Hello, Friends. I’m working on a free e-book I’ve titled “Called to Write; Chosen to Publish.” I’d like to share a quote from what I wrote tonight. The e-book will be available via my websites and is an inspirational resource for writers. Let me know what you think; leave a comment and encourage me as I write for you . . .
What you write may be the key for someone to unlock understanding; it may be one more step in the right direction; the one more breath of fresh air they need. The words you write may be the bone marrow match for a reader’s situation, the water they need to live another day, the money to pay a bill.
So write.
Write, even if millions of people have access to the words, but only hundreds read it.
Write, even if writing bares your soul and you’re left alone and exposed.
Write, for your life was meant to bring the hope of Christ to those who know and read it.
And so, God provided “Our Written Lives of Hope . . .”
In graduate school, I had to cite an academic source for everything that I wrote. If there wasn’t research to back it up, then I couldn’t use it. Common sense, my opinion and personal beliefs were never enough to give validity to anything. I admit that I would often purposefully look for research that backed up my opinion, and I could usually find it. This type of research is what I am going to dub “top-down research.” I wasn’t really learning anything new, I was only validating that I knew what I was talking about.
I remember a story about Mother Teresa that made an impression on me. In the 1950s she opened a home for the dying. She brought in many dying people off the streets of India. She found one man in a gutter, brought him to her hospice, bathed, clothed and fed him. She held him as he died and he said, “I have lived like an animal, but now I am dying like an angel.”
Along with Mother Teresa I think of Princess Diana. I’ve seen so many pictures of both of them loving people that I would have be uncomfortable to show affection to… I wonder if Mother Teresa ever felt the way I did when the homeless man kissed me—uncomfortable? But she remained full of grace, and moved on to their next act of service.
The day I showed kindness to the homeless man that kissed my cheek, I ended up buying my sister’s lunch. She wasn’t homeless, destitute, or dying, but she was hungry. I fed a hungry person. She wasn’t someone I was embarrassed to be with, or someone that made me feel gross. She was someone I loved—not because I was “going out of my way to be a saint,” but because God put her in my life to love.
Today I met with a woman named Nancy whose four month old daughter died. It happened several years ago, but the pain is still there. This woman inspires me so much because she’s using her pain to help others. She’s starting a non-profit organization to provide financial support to displaced parents with a critically ill child.
Rachael Kathleen Hartman 