After going through four back surgeries in the span of two years due to complications from dystonia, Bro. Rick Benson was limited for things he could do while recovering. Thanks to all the free time recuperating from his latest surgery, and a suggestion from his wife, the Union preacher now has a published book about a fictional gospel preacher in the 1880’s.
His book, titled “Frontier Preacher: Book One”, tells the tale of John Bradley, a gospel preacher who brings peace to the American West, one town at a time. From dealing with city leaders who are angry with his sermons against their source of revenue, to bank robbers seeking revenge for his testimony against them, readers will be amazed at the evil that the preacher must withstand to fulfill his God given mission.
The novel can be purchased on Amazon.
Write About What You Know
Bro. Rick Benson and his wife, Karen, have been serving at Union Church of Christ for 23 years, and have resided in Union since 2004. Just prior to answering the Lord’s call to preaching, Benson developed Dystonia at the age of 37, a disease that painfully affected his posture and l that led to his four spinal surgeries. His latest surgery was a spinal infusion, which restricted him from doing some of his loved pastimes of working his farm or building outdoor furniture in his carpentry shop.
When searching for something constructive to do while recovering from his spinal infusion surgery, Benson said his wife suggested writing a book. Although he’d never had an inclination of writing a book before, he said that he was ready and willing to give it a shot and possibly give copies to relatives at Christmas.
“I didn’t want to watch TV all day, so I really just did this to see if I could do it,” Benson exclaimed.
He then began to piece together ideas, characters, and locations, all from his imagination. When trying to come up with the topic for his book, he recalled that best-selling author John Grisham advised aspiring authors to write about what they know.
“So, I said, well what do I know? I know about preaching, but that sounds like a pretty boring book,” he recalled. “After my surgeries, I was watching a lot of westerns. So, a lot of the information that I used to write the book was from watching tv programs and Googling stuff I wanted to know about the west.”
Noticing that the preachers on his favorite western television shows were usually only shown ‘marrying or burying’, Benson was motivated to write an exciting tale about the life of a preacher in a western town while sharing religious truths with readers that may never attend church.
“Bro. John Bradley is a preacher for the Church of Christ. In the book, he talks to people about the bible, what they need to do to be saved, and uses bible references. Things that I do on a weekly basis,” said Benson said. “And I did that hoping that people would see it and I could present the Church of Christ to them, but in a way that it was more exciting with a storyline.”
Frontier Preacher: Book Two
Now that his first book is published, Benson is currently in the process of writing book two of his “Frontier Preacher” series by typing out ideas and working to piece the story together.
“I’m already at about 40 or 50 pages,” he said. “I kind of know where it’s going because it’s going to have a good ending. I’m just still working on what it’s going to be.”
And with one book behind him an another in development, Benson said that the process of creating characters, organizing a story, and formatting a book for publishing has been challenging, yet extremely enjoyable.
“Sometimes I can get on a pretty good role of writing, then sometimes I get to a point where I say, ‘What am I going to do to get from here to here’ and I get stuck,” said Benson. “But it’s been fun, and it takes my mind off of a lot of stuff.”
