Help me share God’s message with my first book

My name is Drew Christian...and I am asking for help in self-publishing my first book: Three Years: Climbing the Ladder of Virtues...

The impetus for this book came to me three years ago...

I was remembering my dad and how he was suddenly taken from me by a massive heart attack when he was only fifty-seven years old. At the time, I was fifty-four and I began to think how I might live differently if I knew I only had three years left, if I knew I was going to die at the same time as my father. This led me to Jesus who walked this earth and changed the world over three years.

I have included the Table of Contents and a short section from the first chapter of my book below.

I wrote the book over a year while pastoring a church in North East, Maryland. Once finished, the congregation read the book while I preached on each chapter over the course of eight weeks. The feedback I received was powerful and encouraging; God was able to work through my inadequacies to touch hearts. The book also includes a Study Guide for individual or small group study.

Since writing Three Years, I have retired after twenty-seven years of pastoral ministry and am currently helping write and facilitate Biblical Leadership principles to churches and nonprofits through a new company, Aspire Leadership. I am unable to afford to self-publish and felt led to reach out through GoFundMe.

The total cost for self-publishing including editing, formatting, cover design, print-to-order, publishing across platforms such as Amazon and Barnes & Nobles, ISBN#, and e-book is approximately $5,000 through Bookbaby.com. My research led me to this self-publishing company as a reputable and viable option to get this book out to the world so others may be uplifted and challenged through God's Word and my personal journey.

There will be a page in the book explaining the book was published thru crowd-funding. Every person who gives will be listed in the book!

I believe God gave me the words I have written in these pages and I have struggled for over a year to get publishers to look at the manuscript and to research ways to get the book printed and out to people. I pray that you will consider being part of seeing this book released and shared. Thank you!

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: The Ladder of Virtues

Chapter 2: Goodness

Chapter 3: Knowledge

Chapter 4: Self-Control

Chapter 5: Perseverance

Chapter 6: Godliness

Chapter 7: Mutual Affection

Chapter 8: Love

Epilogue

Appendix: The Roman Road

Study Guide: Three Years

References

Chapter 1

THE LADDER OF VIRTUES

A Day That Changed My Life Forever

At first, I had no idea that something was wrong. When I walked in the front door, having driven the two-and-a-half hours home from seminary in the nation’s capital, I was excited. We had purchased tickets to take our four-year old son to see Elmo Live. I couldn’t wait to see his face light up at the sight of Elmo, Big Bird, and Cookie Monster. I couldn’t wait to hear his precious giggle.

After I entered the door to our home, the atmosphere was not one of anticipation for the night ahead. My wife, pregnant with our second child, stood there, looking at me, evidence of recent tears on her cheeks. My first thought was that something was wrong with the baby. She asked me to sit down and then shared with me the news of the day that would change my life forever.

“Drew, your dad had a heart attack.” She barely got the words out and then in a crackling whisper, tears beginning to flow, she added, “He didn’t make it.”

I’m not sure what I remember at that point. I felt numb, dumbfounded, confused, uncertain of what I had just heard. I think I responded, “What…what do you mean…he didn’t make it?” Then the floodgates opened.

My father was my best friend; in fact, just the night before I visited with him and together, we watched one of the old sci-fi horror movies we loved. We had been watching those movies together since I was a little kid, staying up on Saturday nights, allowing Count Gore de Vol to come into our living room and introduce the classics like Them, The Invisible Man, Creature from the Black Lagoon, Earth vs. The Flying Saucers, and my favorite, Valley of Gwangi. My dad would sit with me and tell me stories about the actors, introducing me to James Whitmore, James Arness, Julie Adams, Lon Chaney Jr., Claude Rains, Boris Karloff, Vincent Price, John Agar, and Allison Hayes. While sharing these films and their history with me, my dad would build model rockets. At one point we had almost one hundred completed rockets, including the U.S.S. Enterprise, the Klingon’s Bird of Prey, and one rocket with a camera attached. I remember watching the film afterwards and seeing our neighborhood from above. He would shoot these rockets off at Cub Scout events and neighborhood parties with my friends.

My dad taught me, not only to love these old movies which I now collect and share with my children, but to love reading. He started me off with The Hardy Boys, having read every book himself, and then on to our favorite character in literature, Sherlock Holmes. The two things in life he hated were prejudice and litter, and he passed those feelings down to my brother and me. He introduced me to Peter, Paul, and Mary, Neil Diamond, and The Kingston Trio. I learned from him a love for the outdoors, nature, camping, the mountains of Shenandoah and Harpers Ferry.

In my adult years, my dad and I would go to the movies together a couple times a month and before and after, we would talk about all kinds of things, including faith. My father had never stopped showing me love even during my teenage years when I hurt him with my words and actions; he always loved me, encouraged me, and supported me. I could not imagine life without him.

