March 4, 2019 | Mikayla Heldt


SAGU President Kermit Bridges with Karen Norton during the book signing
SAGU President Kermit Bridges with Karen Norton during the book signing

SAGU alumna, Christian speaker, and author Karen Norton has recently released her book “Marginalysis, Building Margin into our Busy Lives” for people who need to create healthy boundaries between the busyness of life and spending time talking to and listening to God.

The SAGU Bookstore hosted a book-signing event for Norton on Friday, March 1. “I was excited to have the opportunity to be on the SAGU campus once again,” says Norton. Featured with “Marginalysis” were Norton's other two books, “Mom, God's Got This” and “Connections”.

Norton’s “Marginalysis” is an 82-page book to help readers examine their lives and to “reestablish and maintain intimate daily time with God” so that they can go about their busy days with joy instead of stress.

“We’re always just trying to fulfill our own agenda and sometimes I think we miss God’s agenda and what’s important to Him,” Norton says.

Often times we can get so busy with work, family, and church that we can forget to spend that important one-on-one time with the Lord to listen to what He wants us to do. This can result in chaos and frustration in many aspects of life. According to Norton, this need for healthier “margins” is the inspiration behind her book, coupled with her day-to-day walk with Christ.

“I’ve just looked at my own process through life, my own walk with the Lord and just what has worked for me personally in spending time with God,” she says.

One of Norton’s favorite aspects of her new book is what she calls the “daily personal accountability chart”, which allows her to keep track of her growth in her relationship with God.

“I look at this chart each day…and hold myself accountable to things I want to do and uphold in my spiritual walk, my prayer time, my Bible time. This has really helped me keep myself accountable, so I thought it might help someone else too.”

Norton encourages everyone to reassess our priorities in life and build “guardrails” during personal time with God to protect us and keep us healthy in every area of our lives.

“I want people to hear from God and learn to live that disciplined life,” she says. “I want them to step back and have an honest evaluation of the margins of their lives and make sure they’re accomplishing what God created them to accomplish.”

All proceeds from book sales during the book-signing event went toward the Jamie Norton Lund Scholarship.