My name is Nathan Nipper.  I am a Christian, husband, dad, and writer.  I’ve been married to my college sweetheart since 1998.  We have a daughter and two sons and live near Fort Worth, Texas.

When I was 16 years old and living in Dakar, Senegal (where my parents worked as missionaries) my French teacher was going around the small class one day, having each of us explain – in French of course – what we planned to be when we grew up.  I did not know the proper term for movie director, so, rather than trying to explain it, thereby prolonging my turn in the uncomfortable French spotlight, I just said I wanted to be an author.  After class when we were mercifully released back to our mother tongue, a snarky classmate who knew the ambition I actually harbored inquired why I had said I wanted to be an author.  Rather than haggle with her, I doubled down on the idea that I really did want to be an author.

Perhaps deep down, my 16-year-old self knew something that my very much under-construction teen brain had not yet figured out.  I have always loved storytelling and from college through most of my career, I have been working with words across multiple media formats:  journalism, op-ed, academic, screenwriting, marketing, non-fiction TV, sports writing, blogging, non-fiction books, ghostwriting, radio monologues, podcasts, and now a fiction book.  There have been lean times and boom times.  This meandering writing journey is definitely not something I would have mapped out for myself.  As it pertains to our ambitions, most of us would prefer a straight path from novice to mega-success.  But my meandering writing path continues to give me a breadth of practice, knowledge, experience, and skill that a “smoother” path never would have afforded.  As I look back on where I have been and consider adventures still on the horizon, I see the unmistakable hand of God who is good, gracious, kind, and unrelentingly patient.  I believe He directs my steps and has been faithful to redeem my missteps.  

I love true stories, behind-the-scenes stories, underdog stories, honorable stories, overcoming-adversity stories, hopeful stories, life-affirming stories.  There are so many stories I hope to tell.  I do not know exactly what formats my storytelling will take going forward.  With the publishing of my first novel in November 2021, for now at least, my focus is books.  But if what is past is indeed prologue, books probably won’t be the only storytelling vehicle I dabble in.  Whatever vehicle it is, I hope you will hitch a ride with me.  Thank you for stopping by!  

“And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is.  May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully.  Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God.  Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think.  Glory to him in the church and in Christ Jesus through all generations forever and ever!  Amen.”  

                                                                                                            – Ephesians 3:18-21 (NLT)