“Give me words to speak, don’t let my spirit sleep, ‘cause I can’t think of anything worth saying but I know that I owe You my life. Every night, every day, I find that I have nothing left to say. So I stand here in silence awaiting Your Guidance. I’m wanting only Your Voice to be heard. Let them be Your Words.”
~Aaron Shust, “Give Me Words to Speak”
Listening to the radio recently, the lyrics above grabbed me with a force that almost took my breath. I was stunned by my own reaction to a simple song lyric. It occurred to me that what I was hearing was the cry of my own heart.
Can I be transparent, y’all? Can I just lay it out there and hope that you won’t laugh? I have this dream – I want to write. I want to spill words onto a page that will reach out and impact someone the way Mr. Shust’s words impacted me. I want to write words that give life, and hope, and encouragement, and joy, and laughter, and peace….and whatever….but I want them to be words that are straight from the Heart of God for His People – and those He longs to BE His People. I want to write words that make a difference in someone’s life, words that make change possible – and desirable. I’m not out to change the world – I just want to change a life – or a thousand.
It’s silly, aspiring to be a writer, when there are so many out there. So many with greater vocabularies, greater knowledge, deeper understanding of the things of God, more creativity, more wisdom. Who am I to have anything of value to say? I’m honestly at a loss for an answer to that question. I’m nobody….but then, so was Ananias…we don’t know ANYTHING about Ananias. He was referred to simply as “a certain disciple named Ananias”. He’s never noted in Scripture again…but, it was this unknown, seemingly insignificant, unimportant man that God called upon to open the eyes of Paul – Saul, the persecutor of Christ Followers. I have a quote on my wall that I look at often. It says, “God used Paul to touch the world; He used Ananias to touch Paul. That may be your job. You may touch the one who will touch the world.”
My desire is not to touch the world. My desire is to touch the one. So, y’all bear with me. You are my experimental audience. Ain’t you blessed?
So, that being said…here’s something I wrote back in February. I’m just going to tack it on here because basically – it’s the exact same thing that I just said up there ^^^^^.
February 23, 2014
I love Disney movies. My favorite scene of all Disney movies is from Beauty and the Beast. It’s the scene where the Beast shows Belle into his library. Floor to ceiling, every wall save one is covered in books. The one wall that is bookless is a wall of windows. Sigh. Belle’s reaction would be my own. I could be happy there – just bring me food and water.
Shortly after I gave my life to the Lord, I was in a church service where a guest speaker was ministering. At one point in the service, he came to me and told me, “I don’t know what it means, but when I look at you, I see row upon row upon row of books. I don’t know if it means that you just love books and God wants you to know that He knows what is important to you, or if it means you’re supposed to write books. So, just take it, pray about it, and God will reveal what He is saying to you.” As he said that, the scene above flashed into my mind, and I was encouraged that God was just telling me that He knows my heart.
I never thought about writing; other than the occasional scathing letter written to complain about poor customer service, or some such, I wasn’t much of a writer. Hated writing essays in High School and College, even though English was my favorite class. Go figure.
It wasn’t long after that night when, one morning sitting at home with my children; Daniel just an infant, Davey an active toddler, I wrote my first poem. And then another, and another, and another. My life, circumstances, fears, thankfulness, hopes, dreams….all flowed out onto paper in the form of rudimentary poetry. Still, I was hooked. It was an escape, a way to record my thoughts. Dozens of “poems” came – some better than others, but all from my heart.
Over time, active children and life made finding time to write – or even think – difficult, and then life took a turn we never expected. Daniel was diagnosed with autism. I dove headfirst into research and advocacy. I learned as much as I could, fought as hard as I could, and stopped writing briefly while all of my focus was turned toward this thing that had taken over our lives. The last poems I wrote were about our journey into autism. Beyond that, any writing was directed toward that end – letters to teachers encouraging, exhorting, instructing, sometimes rebuking. Letters to my representatives in Montgomery and in Washington. Internet message boards, learning from those further along in the journey, and eventually supporting those who’d just stepped into the world of a spectrum parent, offering hope and peace. I started a blog and recorded my thoughts there for the world to read. The subject matter ranged from my faith to our journey to politics to silliness. I enjoyed writing there; enjoyed the responses I got, and thought maybe – just maybe – this was something I could “do”.
It all came to a halt one morning in May 2009 when fear slammed into me, gripping my heart and life due to the actions of another. It crippled me, silenced me, and bound me into a place of uncertainty, insecurity, and inadequacy. I won’t go into it here; it’s long, ridiculously depressing – and pretty much irrelevant. Life continued, the panicked fear lifted, but the splinters and scars remained. I stopped writing. Period. End of sentence. End quote. It was just gone.
I honestly don’t even know when the desire to write resurfaced. I don’t recall. I remember a few years back a dear, precious friend – a former teacher of Daniel’s who’d been on the receiving end of many a letter offering encouragement and gratitude - sent me a message telling me that the Lord had told her that I was to write a devotional book. I laughed and thought, “Yeah. Riiigghhhttt.” Then a year or so ago, my pastor’s amazing wife asked me to consider writing something in the form of a devotional for the church website. This was still a “new” church for me – I have no idea how she knew that I enjoyed writing or what even made her believe that she could ask me and not ultimately regret that invitation. I need to ask her about that…how DID she know?
It took me for.ev.er to write something. One day, my heart was filled with worry and fear of what the future might bring, so I sat down at my computer to just type down my fear. I typed what I felt the Lord had told me, and allowed my thoughts to just flow from that. I sent it to her – unedited and not even proofread (the horror!) – and she published it on the website. It was raw, unrefined, a little confusing – but it was my heart, and it was real. And I was terrified that I’d said something wrong; something unscriptural; something that would show the world that I really don’t have it all together.
Since then, I have had several people say something to me about writing -
“When are you going to write a book?” “You’re supposed to be writing.” “You need to write.” And always, silently, in response, that voice in my head would say, “Who me? What would I write ABOUT? What do I have to offer the people of God? Who am I to say anything? What do I have to say?” – effectively dismissing their words and my own desire to do exactly what they’d suggested.
I really don’t have anything to offer to the people of God. I really don’t have anything to say. Most of the time my head is as empty as my hands. I’m no theologian. I’m no scholar. I worry that I’m not eloquent enough. I don’t “talk the talk” well – you know, church talk. Those buzz words that we in the church use when discussing things of God; the things that cause the world around us to look at us peculiarly. But God. God told me a long time ago that it doesn’t matter if I talk the talk as long as I walk the walk. That I can do. I may stumble, twist my ankle, trip over a rock – but I walk. Sometimes, I plod. Even trudge. Still, I walk. This path God has me on isn’t always easy to walk, but I know that it leads to Him, and that’s really all that matters.
So, no – I have nothing to offer. No profound revelation that will change lives, break chains, and lift up the broken-hearted. But I have God, and He has me – such as I am. (Bless Him – I so got the better end of this deal.) What I have is a Loving Father Who sometimes will whisper to me, and if I am faithful to listen, perhaps I can take what He has whispered and allow it to flow out of my fingers onto paper. Maybe, just maybe, someone will read it who is walking a path so similar to mine that they can relate and can hear God whispering to them as well.
Maybe one day I’ll learn to write concisely, without chasing rabbits, without allowing my meandering mind to take charge of my flying fingers. Perhaps one day my chaos can be beautiful. In the meantime, I just want it to be faithful.