Yet, the words my wife had shared with me were beginning to sink in. That is exactly what I was going to have to do. I was going to have to, not only imagine, but live life without my dad.

Twenty-Two Years Later

Today, as I write these words, I am fifty-four years old, and I am coming out on the other side of a worldwide pandemic that has kept me at home and away from human interaction for over a year. During the year, I had a lot of time to think, to reflect, to analyze, to pray, to wonder, and to question. One of the great questions I felt led to contemplate through the Coronavirus outbreak was “What if I only had three years left?”

Twenty-two years after that awful night when I heard that my dad did not make it, led me to the question, “What if I only had three years left?” My dad died at the age of fifty-seven, a number I would hit in just three more years.

If I only had three years left, how would I want to spend them? What would I want to do? How would I live differently if I knew this to be true? How could I make a difference in three years? Was such a thing even possible?

I immediately thought of Jesus. He walked, taught, and served for a period of three years. Historical and astronomical evidence point to Jesus’ birth being around 3 AD, with John the Baptist being born about six months earlier (Luke 1:24-37). From scripture, we know that John the Baptist’s ministry started in the fifteenth year of Tiberius Cesar (Luke 3:1-3), which would have been between 28 and 29 AD. We know Jesus’ ministry started sometime after John the Baptist’s. The Gospel of Luke tells us that Jesus began His ministry around the age of thirty (Luke 3:21-23). The Gospel of John records three Passover events during Jesus’ ministry (John 2:13; 6:4; 11:55). Furthermore, we know Pontius Pilate was the procurator of Judea from 26-36 AD and that Paul was converted after the crucifixion and before 34 AD.

During these three short years, Jesus walked this earth and changed the course of human history. Jesus starts His ministry with twelve disciples. After His resurrection, Jesus appears to five hundred believers (I Corinthians 15:6). Soon, Peter wins three thousand to Christ during the festival of Pentecost (Acts 4:4). Throughout the book of Acts, one hears how the church grows exponentially (Acts 16:5). Today, there are an estimated 2.4 billion Christians in the world, and we are told that one day, saints from every nation, “a great multitude no one can count,” will worship before God’s throne (Revelation 5:9; 7:1-17).

I remember reading a book, What If Jesus Had Never Been Born by D. James Kennedy and Jerry Newcombe. In their book, they give evidence as to Jesus’ influence on and literal reshaping of civilization including education, charity, government, business, art, literature, medicine, and the value of human life. Most importantly, for over two millennium, countless lives, including my own, have been changed and transformed through faith in Jesus Christ. Theologian William Barclay writes, “The unanswerable argument for Christianity is the Christian life. No one can disregard a faith which is about to make bad people good.”

Questions began to sprint through my mind. How did Jesus change the world and countless lives with only three years of teaching and ministry? What behaviors and attributes did Jesus display throughout His ministry and why were these effective? Could I learn these behaviors and develop these attributes that Jesus carried throughout His ministry? If I made an intentional effort to take on the character of Jesus over the next three years, what difference might I make and how might I affect generations after me?

Mirroring Our Lives After His

Finding my starting point in 2 Peter, I began to study the attributes of Jesus that Peter tells us to add to our faith, to our everyday thoughts and actions.

The book of 2 Peter was written to those who posed a threat to the church. 2 Peter rebukes those who twist scripture to their own purpose (1:20; 3:16); those who selfishly seek things for themselves and do this by exploiting others (2:3; 2:14-15); those who fall prey to their lusts and adultery (2:10; 2:14; 2:18-19); those who mislead others (2:14; 2:18); those who act as if freedom in Christ means permission to follow their every physical desire (2:19); and those who denied the second coming of Christ (3:3-4).

The author of 2 Peter also tells us that, through Christ, through “His divine power,” He “has given us everything we need for a godly life” (1:3). Furthermore, through what Christ has given us, we “may participate in the divine nature” (1:4). It was Jesus’ divine nature that influenced and changed the hearts and lives of the twelve disciples, and through those twelve produced billions of followers. Therefore, if we have been given the opportunity to “participate in the divine nature,” if we have been given “everything we need,” we can share in Jesus’ work and success. If this is true, what is holding us back?

In his book, Experiencing God, Henry Blackaby explains that God invites you and I to join God in His work. Blackaby writes, “God wants us to align our lives with Him so He will accomplish His divine purposes in and through us.” We have been given the unbelievable privilege and opportunity to join God in His work. Jesus told his disciples, “Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father” (John 14:12). Paul writes, “For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do;” “we are co-workers in God’s service” (Eph. 2:10; I Cor. 3:9).

Joining God in his work requires a decision, a commitment. We must be intentional in growing our faith, in becoming more like Christ, and in stepping out in faith to serve alongside God in ministry and mission. Paul instructs, “…continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill His good purpose” (Phil. 2:12b-13).