Oh, How He Loves Us. Oh!
Who remembers climbing on a bookmobile that looked anything like this one? Wave your hand. LOL!
In my first book, “Lessons Learned on Bull Run Road”, I wrote about my summer love affair with the bookmobile from the East Carroll Parish Library. I couldn’t find an image of that old vehicle, but it looked a whole lot like this.
For a little booklover at the end of a dirt road, miles from a public library, that bus of books lumbering down our country road looked like a traveling amusement park. Granted, I did have a problem with the bookmobile’s rule of six books per child, but I soon found a way around that, too. I’d do chores for my sisters in exchange for their book count, since they weren’t all fired up about reading, anyway. Score!
Picture mini me headed back up the drive with my mother lode, eighteen books. Life was good.
Fast forward with me, if you will. Year later my radio talk show began to garner the attention of book publicists everywhere. I know this because they started sending me books by the boatload. Please hear me, I don’t think this is because I was setting the world on fire with my Monday evening show as much as it was about the extreme volume of books out there and the need for today’s author to get in front of eyes and ears. Whatever the reason, it continues, even now, when I’ve given up my radio show for a podcast. Practically every workday a big brown truck lumbers down my long driveway and a sweet fellow gets out and hands me books. Free books. Do you see the pattern? I didn’t. Not for the longest anyway.
And then, one day, I was walking back inside with a stack of freshly delivered books when literally out of the blue two words fell into my heart. “You’re welcome.” Just that quickly, the scene around me faded and I was rooted to the spot, thinking about that mini me longing for books and this grown-up me awash in ’em.
I share this story, game changers, to celebrate the incredible intimacy of our Heavenly Father who sees the end from the beginning. I’m not His favorite. You are. And you, and you, and you. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son, that whosoever believes in Him would not perish but would have everlasting life.” John 3:16
He knows us, one and all. He knows what makes us tick and what ticks us off– and He loves us, everyone. Oh, how He loves us. Oh.
And now a question for the book lovers among us? What book do your grandchildren love to hear, again, and again, and again. (Smile.) How about yourself? What are you reading or what have you recently read that impacted you? I’d love to hear your thoughts!
Hugs, Shellie
