Читать книгу @stickyJesus - Toni Birdsong - Страница 7

acknowledgments

Toni thanks...

To Troy Birdsong, you are the string on my balloon and proof that God wants me to love deep and sweet on this side of heaven. I'd choose you over and over again and over again. Thank you for being my hero.

To my parents, Ed and Georgia Page, thank you for your unconditional love, steadfast faith, and the gift of laughter. I appreciate that my life is a beautiful quilt and not a finely tailored piece of linen. I love you beyond words.

To my children Zane and Olivia. Thank you for being patient in having a writer for a mom. You are my deepest wells of inspiration and two of the most creative people I know. Your laughter and love carry me through the late nights. I love you to the far side of the Milky Way.

To my brothers Rob and Michael Page. You make me better. Your love (and whoopins) has made me a resilient woman of God. I'm proud to call you two of my very best friends. I pray your adventures never end and that your love of God trumps every other pursuit. I'm so very proud of you both.

To my West Coast pastor, Wade Mikels (Village Church, Burbank). Thank you for "bringing me up" in God's truth, showing me the meaning of "familia," and making the study of God's Word the insatiable pursuit of my life. You are passion and excellence with a pulpit, and an inspiration to so many.

To my Tennessee pastor Steve Berger (Grace Chapel, Leiper's Fork). Thank you for being faithful, digging deep, and living out an uncompro-mised faith. You are my touchstone for keeping it real and serving God with everything I've got...on earth as I will in heaven.

To my Aunt Evelyn and Uncle Frank Kenyon—now beaming residents of heaven. Thank you for taking the time to sit with me and introduce me to Jesus at the tender age of nine. It mattered.

To my unbreakable sisterhood of girlfriends in California and Tennessee—you know exactly who you are. You've cheered me on, prayed me up, and kept me focused on what matters. I love you deep.

To Tami Heim. Wow. Thank you for believing God. You are my friend, my sister, my mentor, and the most amazing collaborative partner God could have given me. It's been my pure joy to go white water rafting with you. Is it Friday yet? \0/

And last—but certainly not least—to my Savior, Healer, and Truth-Revealer, Jesus Christ. You are so very kind to me. Thank You for Your awesome love and sweet communion...may my life be a never-ending thank you note back to You.

Tami thanks.

How could I do a book like this and not return the glory to the only place the glory belongs? To God, for relentlessly loving me, saving me, and rewriting the text of my life when I opened the book of my heart to Your eyes. I am grateful that You lead me in the most extraordinary ways. You not only rock my world—You are my all in all.

To my best friend and husband, Dale, thanks for lavishly loving and supporting me over these past thirty-six years of life. Your faithfulness to love me, as Christ loves church and gave His life for it, has drenched my life with fullness and the fire to stand with you as a witness until He comes again.

To my daughter, Zoë, and her husband, Matt, I am grateful for your encouragement and for the many hours you listened to me go on and on and on about what God is making possible in such a time as this. You could not bring me any greater joy as I watch you whole-heartedly follow the God-sized plan for your lives. You inspire me.

Mom, Dad, and George—oh yes, I hear you cheering me on from on high. All three of you always liked the front row of the bleachers. Katherine, thankyou for everythingyou are and for always being a remarkable Mother-in-Law to me.

To ALL the spiritual leaders in my life—thank you. I want to specifically acknowledge Sister Rita for teaching me Freshman English and making it perfectly clear that the only reason or purpose for my life was to know, love, and serve God. To Pastor Ken and Nancy Wilson, thanks for living authentic faith and being indescribably lovely. To Pastor David Landrith, thanks not only for how you shepherd my soul and shower me with truth, but also for using Twitter to connect my heart to a completely infectious crazy love in Jeremie, Haiti. In 140 characters you first took me to Haiti to find Johnny's family and now after all that has followed, my life will never be the same.

I must extend a special helping of gratitude to my dear friend, Lisa Rollins, and my pup, Kali. If it were not for the two of you—I might, just might, have missed Facebook.

To Mike Hyatt, the thank you list for you includes a thousand things, but on this occasion thank you for leading me to the point of WOW, where geek and God intersect.

To Toni—thanks for your obedience, willing heart, and tireless passion. You are a testimony to the power of a single tweet and how God always dreams bigger dreams for our lives than we possibly could. \0/

And to all the people that God has put in my life—yes, all of you—thank you for leaving fingerprints on my being and letting God use you to stretch the size of my heart from here to the ends of the earth for His glory.

Tami & Toni thank.

To the team at Birdsong Creative—Troy Birdsong, Matt Green, Ai Nguyen, Todd Lyda, and David Calhoun. Thank you for your ingenuity and commitment, and for putting wings on a very precious thing. To Maurilio Amorim and Shannon Litton—for your friendship, counsel, and support. Thanks for supplying lots of laughter when we needed it the most.

To the team at Abingdon Press (United Methodist Publishing House). Thank you for your vision on this project and for using your influence in this world to equip others to #LiveSticky in the online world for Jesus Christ.

To Dale Heim for letting us camp out over these many months and for resisting changing the locks. You kept the coffee flowing and blessed us with a consistent stream of inspiration, generosity, and kindness. We love you (and Kali girl) for sticking with us.

To Dimples Kellogg, our exceptional copyeditor, and our eagle-eyed proofreaders Carrie Marrs and Kevin Harvey. It takes a village of passionate perfectionists to tame a manuscript—and our village rocked. Thank you all.

To our Women in Christian Media (WCM) sisterhood. Your awakened hearts, encouragement, and fire for the gospel spur us on.

To Amy Parker for angel prayers that carried us and for being a loyal colleague, sister, and friend.

To our Facebook and Twitter friends (we do call you friends). Thank you for #keepingitreal, inspiring us daily to record (and echo) God's movement online, and for living out your faith so passionately for team Jesus. A special thanks to those who opened their hearts and shared their sticky stories of courage, compassion, and hope in these pages. You are Digital Scribes™—true pioneers—for the Kingdom. It's our honor and joy to #LiveSticky with you daily and light up the online space in His name, for His fame.