[The following column was provided by Kingstone.]
Sometimes God gives you a dream or a task or a vision and you just know that it just has to be done. But sometimes, for whatever divine reasoning that will be only be understood in another time and place, God also sovereignly allows daunting challenges in the fulfilling of that call and vision. That is the Kingstone Comics story.
If a case could be made that some type of unseen force wanted to prevent something from happening, the Reverend Art Ayris could potentially be a living proof text for that case. The journey to completing the most complete visual adaptation of the Bible ever done almost did not happen at several stops along the way.
When Ayris was age 4 and walking in a yard, a mower threw out a piece of metal that penetrated the boy’s intestines. He was rushed to the hospital for emergency surgery but, as he was losing blood, the hospital realized it did not have enough to save him. The local prison brought in prisoners to donate blood so the little boy would live. Ayris’s mother remarked later in life she would never look at prisoners the same way again.
But another close call came right behind it. The hospital could not get Ayris’s temperature down as it rose to fatal heights. The doctors packed the little boy in ice to try to bring down the temperature. Even though his lips turned blue, the procedure worked and Ayris lived.
At the age of nineteen, the aftereffects of that surgery came calling again as Ayris was diagnosed with intestinal gangrene generated by complications of the previous surgery. A seven-day hospital stay extended into a twenty-eight day stay with a final procedure to try to save his life. Ayris emerged at 135 pounds but with an entirely different outlook on life – and a new found faith.
In founding a comics company, the central Florida pastor had little idea of the challenges (and torpedoes) that would lie ahead. With the market goal of becoming the largest Christian comics publisher worldwide, Ayris did numerous presentations to venture capital and investment groups. One New York venture capitalist offered to get in involved if Ayris would change the Kingstone logo because “It looked too much like a cross.” Ayris said, ‘No thank you’ and returned to his small central Florida town where Kingstone Comics is located and began raising capital. Like many start-ups, the company ran out of capital five times, but each time Ayris and his wife Kelly would float money out of his pastoral salary to keep production going on the Bible and the lights on.
The company eventually completed the most complete graphic adaptation of the Bible ever done that is available in over 100 countries and on track to become one of the top ten most translated books of all time. But the journey from beginning to end was a journey through torpedo-filled waters.
After receiving some initial funding, Ayris calls himself ‘Torpedo Number 1’ in that “he made just about every possible mistake that could be made in publishing.” But he kept having the sense “that God was taking the company through one Red Sea after another.” At one point, a board member was advocating to sell the publishing company due to the initial low sales and poor margins. But Ayris could not stop with the Bible only partially complete.
As Kingstone began making traction they received, like the rest of CBA market, the stunning news that Family Christian Stores was going bankrupt and withholding payments due plus inventory. “We know it damaged everyone but at the time Family was 30% of our business and was a major hit on the bow of our little ship, we almost didn’t survive ‘Torpedo Number 2’.”
On the heels of this, Torpedo Number 3 arrived when another major book distributor went bankrupt, sending another capital hit to the fledgling company. But even as the financial winds were hitting and slowing the Kingstone Bible some new, deadlier, challenges emerged in the waters.
Torpedo 4 was totally unexpected and, like the infamous Nazi wolfpack, had been lying there in wait all along. Though an avid runner, Ayris’s doctor was concerned about abnormal EKGs and a heart catherization soon revealed Ayris had been born with an artery routed the wrong way. The cardiologist had just diagnosed another man with the same condition who had suddenly died six months prior. Ayris immediately underwent open heart surgery. Though painful, Torpedo Number 4 it saved Ayris’s life and also resulted in the Orlando Sentinel running a piece written by Ayris about the meaning of Easter.
Torpedo Number 5 arrived almost exactly a year later when Ayris was hospitalized again for serious abdominal surgery related to the childhood accident. Then while in the hospital he developed an infection that resulted in the wound having to be reopened. “This was an especially dark and difficult time because I was totally incapacitated, in pain and could nothing to grow the company or keep things moving forward. But during the time in the hospital, I continued to sing praise to the Lord. One day I said, ‘I guess this is it, Lord, we need to go ahead and sell the company and let someone else carry the football across the line. I have done all I can do but I trust you.’” Then two days before being released, Ayris received word of their largest contract to date, enough to finish the 2,000-page graphic Bible they had been laboring on for seven years.
Torpedo Number 6 came out of the blue as Kingstone neared the goal line in finishing the comprehensive graphic Bible. As they were about to start the book of Romans, one of their top artists quit mid-stream, saying he didn’t want to do the Bible anymore. It was another serious delay as Ayris scrambled to find a suitable replacement but, as always, God provided.
As the Bible released and just as Ayris began working on their multi-language app and website SuperBible.TV Torpedo, Number 7 shuddered Ayris with news he had melanoma, resulting in facial surgery and a skin graft.
But neither the gale force winds of adversity nor the torpedoes of life stopped either Ayris or the Kingstone Bible. The Kingstone Bible was a Finalist for 2017 Christian Book of the Year and, this fall, The Epic Bible in partnership with Tyndale hits retail shelves.
Ayris closes the story with a Scriptural reminder of Psalm 145:11-12, ‘They will tell of the glory of your kingdom and speak of your might, so that all people may know of your mighty acts and the glorious splendor of your kingdom.’ “During the darkest of times I would cling to that Scripture and many others – and God saw us all the way through.” He is faithful. Kingstone Comics is a testimony to that.
[Kingstone is a sponsor of Sacred and Sequential.]