living in the and
What happens when faith doesn't fix what hurts?
Living in the And is a Christ-centered spiritual memoir about learning to live faithfully when life refuses to resolve neatly.
Through deeply personal stories of faith, identity, family, loss, love, mental health, physical pain, and unexpected grace, Jere Van Patten explores what happens when seemingly contradictory truths occupy the same space—when we are grateful and grieving, faithful and questioning, healing and hurting.
This isn't a book about finding the formula that makes everything better. It's about discovering that Christ is present even when the prayer hasn't been answered, the pain hasn't disappeared, and the story hasn't reached its resolution.
Sometimes faith isn't about escaping the tension.
Sometimes it's about learning to live there.
Currently seeking literary representation.
what does it mean to live in the and?
Life has a way of handing us truths that seem like they shouldn’t be able to exist together.
We can love someone and acknowledge the ways they hurt us. We can believe in God and still have questions. We can be grateful for the life we have and long for something different. We can experience healing and still carry pain. We can trust God and have absolutely no idea what He’s doing.
For years, I thought faith meant resolving those contradictions—finding the answer, fixing the problem, choosing the correct side.
I’m learning something different.
Sometimes the most faithful thing we can do is make room for both truths. Not resignation. Not giving up. Not pretending the hard thing doesn’t hurt. Just refusing to believe that one truth has to erase the other.
That is living in the and.
And somewhere in that unfinished space, I’ve found Christ waiting for me.
a life lived in the and
Living in the And grew out of the unfinished places of my own life.
I've wrestled with faith and identity. I've experienced love and loss, depression and healing, physical pain and unexpected joy. I've prayed for answers that came clearly—and others that never seemed to come at all. I've lost things I thought were permanent, discovered parts of myself I once wished I could change, and learned that sometimes the life we didn't plan can still become a life we love.
These stories move through childhood, theatre, faith, marriage, fatherhood, grief, mental health, chronic pain, career upheaval, and ordinary moments that somehow become sacred when we look back at them.
But Living in the And isn't really a book about everything that's happened to me.
It's about what those experiences have taught me about God.
Again and again, I've discovered that Jesus Christ doesn't require my life to be resolved before He enters it. He meets me in the questions, the waiting, the grief, the joy, and the uncertainty.
In the and.
from the pages
“When I was in high school, I auditioned for everything and was never cast. Eventually, my theatre teacher pulled me aside. ‘Jer, I love you, and as your teacher I would be doing you a great disservice by not telling you—you have no talent and will never make it as an actor.’
I was gutted.
So naturally, I auditioned for an acting conservatory and I didn’t get in.
That certainly helped.”
“Fear loves an unknown future because an unknown future can become anything, and my brain is exceptionally talented at writing fiction. Not particularly uplifting fiction, either.
Give me one unanswered email and enough time, and I can construct an entire narrative in which everyone hates me, I’ve destroyed my career, my family is disappointed in me, and I’m eventually living in my car under a bridge eating dog food out of a can.
And all before lunch.”
“I have found Jesus in places I once thought I needed to escape before I could find Him.
That is my witness.
He has met me here.
He met me before I had myself figured out.
He met me before I had Him figured out.
He still does.”
keep living in the and
The book may have an ending. The conversation doesn’t.
I write regularly about faith, identity, purpose, family, creativity, disappointment, hope, and what it means to keep finding Christ in a life that remains beautifully unfinished.
If those are conversations you’d like to keep having, I’d love to have you along.
Join me in the and.