Wednesday, September 24, 2003
WTI Editorial from the Archives
Here's a past WTI editorial for the fall season dated Oct. 25, 2002.
WHAT HARVEST?
By Glenn White
Fall is here! It’s harvest time! Unless you’re a writer like most of us. Harvest? What harvest? You can’t even think about the harvest. You’re busy plowing through line after line, page after page, and chapter after chapter. Sunday comes, you go to church, and the sermon is about sowing, reaping, and the harvest. The message is encouraging as you sit in your quiet padded perch. Then you sing the doxology or a rousing worship song and go home.
As soon as you hit the door, the kids are hungry, the house is a mess, and you want to write. Harvest? You bet! You really have a harvest…a bumper crop of screaming kids and household chores before you can even think about writing. You flop down on the couch at 11pm. You’re exhausted and haven’t written a single word.
Yeah, the writer’s life is wonderful. Or so you thought. You find out that sowing, reaping, and harvesting are not the norm for most writers. You realize the writer’s life is a plowing life. So you write, rewrite, edit, revise and plow through page after page. Just when you think you’re done you notice the lumps and clods in your story. So, you plow some more. You take a deep breath, look again, and notice rocks and weeds. So, you plow through your story when you’re not plowing through piles of dirty clothes.
Then you struggle with unrealistic ideas about the writer’s life. Sometimes, you think publishers will grab your hard work, sow it to the world, and there will be a great harvest. You know it’s a wonderful goal but you also know writing is more about putting your hand to the plow every day. So you plow, you don’t look back and suddenly realize you really can leave the harvest to God. That's when you know you know that you're a fit writer for the kingdom of God.
Here's a past WTI editorial for the fall season dated Oct. 25, 2002.
WHAT HARVEST?
By Glenn White
Fall is here! It’s harvest time! Unless you’re a writer like most of us. Harvest? What harvest? You can’t even think about the harvest. You’re busy plowing through line after line, page after page, and chapter after chapter. Sunday comes, you go to church, and the sermon is about sowing, reaping, and the harvest. The message is encouraging as you sit in your quiet padded perch. Then you sing the doxology or a rousing worship song and go home.
As soon as you hit the door, the kids are hungry, the house is a mess, and you want to write. Harvest? You bet! You really have a harvest…a bumper crop of screaming kids and household chores before you can even think about writing. You flop down on the couch at 11pm. You’re exhausted and haven’t written a single word.
Yeah, the writer’s life is wonderful. Or so you thought. You find out that sowing, reaping, and harvesting are not the norm for most writers. You realize the writer’s life is a plowing life. So you write, rewrite, edit, revise and plow through page after page. Just when you think you’re done you notice the lumps and clods in your story. So, you plow some more. You take a deep breath, look again, and notice rocks and weeds. So, you plow through your story when you’re not plowing through piles of dirty clothes.
Then you struggle with unrealistic ideas about the writer’s life. Sometimes, you think publishers will grab your hard work, sow it to the world, and there will be a great harvest. You know it’s a wonderful goal but you also know writing is more about putting your hand to the plow every day. So you plow, you don’t look back and suddenly realize you really can leave the harvest to God. That's when you know you know that you're a fit writer for the kingdom of God.
