What Color Is God’s Love?
My friend Xochitl has written a new picture book that will be embraced by all cultures and families. She is a multi-genre, multi-talented author and I’m excited to share my interview with her in today’s post.
Please tell us how you got the idea to write your new picture book, Xochitl.
After following God from California to Wisconsin, I was missing my sons, struggling with chronic pain and fatigue, and angry at my husband for getting a job across the country. During this spiritual drought, I was feeling isolated and abandoned by God. Even though I had originally felt at peace regarding the unexpected move, the overwhelming loneliness and extreme weather had worn me down. I began to sob as I cried out to God. When my rescue pup, Callie, licked my tears away and rested her head on my shoulder, I looked out the window.
The sun pierced through the dark, gray clouds and shone on a white heron that had landed in the lush green foliage by the creek next to our front yard. I began to praise God. What started as a prayer of praise back in 2018 eventually became a free verse poem, until God transformed that poem into the rhyming couplets on each color spread in What Color is God’s Love? and the accompanying Breath Prayer Cards.
In What Color is God’s Love?, a little girl with an invisible disability (like me) and her service dog (inspired by my service dog, Callie) join her diverse friends and family to explore the colorful world God made and their God-given emotions. Children with disabilities and without disabilities play and work together, discover the full spectrum of God’s unchanging character as His unconditional love flows for them, in them, and through them.
Did you face any challenges during the writing or publishing process?
I faced many challenges during the writing and publishing process, mostly because I live with chronic pain and fatigue. However, there is not one challenge that God didn’t help me overcome. Hallelujah! However, one of the challenges I faced with the writing process was learning the format. I’d never written in rhyming couplets. I do not consider myself a professionally trained poet. I revised this manuscript multiple times. I prayed over each stanza and did not finalize the individual spreads until I was sure I had each color just right, the right Bible verse, the right images, the right words, the right rhythm. When I got it right, God gave me peace and I was able to move forward.
Who is your target audience?
Children Ages 2-8.
What would you like readers to take away from your story?
For parents: I want kids to feel safe processing emotions in the constant presence of God, while using colors to remember biblical truth that affirms His unchanging character and His unconditional love flowing for them, in them, and through them.
For children: God understands us and is always with us, using all the colors He made to remind us who He is, as He fills us with love so we can love others together.
Please share an excerpt and review with us.
This playful rhyming picture book invites young readers to discover all the ways God’s love can be displayed through a rainbow of colors.
All the colors displayed in this world that God made—
every glorious, fabulous, beautiful shade—
show how good God is and will always be.
But what is the color of love? Come and see!
God created all the colors in the world, and in each one, we can discover how great His love is for us and how we can let that love shine to others! With each turn of the page, the focus shifts to a specific color–orange, yellow, blue, green, pink, black, white, gray, brown, red, purple–and explores a different attribute and expression of love through its many shades.
Where can readers order What Color is God’s Love?
You can order What Color is God’s Love? wherever books are sold or directly from the publisher at: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/711471/what-color-is-gods-love-by-xochitl-dixon-illustrated-by-darshika-varma/
You can also visit my website at www.xedixon.com and download the FREE Breath Prayer Cards on my What Color is God’s Love?
You can follow me on Instagram: @xochitl.e.dixon
Subscribe to my You tube channel at: YouTube Channel: Pause for Prayer with Xochitl Dixon
Thank you, Xochitl, for this wonderful interview and letting our readers learn about you and your beautiful new book. I’d like to add that Xochitl also serves as a contributing writer for Our Daily Bread Ministries, so if you read their daily devotions, you may have seen her name.
Here’s to embracing the colorful world that God made.
Crystal
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Xochitl serves as a contributing writer for the God Hears Her blog and compilations: