Michele is a freelance writer, who loves listening for God’s voice in the daily routines of life and blogging at tearsamidthealiencorn.blogspot.com and on Facebook. Having raised four children with her husband Don in a sprawling croft in rural Aberdeenshire, she enjoys extending hospitality to friends and family, refugees and others in need of respite, and B&B guests. With her 97-year-old mother living in Los Angeles, Michele is involved with all aspects of her living arrangements and, pre-pandemic, visited at least every six months. She enjoys writing, playing the cello, playing with her grandchildren in Aberdeenshire, Dundee and Glasgow, gardening and leading Bible studies.

A California girl, Michele was overjoyed by a vibrant encounter with God while she wrestled with debilitating homesickness during those first years in Scotland. He re-ordered her priorities and she has loved pursuing him ever since.

As the first editor of environmental technology magazine Envirotec, Michele was encouraged by the amount of investment and attention being given to new technologies designed to minimise pollution and remediate the degradation caused by human activities. Nearly thirty years later, she continues to be passionate about reducing her own carbon footprint and learning to live sustainably. She longs and prays for bold leadership which will address the environmental emergency with the urgency it requires, believing that the most effective leaders will be led by God.

We asked Michele about her latest series for Day by Day with God.

What do you enjoy/value most about writing for Day by Day with God?

I love the way God engages with me as I consider and meditate on each passage. I am grateful that as a writer for DBDWG, I am encouraged to personalise the application, drawing analogies from nature and my own experience. I would never call myself a theologian: I don’t have formal training but love the way God speaks to each of us right where we are.

What inspired your series on Caring for God’s creation?

Greta Thunberg galvanised me! She addressed the adults of the world, declaring that she didn’t want our hope (for passing on a cleaner world), she wanted us to panic. No! I thought. Panic paralyses; hope inspires.

I began to think how many times God tells us not to be afraid, but to trust him, and I wanted to bring that out in these notes. Yes, the situation is critical and it feels as if we are whistling in the dark. It’s time for Christians to take action both in prayer, and then in practical ways. As the commission came at the beginning of the pandemic lock-downs, I also felt energised by this awful opportunity to take stock of the way we live, and, not give up on ourselves, but move into a radical change. Christians should be providing a leading voice calling the world into a better way to live. Frankly, it starts with loving God. Love God: love his creation.

What did you learn from writing it?

So much! One of the most startling revelations came in Leviticus 26. The sabbath was made for man, as Jesus taught, but it was also made for ecological health! In threatening a severe judgment on the Israelites if they continued to disobey him, God declared he would banish them from the land and then the land would ‘enjoy its sabbaths… the land will have the rest it did not have during the sabbaths you lived in it.’ Our frantic, 24/7 lifestyle, where sabbath is often neglected, is killing our planet. We need the rest we are commanded to take, for the sake of the world.  

What is the key thing you hope your readers might take away from the series?

Deeper love for this God whose artistic joy in creation is everywhere evident. He has opened the storerooms of heaven and scooped out a breath-taking planet, and in its pristine state it could provide for all of his millions of creatures, large and small, serious and comical. Like Andrew leading his brother to Jesus, I pray that readers will be led deeper into their relationship with God, because it is he who will inspire their actions. He will raise up women and men with knowledge and power to effect change, as we trust in him. I want readers to dismiss panic by embracing an active hope in the God who uses us to make all things possible.

Click here to view the blog that Michele has written for BRF.