V is for Victory

I sincerely hope you and yours celebrated the birth of our Savior with happiness and holiness dear BFF (Blessed Friend Forever)!

My holiday took a strange and unexpected twist. A bit of background first: You may recall that I’ve been diligently working all year on a new 365-day devotional that was contracted to be completed in late October (2024). I turned the manuscript in a week before the deadline. WooHoo!

As is the case with traditional publishing, they receive it by the contracted date and then begin round after round of editing that usually takes months to complete before the book is ready to go to the printer.

I received several rounds of edits (suggestions for improvements) and complied accordingly. The last round went back to the publisher at the beginning of December. I rejoiced that I was finished in time to enjoy the upcoming holy days and tend to house guests who came to stay with us in mid-December and are still here (our house looks a little like a Christmassy college dormitory but I love every minute of it).

Well, the joke was on me.

Two days before Christmas, I received word from my publisher that the final round editors were excited about my new book, but they would like me to rewrite 80 of the 365 readings within ten days, a time period which included Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and New Year’s. My deadline was January 3. Yesterday. Eeeeek!!!

So I glued myself to my computer chair for most of the holiday week and leaned heavily on the divine Motivator for all my writing. I hit send on the updated manuscript at 9 a.m. on January 3. Then I took a relief walk. And as I rounded a corner in my neighborhood, pretty much still shell shocked from the trauma of the past ten days, I encountered a HUGE atta-girl from Papa God. It was a gigantic contrail V in the sky. I know some would say it was a nice coincidence. But I took it as a loving grace note from my heavenly Father; even if no one else ever realized the pressure I had been under, He did. And He was sending me a personalized V for Victory!

It made me laugh. Then it made me cry. Grace notes from my Papa tend to do that.

So now I’m skipping around the house yelling “Freedom!” like Braveheart. Until tomorrow when I have to start taking down the Christmas decorations.

How about you, my friend? What gives you that incomparable celebratory feeling of freedom? Feels terrific, doesn’t it?