Wanda Brunstetter

The Christmas Prayer

{September 2018}

Only the brave—or foolhardy—would attempt a cross-country journey late in the season. Three wagons meet up in Independence, Missouri, in April 1850, and their owners decide to keep forging ahead despite many setbacks and delays. December finds them in the Sierra Nevada Mountains when a sudden snowstorm traps them, obscuring the trail.

Cynthia Cooper is traveling with her mother and the man she has promised to marry. But as Christmas is upon them and they are hunkered down in a small cabin, she is forced to reevaluate her reasons for planning to marry fellow-traveler Walter Prentice. When a widowed father heading to a California ranch and a gold prospector both show an interest in Cynthia, she weighs her dreams for marriage alongside her responsibility to care for her mother. Can love win over her timid heart? Find out in this historical Christmas-themed novella.

Mistaken Identity

In my recent novel, The Hope Jar, Michelle Taylor takes on the identity of Sara Murray, an elderly Amish couple’s granddaughter. Willis and Mary Ruth Lapp have never met Sara before, and since Michelle resembles their daughter, Rhoda, whom they have not seen since she ran away from home many years ago, they believe the imposter is actually their long-lost granddaughter.

Has anyone you know ever hidden a truth from you or said something hurtful–something you never would have expected? If so, how did it make you feel? Were you able to forgive that person?

What does the Bible teach us about forgiveness?

One thing I admire about my Amish friends is their ability to forgive others who have hurt, or even harmed them. This kind of forgiveness does not come easy for anyone, but with God’s help we can find it in our hearts to forgive anyone who has hurt us physically or emotionally.

“Jesus said, ‘If ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.'” Matthew 6:14.