As Your Soul Prospers

As your soul prospers: behind the scenes

I never really intended to write this book, until I had most of it written. That sounds odd, I know. Let me explain.

The project started out as simple curiosity and a desire to allow God to direct every area of life. What does the Bible say about health? And why hasn’t anyone written about Bible-based health from the New Testament? (There are plenty of books out there about Old Testament laws and their implications for physical health, but very, very few that even touched on the New Testament, except for a few books that focused on the spiritual roots of disease.)

So, I started reading in the gospel of Mark (which I chose because it is the shortest gospel and because of Mark’s straightforward writing style). I soon found that the New Testament has a lot to say about health. Jesus heals. A lot! He obviously cares about our physical well-being. And even when He isn’t miraculously healing someone, there are so many principles in His teachings that have implications for our health.

I also noticed that Jesus has a broader concept of health than what I did. When He talks about sickness, he seems to interchange body, soul, and spirit. Almost as if they were connected! (Which is exactly the argument set forth in As Your Soul Prospers.)

As I studied New Testament wellness, I had several opportunities to share what I was learning, by speaking at events. At a ladies evening at church, the presentation audio was recorded and CDs went out to friends in other states. The feedback from that was overwhelmingly positive, and one friend in particular encouraged me that this message of grace and light needs to get out to a larger audience.

However, it wasn’t until more than a year later, in July 2020, that I actually considered putting this information in book form. Unbeknownst to me, the organizers of Family Days on the Farm had recorded and transcribed the presentation I had given there in the summer of 2019. Months later, they asked me if I would edit this rough transcription so they could include it in a book to be sold at the 2020 event. I procrastinated on this boring job as long as I possibly could, and finished it mere days before the book of speeches was due to go to the printer. While editing the transcription, I realized that here was the raw material for a book of my own. Here, finally, was a way to get this vital message out to a wider audience. Hesitant, I prayed about it. While I have long known that I will write a book someday, this is not the one that I thought would be first. As I prayed, and others prayed with me, I sensed that now was the time to write. (I still wasn’t sure if now was the time to publish, but clearly this was the time to write. So I did.)

I started re-writing, editing, adding and taking away. Because the transcript was in my “talking style”, almost every word needed to be rewritten for clarity and ease of reading. The work progressed quickly, and within weeks the manuscript was ready to send out to early readers/proofreaders. And so it was that in late August in the pandemic year of 2020, a paperback came on the market with my name on the cover. The ideas are not original to me. They are taken from the Manufacturer’s Handbook (aka the Bible). Most likely, I have made some mistakes in interpretation; I take full responsibility for that. But any honor and glory belongs to God.

You can find the book here. Or if you’d rather read on a screen, click here for the Kindle version.