CHILDREN'S AUTHOR INTERVIEW
With a knack for making biblical truths resonate with little ones, author Christie Thomas serves as a guide for parents looking for uncomplicated, meaningful ways to disciple their kids. Christie comes alongside families as they cultivate a lasting faith in their children in simple, enjoyable ways each day through her ministry, Little Shoots, Deep Roots. Through establishing little daily habits that take a few minutes, Christie leads families in discipling their children in the lives they have today.She also writes Christian picture books for young readers (ages 3–8) to navigate anxiety and loss from a biblical perspective and engaging devotions for families.
Christie is the author of five books, including her most recent family devotion, Fruit Full: 100 Family Experiences for Growing in the Fruit of the Spirit. This family devotion walks through how Jesus produced the fruit of the Spirit and how to abide in Christ to follow in His footsteps.
2) What do you love about writing for kids?
3) What sparked the idea for your picture book, Quinn's Promise Rock?One day, I was poking around on Facebook when one of my acquaintances told how her young son was afraid to go to school. She had tucked a rock in his pocket and told him to put his hand in there to remind him that God was with him, everywhere he went. Her story sparked an idea in me that morning, an idea that percolated as I drove to and from a women’s Bible study, then solidified after I hastily fed my boys and put them down for a nap.
Christie is the author of five books, including her most recent family devotion, Fruit Full: 100 Family Experiences for Growing in the Fruit of the Spirit. This family devotion walks through how Jesus produced the fruit of the Spirit and how to abide in Christ to follow in His footsteps.
As a mom to boys, I'm looking forward to working through my copy of Christie's The Mother and Son Prayer Journal: A Keepsake Devotional to Share and Connect Through God. This prayer journal lets moms and sons explore how to be a person after God's own heart together.
Let's dive into the interview with Christie to learn more about her and her writing.
1) Which children's book has most impacted you? Why?
My absolute favorite children’s book ever was Anne of Green Gables. I don’t know if it’s technically considered a children’s book, but I found it in my grandparents' bookshelf as a child and read it under their pool table, so it wormed deeply into my childhood brain. I delighted in Anne for her love of reading, her brilliant imagination, and bold spirit. I had the first two, but none of the third, and Anne became my heroine.2) What do you love about writing for kids?
I love being able to speak into the hearts and minds of children I’ll never meet. What an amazing gift to hear parents tell me one of my books is their child’s favorite, or that their child made a spiritual or emotional connection as a result of something I wrote.
3) What sparked the idea for your picture book, Quinn's Promise Rock?
I sent the story to her so she could share it with her son, and she loved it so much that she invited me to her house to talk about how to get it published. I had previously self-published one book, but Quinn’s Promise Rock became the story that opened the door into the traditional publishing world. The story in the book is virtually unchanged from the way I wrote it that afternoon while my boys slept.
5) One of your books, Wise for Salvation: Meaningful Devotions for Families with Little Ones, was the runner-up for the 2016 Word Christian Book award. First, please tell us a bit about this award-winning devotion for children ages 2–6. Second, what impact do you hope this book has in the lives of little ones?
6) How can parents pass on their faith to their kids in simple, meaningful ways today?Keep it simple! I have talked with so many parents who feel stuck because they can’t do family discipleship in the way the big parenting books describe. It feels like an impossible dream. Instead, I coach parents how to take that big vision and distill it into tiny, sustainable faith habits that will grow over time.
4) As the founder of Little Shoots, Deep Roots, how does your ministry help families pursue Jesus in their everyday lives?
My goal is to help Christian moms and dads overcome the hurdles associated with discipling our kids. So often we feel unequipped, strapped for time, or hypocritical, so we don’t share the way we want to.
The goal of Little Shoots, Deep Roots, is to help them discover small pockets of time in their daily lives that they can fill with tiny little faith habits. The beauty of tiny little faith habits is that they don’t take much time, don’t require us to know it all, or do it all, and through them, we are forced to realize that the burden doesn’t lay on us at all, but on the God who does the hard work of softening our children’s hearts.
5) One of your books, Wise for Salvation: Meaningful Devotions for Families with Little Ones, was the runner-up for the 2016 Word Christian Book award. First, please tell us a bit about this award-winning devotion for children ages 2–6. Second, what impact do you hope this book has in the lives of little ones?
Wise for Salvation came out of my desire to equip the parents in my church with take-home pages they would actually use! I was the children’s ministries director at my church for over 10 years, and in that time I also had my own 3 boys. I realized that these preschool take-home pages weren’t being used, even by me! They were too complicated and I couldn’t weave them naturally into my day. So I set to creating something that would only take a couple of minutes each day, but that could also become a habitual part of a family’s day.
It was in seeing the impact of those fun, interactive 2-3 minutes per day that I became convinced about family discipleship being more of a daily, small habit than the big hairy deal we often think it is. Those take-home pages became Wise for Salvation, which is currently in the process of being re-published as My First Devotional. I’m delighted that it will take a new generation of families deeper into Scripture and getting to know our amazing God…2 minutes at a time.
For example, instead of reading a 10-minute Bible storybook each day, fighting with your toddler to pay attention and not rip the pages, break it into 2-minute chunks. Or, use an interactive book like Wise for Salvation, which helps you take a single Bible passage and spread it over 5 days, allowing you to enjoy being with your child instead of trying to ram all the details into their brain. The details will come as they grow.
I hope you enjoyed gleaning insight from Christie today. Be sure to keep an eye out for more author interviews! Swing by my blog on February 12th to meet the next author in this series.
Also, mark your calendar to catch the first post in the Reaching the Lost family prayer guide series launching next week on January 15th!
CHRISTIE THOMAS lives in a houseful of boys and loves them to bits. She writes about cultivating authentic faith in the home at christiethomaswriter.com and is the author of Quinn Says Goodbye, a picture book for children experiencing loss, as well as Quinn's Promise Rock, a picture book for children experiencing anxiety. She is the founder of Little Shoots, Deep Roots, which is all about leading kids to a deeper Christian faith through little faith habits without parents feeling like they have to know it all or do it all.
Christie's books: