Living Story Grace

As a writer and speaker, I spend a lot of prep time alone creating and formatting content. Today, I’m having so much fun creating a new booklet for a women’s conference in Kent, Washington, that I wanted to share it with you. If you’d like to know more about hosting a conference or retreat at your church,. If you’d like to work through the material on your own or with a small group, check out and .

As we wait just a few more days for the second in the Living Story Bible study series to arrive, I decided to revisit some of the things I’ve learned about who I am through Learning God’s Story of Grace:

Women struggle. We forget our God-designed and designated meaning and mission; we are blind to our manipulative ways; we hunker down in shame rather than being buoyed by the hope of the freedom for which Christ set us free; we lose hope when our sights don’t remain on the full redemption to come.

In the workshop on bearing Christ to the world’s women, we considered the implications of redemptive history for the world’s women. The above chart is lifted right out of Learning God’s Story of Grace — to explore more fully what redemptive history tells us about who God is, what He has done, and why that matters so emphatically to us, check it out. For more on why knowing this story of grace matters for women, check out the recorded workshop at Barker Productions.

Weighing in at approximately 12 ounces, with a definite pastel skin tone, sturdy and sensible binding, and perfectly lovely writing paper,

Learning God’s Story of Grace, the first in the Living Story Bible study series, has arrived!

To give you an idea of its nature, I’ll share with you a few questions people have asked, and my answers. Please add to the questions (or answers, if you have already taken part in the study!):

1. “Would this be helpful for me to discover more of my own story of grace? I’ve done a lot of Bible study but I haven’t ever really thought that I had a story of grace.” Scotty Smith, who wrote the foreword, says: “Elizabeth helps us find our place in God’s story – God’s Living Story of redemption and restoration. Each of us is called to be a character in and a carrier of this amazing story. Indeed, the gospel runs to us and through us, to the glory of God.”

2. “Do you study the Bible?” Learning God’s Story is about just that – understanding the whole of the love and life story Scripture tells in a way that makes us passionate to study it and learn it.

3. “Is it only for women? I have some co-ed groups in my church that I would like to use it with.” Take a look at Chapter 4 to find a great story of a men’s church board using the concept of Story Feasting. I surveyed church planters as I was designing the study, and they asked me to leave it open for study by men and women.

4. “Can anyone in any denomination use it?” Anyone who has an interest in growing in grace, living the story of the true gospel of Jesus Christ will not only love this study, but begin to see new realities about God, Scripture, and themselves in it.

5. Where can I buy it? It is available online through P&R Publishing, Christian Books, Barnes and Noble, Amazon, Family Christian, and others. You should be able to walk into your local Family Christian and Barnes and Noble and ask for it. If they don’t have it, please tell them to order it for you and stock a few extras:!

Got questions? Ask them here or on Facebook page, Living Story.

“Each of us is called to be a character in and a carrier of this amazing story. Indeed, the gospel runs to us and through us, to the glory of God.” Scotty Smith, in the Foreword of Learning God’s Story of Grace

Pastor Scotty Smith has taught me and many much about God’s story. One of my favorite expressions he uses is the phrasee: “character in and carrier of this amazing story.” We don’t live this life in a vacuum. I love to think about the characters and carriers God has used in my story to reveal his transforming grace. If you’ve ever been to a Living Story conference, you’ve probably heard me ask the basic question:

“Why are you here?”

This question reveals so much about our stories in so many ways. One of the great joys of writing Learning God’s Story was acknowledging the characters and carriers of grace in my life. Try it:

If you were writing a book about your life, whom would you want to acknowledge as playing some crucial role? How did God use this person (even if, as Joseph said about the brothers who harmed him, “they meant it for evil” Genesis 50:19-20).