GOODlife Magazine June 2017

Something
Important About
Remembering
With Steven Curtis Chapman
Image(s) taken from Between Heaven and the Real World by Steven
Curtis Chapman with Ken Abraham. Revell, a division of Baker
Publishing Group, © 2017. Used by permission
10 goodlifemagazine.org
-by Gabriel BLand
“It was the best of times. It was the worst of times.” It’s a quote
most of us recognize from Charles Dickens’ novel A Tale of Two
Cities. . But it’s also how renowned Christian music artist Steven
Curtis Chapman begins characterizing his life to this point.
He continues, “It’s a journey. It’s been an amazing journey—
mountaintops beyond anything I ever imagined, and valleys
deeper than I ever could have imagined—and God has been
faithful every step of the way. And that’s the best I can explain it.”
Being in the public eye for over 30 years as a singer, songwriter,
record producer, and more, many of Steven’s personal highs and
lows unsurprisingly are not so private. Some of his experiences,
like winning 5 Grammy awards and 58 Gospel Music Association
Dove Awards, are probably pretty easy to celebrate with the
masses. Others, though, like the tragic loss of his youngest
daughter Maria in a driveway accident involving his son Will in
2008, can make living in the spotlight a little more difficult and
painful.
Ever since Steven’s wife, Mary Beth, published her book
Choosing to SEE: A Journey of Struggle and Hope in 2010,
countless people have come forward to thank her for her
openness, saying things like, “Man, I’m really not alone. This
is a person that I would have thought had it all together, and
she is sharing that she has to daily say, ‘God, I believe. Help me
with my unbelief.’ That’s a journey I can relate to!” Seeing the
ways that Mary Beth’s testimony has touched so many lives, as
well as having God’s continual guidance, encouraged Steven to
overcome self-consciousness and doubt that were keeping him
from what the Lord was calling him to do—record his own story.
In his new book Between Heaven & the Real World, Steven
hopes to encourage others through his personal reflections
on his life journey, but also by emphasizing the importance of
remembering.
The Lord’s plans for calling Steven to write this book go far
beyond the profound impact it is sure to have on the lives of
innumerable readers. When people reflect upon their lives with
the leading and guiding of God and His word, they cannot help
but to find ways to grow and learn from their past, Steven being
no exception. By looking back on his life, he gained deeper
understanding of the patterns in his life, one being his tendency
to be a fi x e r : “I’ve always tried to fix the things that are broken,
in a very broken world. And in the book, I share in great detail
that there have been many places in my life that I encounter
unfixable things, unfixable people, and unfixable situations.
Those—over and over again—I have discovered, have been the
places where I have experienced God in the most profound ways.
It may not take a theologian to figure that out, but it was a bit of
a surprise as I began to look back and realize it.” Steven went on
to elaborate about specific areas he’s realized he has been unable
to “fix” and instead has had to rely on God. “It would probably
be my marriage that would be the biggest one. Because I came in