fare would have been a sin.

You know how the story ends, don't you? After a time of testing, all could see that God had met Daniel's physiological needs. Not only was the diet of vegetables and water enough, but he was better off, fatter and healthier than the other young men.

Can't I say the same?

I have found so much solace, peace, and purpose in my time at home, mothering, keeping a home, and yes, writing to my heart's content. God has met my family's needs all this time, preserving, delicately at times, our one-income arrangement.

It has been enough.

It would be a sin for me to say to God, "These vegetables and water are not enough. I want Babylon's meat and wine. I want the paycheck. The fat retirement account. Security. Stability. Predictability."

These things aren't bad. It is possible for others to serve and honor God in the midst of pursuing them. It is not a sin.

But they have not been called to subsist on vegetables and water. They have not been shown, over and over, that it is enough. I have.

My friends, fellow aspiring writers, who labor with me at a thing which seems at times to be fruitless, hold fast. Remember why you started down this path. Be patient. See if God doesn't prove His sufficiency. See if you are not "better in appearance and fatter in flesh than all the youths who ate the king's food." Daniel 1:15

I'm not talking about being fatter in the flesh of your savings accounts. I'm talking about your appearance, having "put on," as Paul says in Colossians 3:12, "compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience."

Listen to those promptings, friend. Be obedient to them. Don't look at the world around you and begin to question what you were once so sure of. Where God has brought you, what He has provided, though at times it feels meager in comparison, it is enough. Trust Him with that, and with your future. And write on. For goodness' sake, write on.

Who are we? Part one of four interviews.

Since this is a brand new blog, we thought it would be fun to interview one another so you can get to know us better. And since we live all over the world and haven’t met one another except over social media and through ACFW, it gave us an opportunity to find out a little more about each other too. Deanna decided to kick things off by asking Jebraun a few questions about writing and life.

What inspired you to start writing? 

The question should be what inspired me to start writing again. After taking an almost twenty year break to raise a family, I thought it was time to rekindle an old passion and start writing again. I enjoyed writing short stories at college but always wanted to latch onto a great idea for a novel. I'm excited about the one I have brewing now. Storytelling is so important. Stories are such an amazing way to entertain, educate, and encourage. And we need that! There's a lot of negativity in this world, and sometimes the best vehicle to counter that is a story full of hope and promise. 

You write Speculative YA, what made you pick that particular genre?

I want to write about a world where anything can happen! I don't want to be limited by history, research, or even physics. And there are so many possibilities with speculative fiction. Steve Laube from Enclave Publishing describes the speculative genre, in particular science fiction and fantasy, as the one genre of all genres in fiction that reflect the creativity of God. Isn't that an amazing concept? And I want to write to a YA audience because that’s the age when we start asking those questions about why we're here, and what it all means. Madeleine L'Engle, probably my favorite author of all time, once said that some of those questions don't have finite answers, but the questions themselves are important. I hope to ask some important questions as well as provide a few possible answers to my readers.

Tell us the name of your WIP, and what is the message behind it?

Well, I entered a contest recently and can't post my title on social media. But the message is simple. My WIP is about family, loyalty, and finding our true identity. And it tackles the difficulties we can have when one or more of these ideas clash with one another. It’s also about staying true to who God created us to be in the face of adversity.

Who is your favorite character in your story and why?

My favorite character is my heroine, Tyrzah. I like her because she wants to do the honorable thing whatever the cost may be. She sees the injustices around her and wants to do something about it. And if someone has to take the hit for making the right decision, she'll accept that responsibility. Plus she has some mean skills with a sword!

Every story has to have a villain/a bad guy/an antagonist. Describe your villain.

Like in our world, the bad guys are behind the scenes. There are people in my story who look like the villains, but they're only pawns in the hands of the evil spiritual powers from my world. My heroine has to learn to wrestle against these powers to set things right.

Now just for fun, where is your favorite place to go on a date with your husband?

We love going to Leonardo's - this seriously amazing Italian restaurant - for our date nights. We take our time, eat, talk, and soak in the atmosphere. I love it! It's vital for couples to take time to recharge their relationship and have fun together. That's definitely one of the secrets for our 22 year marriage.

Check back next time when Jebraun poses a few questions to Robin.

As always, we welcome your comments. And if there's anything else you'd like to find out about Jebraun, ask away!

The Truth About Creating Order From the Chaos

by Jebraun

I’m not very tidy. That’s not one of my talents. I can bake a mean chocolate brownie, teach a Bible study, run a 10k, and knit a pair of fantastically cabled socks. But I am not tidy. Like, at all. I’ve got piles of stuff everywhere. Books. Paperwork. (Mostly) clean laundry. Various finished and unfinished craft projects. And don’t even look in my pantry.

I don't mind the chaos.

And yet one place I love to make order from chaos is in my writing. I love taking a convoluted idea that’s roaming around in my very messy brain and beating it into submission until it sparkles and shines like a well-polished silver pitcher.

All artists enjoy this process. Writers, musicians, painters, dancers. There’s something satisfying about developing something out of nothing. Why is that?

God's plan for order in the chaos

I believe it goes back to God’s instructions to Adam and Eve in the Garden. “Fill the earth, and subdue it,” He told them in Genesis 1:28.

The Amplified Version says it so beautifully. “And God blessed them [granting them certain authority] and said to them, “Be fruitful, multiply, and fill the earth, and subjugate it [putting it under your power];”

So many times I’ve heard this passage refer only to having children, but it goes far beyond that aspect. Fruitfulness also refers to our creativity. When we use our gifts and talents,we're working alongside God to make His will done on earth as it is in heaven.

We need to be creative

When we create – when we write a song, story, or poem; paint a delicate watercolor or spray paint a mural; dance a ballet or dubstep – we’re echoing the vast imagination of an unlimited God. We're showing our fruitfulness. We're multiplying the truth. We're flexing the power He gave us. 

So get out there and do it! Write, paint, dance. Learn how to play a musical instrument. Sew a quilt. Build an end table. Decoupage to your heart's content. 

And enjoy the process. Know you’re actually putting into motion His plans. Filling our world with His glory and goodness. Taking chaos and turning it into order. Even if the pantry stays a wee bit messy.

Be blessed,

What’s your favorite way to make order from chaos? Let us know in the comment section!