The View From Here

“…Bring forth its fruit in season…” Psalm 1:3

Last weekend I saw some encouraging fruit from seeds planted quite awhile ago.

Last year in May Tree of Life received from the printer our inventory of the Russian language version of Steve Carr’s book “Married and How to Stay That Way”. It had been promised in March when Steve, his wife Susie, and a crew from Calvary Chapel of Arroyo Grande, CA came for a marriage conference here in Kyiv. The conference (and really the whole time with that team) went GREAT! By the end of the conference local CC Kyiv leadership was already asking when Steve and Susie could plan to come back for another conference! But still the books were not ready.

Finally, in time for our national conference in May, the book was ready. I don’t even remember when we first started the long and involved process of translating, editing, second editing, cover design, proofing, printing, etc. A year before? Maybe. Tree of Life had already done other books in cooperation with other organizations, but this was our first title that we did start to finish. What a learning process! (The marriage conference was the first conference that we organized, too…a lot of firsts with that book!)

BREAKING NEW GROUND 

But last weekend TOL, our friend Pasha who makes and designs t-shirts, and In Lumine publishers (a project by my friend Jake Knotts) had a table at the monthly Christian book faire here in Kyiv and the results were great! (FYI, we had never done that before because the cost for renting a table is simply prohibitive when compared to what we sell our books for and it took awhile before Jake, Pasha and I could get coordinated to take a table together).

 One mail-order Christian Book Distributor / Publisher took 50 copies and another took 10 (saying they would want to get more soon.) We sold all but about 4 of the books we had brought to the faire!

This may not seem much to you, but one of the reasons I am so excited is because these were to people outside of our circle of churches and who had no clue who the author was! They had, however, read the sample copies that my staff had given out the minute the book was available. It is a comprehensive book (translation: you could use it as a door stop! Sorry, Steve, but you have to admit the thing is meaty!) so it took folks awhile to get through it, but when they did they had nothing but praise for it!

This is a big deal. Not just because we have some hope of getting rid of all the 3000 books we printed and paying off the loans that we took to pay for the printing, etc. but because (as I had believed it would) this book cut across denominational lines! It is just a good solid Biblical book that anyone from any denominational background can appreciate.

…a little rant 

Denominationalism, to the point of territorialism - sigh. ….some churches that I know of actually have lists of other churches that if their members are known to visit those churches they will be “dis-fellowshipped”…ie. kicked out of their own church for simply going to a concert, Bible study, drama performance, etc. of another CHRISTIAN church. I’m not talking cult or false religion, I’m talking another Christian church that maybe just doesn’t agree with them regarding the issue of how long you wait before you can be baptised….or if it is necessary to have a church membership list or not….or if non-baptised people can take communion…I realise that to some people these are serious issues (whether they should be or not - biblically - is a WHOLE other blog), but to dis-fellowship someone because they simply visited another church which, (the afore-mentioned issues aside), is a biblical Christian church in regards to their doctrines of sin, salvation, deity of Jesus, etc.? I will let God judge that, but personally, it makes me ill…(particularly when I see it in myself!)

Back to our regulary scheduled programming… 

Anyway, now that I’m through (for the time) ranting…that’s why the sales of those books were so exciting! People aren’t liking this book because of its denominational association, or a well-known author but because the truths inside are spiritual, biblical, and therefore they recognize the power of them to change lives and heal broken marriages! Awesome! (Although I do think our WONDERFUL re-design of the cover might have helped, too! ha!)

So…there ya go. Good things do come to those who wait. And I know that with this book, the best is yet to come. Thanks for writing it, Steve.