Words for the Word

I was made to write. My soul exhales through written words.

my journals

Since I was a young girl, I kept volumes upon volumes of diaries. Today, I have a growing collection of what I call "quiet time journals," which are nothing more than written prayers, or scripture observations, or workings-out of frustration and grief and joy. It's not that I'm so good at quiet times; it's that I think most clearly either with a pen in hand or a keyboard under my fingers. My thoughts become organized. I reach clearer conclusions.

For years, I've feared to admit just how intrinsic writing is to who I am. My amateur words often feel weak and atrophied in comparison to gifted authors, like a muscle I am aching to strengthen through exercise. How can I define myself by something I haven't yet mastered?

But I am learning that "amateur" is not an antonym for "art". There is value even in the unpolished.

Lately, writing has been an increasing itch that only amplifies the more I scratch it. My blog is cluttered with words… my journals filling quickly… even my private, internal thoughts are rearranged into sentences more pleasing for the written page.

I am a woman obsessed.

At the age of seven or eight, I filled my free time writing short stories, usually tragic tales about motherless young girls. My own mother took slight offense at the constant killing off of each maternal figure.

She should have felt complimented. I knew that great stories needed calamity, and I could imagine no adversity worse than losing a mother.

And here I sit, 28 years old, writing blog posts, still about motherless children and what we call "the orphan crisis." It is almost laughable how little things change.

The difference now is that I'm more interested in happy endings.

Redemption.

God's hand of intervention.

And because God encompasses so much more than ONLY adoption and His rescue of motherless children, my writing also is shifting towards other manifestations of Jesus' love.

I'm asking God to please use my writing.

Please marry my love of words 
to my love for You, 
The Word...
(and even mingle in some happy endings for motherless children.)

Be pleased, Lord, to glorify Yourself through me. I don't deserve it, but I do desire it.

Wouldn't that be a happy beginning?