Duke Divinity School professor Kate Bowler called me to talk through a critical direction-setting choice she faced. A few months before, she had chosen to fight for her life by aggressively treating stage 4 cancer. She wrote her story, later published in the New York Times(, to explore what had happened and what it meant. On this day, a publisher had offered to publish her memoir as an "airport book."

She knew what this offer meant.

The publisher thought her book could be a best-seller. Sharing her story could help many people by offering hope and a picture of faith in Christ. But to write this book and manage her growing public presence would take enormous time and effort -- time away from her research, her scholarly writing, her teaching, her family. And she was still sick, dealing daily with doctors and treatments.

Kate was pivoting.

She had a foot firmly planted in God, in her family and friends, and in her vocation. She was very clear about where she stood. But she wasn't sure whether she should turn from the classroom to mainstream media.