by Matthew Brough, @mbrough

I sat down to plan out an eleven-week sabbatical. I’ve been a pastor for thirteen years and I needed a break. I knew, as well, that for at least a few weeks, I needed to get away from home, and I needed something to focus on. I settled on the themes of preaching and writing. I had just recently written and self-published my first novel, and had found a love for writing fiction that I had never known was there.

I decided to attend the festival of homiletics in Atlanta, and then began scouring the web for other events in the area. It turned out that the Blue Ridge Christian Writers Conference was the following week, not too far away, at least by this Canadian prairie dweller’s idea of distance.

I went to the conference thinking that it might be a good idea to learn something about writing fiction, since by then I had already completed book two in what would now be a series. All the tricks and techniques, while helpful, were not what set Blue Ridge apart as an unforgettable week for me. It was something else entirely—learning to submit my writing gift to Christ.

The first stand alone workshop I attended was in some ways a microcosm of my entire conference experience. I didn’t know who Lori Roeleveld was (shame on me!), but her bio as a “disturber of Hobbits” (did I mention my books are Middle Grade fantasy?) and the workshop title “10 Surprising Ways God Might Use Your Writing” drew me in.

What Lori had to say blew me away. I thought I was at Blue Ridge to focus on my novels and my writing life, and not on my life as a pastor. In some ways, and it seems ridiculous to me now, I was thinking about my ministry and my writing as completely separate things. Lori pulled these worlds together with her gumption and grace.

She spoke about how bloggers want to reach a large audience, but usually have less than twenty visitors to their blog per week. As someone who kept a blog going for a few years, I could relate to this. Lori provided perspective. “Imagine if you had twenty or thirty people knocking on your door every week asking you to lead them in a Bible Study,” she said. “You would think you were on to something.”

Throughout the workshop she continued to bring the discussion of writing back to the impact it can have on individuals. She told about how she had expected her blog to have a global reach, but in the first few years it actually opened up local conversations with friends who had questions about faith.

Lori challenged us to practice our craft in every piece of writing we do, whether letters to the editor, or to members of our congregations. She spoke about actually thinking about the sentences we use in posts on social media and in emails.

Somehow, I had missed that my writing, all my writing, was ministry. People could read something I had written and be encouraged, or moved, and, yes, on occasion, challenged or motivated. As the week went on, I became convinced that God had truly given me a gift, and it was writing. I needed to develop it, and use it, putting it in service and submission to Christ. Not the kind of submission we always think of with our writing, but certainly the kind that matters most.

[reminder]

Matthew Brough is the pastor of Prairie Presbyterian Church in Winnipeg, Canada. He is the author of middle grade fantasy novels, Del Ryder and the Crystal Seed and Del Ryder and the Rescue of Eleanor, and has a series of short books on faith being released in 2017, beginning with the title Let God Be God.

Matthew is the devoted husband of Cheryl and loving father of Juliet. In both his reading and writing, he avoids books that moralize or “preach,” but loves stories of hope. You can connect with Matthew on his Website, or on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.