Yesterday’s mail delivered my copy of the hardback Word Aflame Lesson Manual, The Living Word, 2020-2021, Volume 3. All writers who contribute to this project receive a complimentary copy.
As I usually do, I checked to see which lessons I had written. I write lessons somewhere around two years before they are published, so I can’t remember offhand which ones I wrote.
I looked them over, and I noticed something I don’t think I had seen before. I wrote lessons for two quarters, a total of four lessons. Three lessons were for the Winter 2020-2021 quarter. The lessons are titled “Walking in the Light,” “Rejecting the World,” and “Fight the Good Fight of Faith.”
But here’s what I noticed: There were six writers for this quarter, and three of them were students I had the privilege of teaching, one graduate of Christian Life College and two graduates from Urshan Graduate School of Theology. All in all, five of the contributing writers for the entire year were people I had taught.
I am genuinely grateful to our Lord for the opportunity to participate in the writing ministry, and I am thankful that some I have taught have taken up the same mantle. They are no longer my students; they are my peers.
Is writing a calling? This morning I read Robin Johnston’s excellent article “The Spiritual Discipline of Paying Attention” in the January 2021 issue of Pentecostal Life. Dr. Johnston referred to a book he recently read, Andrew T. Le Peau’s Write Better: A Lifelong Editor on Craft, Art and Spirituality. The third section of the book is titled “The Spirituality of Writing.” Le Peau asked, “Are people called to write?”
My immediate response is, “Yes!” All Scripture was written by those who were called to write. Specifically, The LORD said to Habakkuk, “Write the vision and make it plain on tablets, that he may run who reads it” (Habakkuk 2:2).
As with all other gifts, God gives some people a desire to write, and whenever He gives desire, He also gives ability. (See Philippians 2:13.)
Who knows? Exercise your gift, and you may someday discover that those who have been recipients of that gift are now your peers.
© 2021 by Daniel L. Segraves
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