Shalom in the City
Sistas! It’s been over two weeks since my first book, “Shalom Sistas: Living Wholeheartedly in a Brokenhearted World” released. I’ve been all over the place talking about the book, from podcasts to radio interviews and with a group of amazing Dangerous Women. It received a Red Star Review on Publisher’s Weekly which had me happy dancing all over my house, not just because someone who actually get paid to read books thinks “Shalom Sistas” is a good book, but because they likened me to Nadia Bolz-Weber who is hands down—my favorite living theologian.
Last week, my good friend and admin fairy Dawn flew in from Boston to help plan my book release party at Holy Grounds Coffee and Tea which was hands-down one of the best nights of my life and today, I’m putting together “Shalom Sistas” care packages for my launch team because they’ve been a beautiful source of encouragement to me.
When I first wrote Shalom Sistas, I never imagined how much we’d need a book on embodying the peace, wholeness, goodness, and flourishing of the Kingdom of God right now. I mean, y’all the world feels so chaotic and at time, I feel so overwhelmed by all the ways brokenness come to bear in my life. If you peeked into my brain, you’d see that at any given moment, I could be worried about politics, natural disasters, my weight gain, my family’s morale, finances, and theology (like seriously, I’ve wondered a few times, how do I believe and trust in a God I cannot see?). I think about calling and acceptance, boundaries and risks, loving my enemy and access compassion. But most of all, I think about peacemaking and wonder what does it mean to truly call Jesus my Prince of Peace— in a world that is sorely lacking of the “peace that surpasses all understanding”.
So I wrote a book about that. It’s my love letter to you, the Everyday Peacemaker. Maybe you don’t realize yet, but you create shalom right where you are in ordinary, beautiful, impactful ways. Shalom Sistas, is my way of pulling into my line of vision so that you can see how shalom flourishes around you, because the world needs us to see this. The words needs us to have eyes for the Kingdom of God, and embody right where we are. It’s the only way to live wholeheartedly especially when everything feels so incredibly broken. I wrote Shalom Sistas, because world needs more imaginative and creative peacemakers who are willing to harness the everyday in order to create the extraordinary.
Also, really, really, wanted to laugh with my tribe of peacemakers and share recipes and dance and get really practical which is why I included “Shalom Steps” in the back.
In Shalom Sistas, I really wanted to demystify peacemaking for us— we don’t have to be sweet passive quiet women or join the Peace Corps to consider ourselves peacemakers. We just need eyes to see the potential right around us and then be brave enough to live it out.
Because I love y’all and these new digs here at Patheos, I wanna give away a couple of copies of “Shalom Sistas” today and tomorrow. Today, comment below and I’ll choose a winner and then come back tomorrow because I’m posting this week’s “Shalom Sistas” podcast episode where I read the whole first chapter ( you can sign up to read it ahead of time here) and offer commentary I couldn’t while writing the book.
Until tomorrow, I’ma be all like this today
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