Welcome! My name is Allen Stark, and here you can find information about my writings. Check out my books, read my writing tips or learn more about me in my autobiography. You can also find information about the services of Paper Bridges.
Why do I write what I do?
We all want to be remembered. Most of us have a good idea of how we want our loved ones to remember us when we are gone. But do we know they'll remember us the way we want to be remembered? One of my motivations for writing is so I can have the satisfaction of sharing with my loved ones one of the gifts God has given me. I want my voice to be heard in my own words.
As this Christian grew in God's grace, I was often surprised to find how God's words grew, too, and took on new and deeper meaning. I can look back to the day when the Word of God was opened to me, and I rejoiced in the blessing I found in it. And then, after a time of growth, a deeper experience gave some of God's words new meanings. Things that I had never understood before were suddenly opened up to me.
It is my hope that, through my digging and the Holy Spirit's tutoring, I have discerned clearly that which I am sharing with you through my writing. The Sword of the Spirit relies on our faith that what has been written is true. From the very beginning God has spoken words that have powerfully influenced everything that exists. For example, God created the heavens and earth by speaking them into existence. The Bible says, "By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word (rhema) of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things which are visible" (Hebrews 11:3 NASB). Since God created us in his likeness, we too have the ability to release power through speech, whether spoken, sung, or written. Our words can bring life (see Proverbs 18:21). They can also build people up (see James 3).
God is a God of new beginnings. It seems that he is always providing new seeds to plant in our lives so that they will grow and mature and bring forth a new season of life in us. Believe me, I am a testimony to the fact that God is able to take stark desert lands and turn them into fertile fields. I have experienced the joy of the redeemed as spoken of in Isaiah 35:1.
"…everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope" (Romans 15:4).