Just As I Am

Plot

"I've always said the Lord had to drag me kicking and screaming to His altar, but once I got there I pitched a tent, unrolled my sleeping bag, and made myself at home. Anyone less patient than the Almighty Himself would have zipped up that sleeping bag, sewn the top shut, and tossed me into the dumpster in the back parking lot." --From Chapter 1 When purple-haired Mayla Strong struts down the center aisle of Salliesburg Independent Christian Church, the bug-eyed congregation strains to get a peek at her pierced nose and lip. But Pastor Paul welcomes her with a huge, infectious grin and baptizes her on the spot. Determined to make her heavenly Father proud, Mayla's sincere, and often hilarious, attempts to let Him change her from the inside out take her into some difficult places--like the hospital room of a man dying of AIDS. Through it all she grows in faith and wisdom--sometimes through pain, sometimes through humor, but always in a way that is distinctively Mayla. "Purple-haired, nose-ring wearing Mayla Strong is a character I will never forget, and Virginia Smith's Just As I Am is a keeper of a novel! Though by turns hilarious, heart-tugging, and convicting, Mayla and her friends illustrate the important spiritual truth we often forget--that God loves each of us just as we are . . . I highly recommend it!" --Colleen Coble Best-selling author of Alaska Twilight, the Aloha Reef series, and the Rock Harbor series Virginia Smith is a freelance writer, a Christian speaker, and the contemporary worship leader for Voice Of Joy Ministries, based in central Kentucky. She has published articles and short stories in a variety of Christian magazines. When she isn't writing, speaking, or singing, she and her husband, Ted, enjoy exploring the extremes of nature--snow skiing in Utah's Wasatch Mountains, motorcycle riding on the curvy roads in central Kentucky, and Scuba diving in the warm waters of the Caribbean.