Lisa Bevere

2.28.14

     The night before, when I had filled my Mom in on all the twitter conversation about no book-signing, my sassy Mom had said to me, "Well just keep your books with you at all times, you never know when you'll have the opportunity to catch one of them and tell them your story." Yeah, my Mom is such a rebel.

     Friday morning, we had decided that we were going to get to the conference super early, just to give God ample opportunity to let me run into Lisa or Priscilla. The conference started at 9:30, doors opening at 9:00, so we decided to get there around 8:30, plenty of time before hand. Plenty of time to claim a seat just behind the speakers to bend their ears.
      Then disaster struck. The first thing was that my Dad, who was flying in to Austin, had decided to fly in that morning and his flight was going to land at 8:00 am. Plenty of time, right? Wrong. His flight ended up being about an hour and a half late. He was set to land right in the middle of the first session. So Mom and I scrambled to figure out a way to get a car to the airport, or to reserve a car, but we ended up getting him on a shuttle that would be waiting for him as soon as he landed. Problem solved.
       Then my Mom opened her closet door. Sometime in the middle of the night, one of her dogs had gotten sick in her closet, twice. So at this point its about 8:30 and my Mom is trying to hurry and get ready and telling me to go ahead and go to the conference and she'll meet me there (like I'm going to leave her...). In the meantime, I just started laughing. In her frustration, she finally said, "WHAT is so funny?!" I finally just told her that obviously it was really important for us to be at the conference this morning because Satan sure was doing his best to make sure we didn't make it. And then she just started laughing, too.

       After finally getting everything cleaned up and the house locked for my Dad to get there, we arrived at the conference a few minutes after the doors had opened. Now that we had been in one session, we knew that Lisa and Priscilla would sit on the front row towards the left side, so we hauled it towards that area of the auditorium.
   
        Lisa got up and spoke that morning. Have I mentioned lately how much I love Lisa Bevere? I have a total girl crush on her because she speaks truth in an empowering way towards women.

There's Lisa teaching.

       That morning, Lisa said some nuggets of wisdom that I jotted down to remember them:

• When under pressure, your faith life is forced out into the open.
• Do not let the world tangle you in the small questions when you have the big answer.

• If you're don't pray prayers that are scary to you, you're not scaring the enemy. 

     Like I've said before, the woman is an absolute warrior for God and I look up to her a lot. 

     Before we knew it, the session was over and it was time for a break. There was only one person between me and the isle that morning, and as the session came to a close I whispered to my Mom, "I think I'm going to try to go up there and talk to her." And of course, my Mom was saying, "DO IT" the whole time.

     Session ends, the lady next to me gets up and leaves, and of course she's left her iPad there. Of course. So I have to run yell at her and give her iPad back to her and then I start heading upstream towards Lisa. 

     Lisa was standing talking to Lori Champion, who is the co-pastor of Celebration church, and who had been called out by one of the other speakers as the "Barbie" of the church since she's so skinny, pretty, and blonde (and her husband is a doppelganger of Ken). Anyways, as I come up the isle, Lisa is reaching down to get her purse off the chair (its a big silver bag, just for the record), and I wait for a minute hoping that she is going to turn around. No such luck, time to be bold. So I tap her on the shoulder.

     "Lisa, can I have just three minutes of your time?" I asked tentatively.

     "Of course!" she said, and she set down her purse. I don't know why that detail is so important to me, but it just reminds me that she was not only taking a few minutes, but she was preparing not to rush our conversation. Amazing.

      I told her about the letter I had given to her assistant, Hannah, the night before and asked if she received it (I realized I left out this detail- so Mom and I ran into Hannah in the little shopping mart after Priscilla's session the night before. Since I was resigned to not getting my book signed, I decided that finding Lisa's assistant was the next best option. It wasn't really hard- she was standing right next to the book table asking if anyone had any questions about the materials). Lisa said she hadn't gotten a note yet, but not to worry since I used the note as my "self-prep" to help get my story together concisely.

     "I first heard you speak in Frisco last January, and at the time I was facing a deployment,  pregnancy, and a new job," I started.

     "Oh my gosh!" she exclaimed, patting me on the arm.

     "Oh no, that's not the half of it... So last fall we lost our daughter, Kaitlyn, to a stillbirth..." I finished quietly, to the horror on her face. "And I believe that God wants to have closed communication with us, so I needed to tell you that because you followed God's prompting to write Girls with Swords, God used you to help me in one of the darkest seasons of my life. I just needed to tell you face-to-face, thank you. Thank you for being courageous and writing that book. Thank you for letting God use you. Thank you for everything." 

       Once I finished talking, Lisa had tears running down her face. She had been holding my hands between us as she listened, and then she pulled me into a hug. 

       "Can I pray for you?" was her only response. Um, heck yes you can, Lisa.

       I wish I could have had someone record her prayer over me, but I just remember her claiming that the next child that came from us would live, and that we would be blessings to everyone around us. She claimed goodness over our lives, and she claimed that God would use me to His glory. 

      It was cool.

Me and Lisa huggin' it out

Is she not the coolest?! 

      Since I had dominated about 15 minutes of her time (instead of 3), I realized that other people were standing around waiting to talk to her as well. I had accidentally left my bag of books back with Mom, so I told Lisa that I would love to have her sign my copy if she had any time.

      "Absolutely," she said. "I will find you tonight!"

I love Lisa Bevere.