Until recently, I have not written for a number of years. It's not that I didn't want to write. There were times that I sat down to do just that. But I couldn't.
For many years I wrote continually. I wrote "Letters to the Editor" for many different newspapers and, as I recall, every letter was published with the exception of two. Those two were political. I suspect my opinion was not always popular. In fact, I suppose it has never been popular. Most of my writing was about the faith, Christianity, and I suppose some of the editors didn't know any better than to publish them :-)
Popularity has never been of much importance to me, anyway. Of course I want people to like me, but not if it costs me anything at all in terms of my belief system. That's another beautiful thing about writing. It's not targeted at anyone. You say what you believe. They choose to read or not.
Oh, and that reminds me. My husband has never, ever read one of my articles or blog posts in all these years. Can you believe that? Does it bother me? No, not in years. Remember, after all, he hears it verbally all the time...and far more than once :-)
Then, all of a sudden, I could no longer write. It happened abruptly. Remember when I talked about God's Waiting Room? Well, now that I think about it, those eight years in the waiting room were approximately the same years I found it impossible to write.
It wasn't that I had nothing to say (that'll be the day!). It was that it was impossible for the words to make the trip from my head to paper. They couldn't get from here to there.
That was God's doing.
I knew it then, and I know it now. He controls our gifts. He enables them...and He disables them. All according to His will and His plan for our lives and the lives of others.
So he didn't want me to write. Okay. I accepted that. It didn't really bother me because I doubted that what I wrote made much difference, anyway. I doubted that many people ever read them. It was my pleasure to write. I still had the thoughts; I just couldn't get them down on paper. Besides, I was very, very busy reading and studying. It wasn't as if I depended in any way on writing for anything at all. I rarely even missed it. I just found it curious. Actually, I almost forgot that I had ever written. It was in the past, although I occasionally talked about starting a blog, but not really believing it.
And then one day - out of the blue - I had to write. I dismissed it at first because I hadn't been able to do it for so long. Why waste the time trying if the Lord had turned it off?
But I heard that still, small voice say to me, "I want you to write. Right now." (The Lord does have a sense of humor.) "Okay, Lord. About what?" Silence.
I got up and went to my computer ... and I wrote. And wrote. And wrote. I can't stop. It's a spigot that is broken and can't be turned off. I am broken. The Lord turned it on, and He will turn it off when He is good and ready. I never know what will come out when I sit down to write. Sometimes I am amazed. Once in a while I think ahead about something I might write. That's seldom what comes out, though. At times it's not even in the ballpark - not even the same topic. It's as if I started to make lasagne, and a roast came out - which is a ludicrous example because I hate to cook.
One of the things I enjoy most about writing is that you never have any idea who is reading it, which gives a person a total freedom, seldom experienced in any other endeavor. What you are saying is not compromised in any way by virtue of a known audience. It's a lark!
The Lord and I are having a wonderful time.
I hope you are, too.
A Child of The King
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