For several years, people suggested off and on to me that I start a blog because they knew that I enjoyed writing.  I considered it, but I felt the same way about that as I did about acting when I was a teenager.  It’s great fun to be onstage when you are portraying a character, but if I was called on in class to speak my mind aloud, I was very uncomfortable.  I can write press releases and informational text all day long, but revealing myself to the world is another thing altogether.

So, about a year and half ago, when I felt God putting it on my heart to create a blog, I resisted at first.  He’d given me inspiration for an opening post and I composed it, but kept finding excuses not to take the next step.  I needed to finish our homeschool year first.  I had to plan my daughter’s wedding next.  In the meantime, my mind was flooded with things that I needed to say (and would periodically stop to put on paper).

Eventually, summer arrived and the wedding was over.  I opened up my local paper, which I rarely do, and spied a letter to the editor.  A councilman from the town that my church is located in had written it, making arguments as to why we should not be allowed to build our permanent church (rather than renting space, as we do now) on the land that we have recently been given.  Although he was attempting to veil it, I saw his prejudice of churches between the lines and that he had a false impression of what the Body of Christ really is.  I felt God calling me to respond to it.  Initially, I thought, “I’m not even a resident of that town.  What difference does my opinion make?”

That Sunday, however, as we read about the parable of the talents, I felt convicted.  When I was in middle school, my English teacher, Mrs. Kruvcyk, told me that writing was the gift that God had given me and I needed to use it.  When I ran into her years later and she asked me what I did for a living, I saw her disappointment when I told her that I was an administrative assistant.  Was I burying my talent in the sand instead of investing it in the Kingdom, as God would have me do?

I made up my mind to be obedient in this small thing that God had asked me to do.  I wrote a rebuttal letter and sent it off, careful to edit my flesh out and stick to what I thought that God wanted me to say.  That Saturday, my letter appeared in the paper and a couple of days later, one of the assistant pastors called me.  “I thought you’d like to know that we had two separate people visit our church on Sunday who said they came because they read your letter in the paper,” he told me.

I was flabbergasted.  Although I know that as a believer, I am called to spread the Gospel to unbelievers, I have always felt unqualified to do that.  I am introverted and socially awkward.  No one would ever visit church or get saved because of my influence.  Well . . . aside from my husband, that is.

The lightbulb went off then that it doesn’t matter what flaws or failings that I have.  All I really need to do is be obedient to what the LORD has called me to do and use the gifts that He has given me to His glory.  He’ll take care of the result.

That’s when I knew that it was time for me to take a step of faith and just create a blog already.  I’ve known since I was eleven years old what my primary gift is.  If God was asking me to use it, then I needed to stop hesitating and just do it, because He obviously has a plan to use it for His purposes.