Sometimes it takes low vision to give the church new vision!

In October of 2018, Rebecca started a blog (BeckieWrites.com) and was deeply touched to discover that her voice resonated with many other people, especially other women of faith and people with disabilities. In this volume, Rebecca gathers the best of her writing as it relates to faith, disability, and the United Methodist Church.

This volume includes:

As a person of Filipino-American descent, Rebecca hopes to offer her diverse voice and unique worldview to help her church find a way forward through this challenging time. It is also her hope to that the essays, ideas, and articles gathered together in this volume will inspire and empower other people with disabilities to follow their dreams.

About the Author:

Rebecca is proud to be a visually impaired writer and half-Filipino clergywoman. She is chair of the Disability Ministries Task Force of the Susquehanna Conference of the United Methodist Church and a graduate of Wesley Theological Seminary. She has been recognized as an emerging young leader by Path 1 Ministries.

Rebecca’s poems have been published in several small literary journals. In 2018, she published her first chapbook, Through My Good Eye: A Memoir in Verse. Her writing has also appeared in Hacking Christianity, United Methodist Insight, Keys for Kids, CAPTIVATING! Magazine, Bold Blind Beauty, and Sacramental Life, among others. She blogs about faith, books, and disability awareness at BeckieWrites.com.

Rebecca serves in full time pastoral ministry in the Susquehanna Conference of the United Methodist Church. She and her husband are the proud parents of one very large cat and one exceedingly sassy Chihuahua.

Large Print Edition

“He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted… to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning.” –Isaiah 61:1-3, NIV

Rebecca was no stranger to adversity. Marked as different from an early age by her visual disability and half-Filipino heritage, she tried her best to bury herself in the pages of a book. For years, she was able to find solace in stories, until an ill-fated battle with her own personal Goliath left her with a shattered heart and broken dreams.

Rebecca found herself at the darkest point in her life. All she knew was that she needed to finish school and find work so that she could continue to afford the expensive medicines that maintained what remained of her precious eyesight.

During the darkest point in her life, a miraculous encounter with God gave her a new hope and a new purpose. Rebecca accepted the call to ministry in the United Methodist Church, and since then, her life has never been the same.

By writing just fifteen minutes a day, you can find God’s comfort and spiritual healing for your own life!

Redeemed by the gift of God’s grace, Rebecca found her own “happy ending.” In this book, Rebecca helps the reader to use the art of writing to find that same sense of purpose. It includes:

-Instructions to help you create your own Writer’s Notebook

-Weekly Bible verses and prayers

-Daily writing prompts

-Exercises to help the reader connect to God

-Excerpts from Rebecca's own spiritual journals and poems

God bound up the pieces of Rebecca’s heart and created something beautiful. Healing doesn’t always look like we expect. Journey with her as you find your own place in the biblical story and hope for your own life.

Marked as different from an early age by her visual disability and her ethnic features, she was once told by a teacher in her small hometown that she would never go to college.

After enduring years of abuse, Rebecca almost gave up on herself; however, God had other plans. God gave Rebecca a new life and an unexpected new identity as a preacher in her beloved United Methodist Church.Through My Good Eye: A Memoir in Verse , gives the reader a glimpse of the world the way the author sees it. This brief chapbook includes poems from her first five years in ministry as she worked toward ordination, fell in love with her congregation, and eventually found her own, "happily ever after."

An earnest statement of faith in the midst of struggle, this collection invites you to take a look at the world from an entirely new perspective.

About the author: Rev. Rebecca L. Holland (M.Div. & B.S. English Ed) is the pastor at Christ Community United Methodist Church in rural Pennsylvania. Rebecca is particularly passionate about spreading the love of God to those who have been traditionally marginalized by society.She writes about ministry, the church, literature, and her life as a young female clergywoman of color with a visual disability on her blog at www.beckiewrites.com