In February 2007, I had a dream. I dreamt that I was sitting in a college religion class. The class was discussing a book that presented a world where God had created only one person. The story described the growing relationship between this person and God. When I awoke, I concluded that God wanted me to write this story, believing that it had not yet been told. I started writing later that year, beginning with a chapter in the middle of the book. It didn’t take me long to discover that I didn’t know how to write a book. In September 2009, I found a writer’s workshop that I have been attending ever since. My writing teacher, Sue Clark, is brilliant and I have learned so much from her. With her help and thirteen revisions later, I finished my manuscript on February 7th of this year. Over time, the book gained a life of its own and took me places I didn’t expect to go. I take that as a good sign and hope that the journey for the reader will be as rewarding as it has been for me.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In February 2007, I had a dream. I dreamt that I was sitting in a college religion class. The class was discussing a book that presented a world where God had created only one person. The story described the growing relationship between this person and God. When I awoke, I concluded that God wanted me […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[3],"tags":[7,8],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7Hhvw-7","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":47,"url":"https:\/\/www.rickhocker.com\/weblog\/a-solitary-adam-without-eve\/","url_meta":{"origin":7,"position":0},"title":"A Solitary Adam, without Eve","date":"October 19, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"One of the most dramatic detours from the Garden of Eden story is that Four in the Garden explores the relationship between one person and God. In the Garden of Eden story, God created a companion for Adam because none of the animals proved to be a suitable companion for\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Writing"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":37,"url":"https:\/\/www.rickhocker.com\/weblog\/god-and-brussels-sprouts\/","url_meta":{"origin":7,"position":1},"title":"God and Brussels Sprouts","date":"August 30, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"People seem to either love or hate Brussels sprouts. People who hate them made that determination because they have tried them at least once in their lives. Then you have those people who have spurned God because they tried that once, too, and they didn't like it or it didn't\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Spirituality"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":289,"url":"https:\/\/www.rickhocker.com\/weblog\/the-god-particle\/","url_meta":{"origin":7,"position":2},"title":"The God Particle","date":"November 24, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"\u201cI believe that God is in me as the sun is in the colour and fragrance of a flower \u00ad\u2013 the Light in my darkness, the Voice in my silence.\u201d \u2014Helen Keller. Most of us think of God as being outside, up there, or elsewhere. \u201cHe is high and lifted\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Making God Real"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":246,"url":"https:\/\/www.rickhocker.com\/weblog\/engaging-god\/","url_meta":{"origin":7,"position":3},"title":"Engaging God","date":"November 6, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"How do we come to know God? Do we grasp God by reading books? Or by listening to others tell us who God is? Reading a book about someone isn't as instructive as interacting with that person firsthand. Someone can read all the books written about God, but never experience\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Spirituality"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":318,"url":"https:\/\/www.rickhocker.com\/weblog\/when-god-disappoints-us\/","url_meta":{"origin":7,"position":4},"title":"When God Disappoints Us","date":"January 30, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Have you ever trusted God and been disappointed? You placed your trust in God and He let you down. After many such disappointments, we can lose hope. When we lose hope, we are tempted to despair or walk away from God. If we manage our expectations at the start, we\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Trust"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":260,"url":"https:\/\/www.rickhocker.com\/weblog\/willfulness\/","url_meta":{"origin":7,"position":5},"title":"Willfulness","date":"March 18, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"In my book, Four in the Garden, I avoided the use of the word \"sin\" because it's such a religiously-loaded and off-putting word. It conjures feelings of shame, guilt, and condemnation. Rather than driving us to God, it generally has the opposite effect. 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