I’ve taken the past year off from writing of any kind, including this blog. It wasn’t exactly a vacation, more of a year of disconnection (in some ways).
A Year Off?
In that year, my wife and I have started three new businesses. We bought a vineyard and events center and opened a separate tasting room. On top of that, we now operate these businesses (as COVID shutdowns allow) with seven of our ten kids and five spouses of those seven. We’ve welcomed two new grandchildren and hosted three weddings for our children (we have ten combined and seven of them are now married – three to go!)
With all this going on, not to mention my full-time job, I’ve found little time to do the thinking it takes to write intentionally.
A Letter To The Disconnected
I have continued with varying success to help via email and phone calls, those who have read The Disconnected Man. It’s been a couple of months since I last checked to see if anyone has reached out for help via jimturnerauthor.com. I apologize. I’m truly sorry for being disconnected from those of you who have asked for help. I will be back on the site and working toward connecting with you soon.
Now that shutdowns are upon us for the winter and I have some time off my full-time job I intend to pick up where I left off. That is, I intend to write about relationships and how important they are.
A Year of Disconnection
2020 has been a year of intense disconnection. Many lives have been devastated by the permanent disconnection of death. Many more have been equally devastated by the breaking of once beautiful relationships. The orders handed down by various worldwide governments to distance, stay safe, etc. have created hyper-awareness, even a fear, of human contact.
In the end, this will not be good. Although, in the short term, perhaps necessary. The debate about what is right to do for our physical health will continue for years after the pandemic is gone. Governments will do their best to justify whatever decisions were made. The full impact of those decisions may never be known.
Long-Term Relationship Problems
But the relationship impact may last multiple lifetimes. Soul-questions are not the primary discussion in the middle of crises. Crises seldom leave time for such discussions. But this one is different. Questions are being asked, posts written about the consequences of making human contact illegal.
Relationships are suffering in ways they haven’t for many, many generations. Divorces are at epic levels, anxiety, suicides, mental illness struggles, fear, and more spirit-breaking relational challenges march around us like an ever-enclosing circle of wild-eyed destroyers.
Hope
In these days, we need hope. We need to know how to endure and how to find peace for our souls. Do you feel the need for deep thought? For Closeness? For real love? We need relationships like we’ve never needed them before. I feel that need. Do you?
I’m hoping to spend a large amount of time with the Lord and in His word while thinking about the state of the world as it is in these times. I’m hoping and praying for insight from the heart of God to share with you. I intend to write whatever it is I discover and I’m praying that it will help many of us to not only cope with the times in which we live, but to overcome the effects of them and experience victory and intimacy with our God and our loved ones like never before.