Overflowing by Valerie Ronald

                                                                              painting by the author
 

Before I step out of the car, I hear the deep roar of the waterfall echoing up from the ravine below. I make my way down a steep path with the increasing thunder of the falls reverberating in my chest. The dense coastal rain forest drips with mist created by the swollen river cascading in a high free fall to the deep pool below. The constant flow of glacial river water is mesmerizing, ever-moving, a living force breathing mist and noise into the atmosphere like a mythical dragon. I wonder how many thousands of years this particular flow of water has carved its way through the landscape, shaping the rocks and terrain on its way to the sea?

God’s overflowing generosity toward His people has its source in His heart of love. He floods us with grace upon grace, demonstrated in the giving of His Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior. There is no end to His love, His faithfulness, His grace, streaming in a perpetual river to those He loves. His blessings fill us to overflowing, splashing over onto others, as He intends. There is a reciprocity in His blessings, for they are given to return to us in even fuller measure. This is not to say we selfishly seek after God’s gifts so He will bless us even more. An overflowing vessel is first filled to its brim before its contents spill over. When God’s blessings overflow to others, we cannot help but be blessed as well.

Don’t hold back—give freely, and you’ll have plenty poured back into your lap—a good measure, pressed down, shaken together, brimming over. You’ll receive in the same measure you give. (Luke 6:38 The Voice)

So how does this concept translate to our writing life? What sets us apart from writers who do not follow Christ? They may have extensive gifting, talent, education and experience informing their writing. Although we have the same opportunities, as believers we draw from a different source ˗˗ a supernatural source ever-flowing from the throne of God. No matter what genre or topic we choose, when the Spirit of God fills us it overflows into our writing.

The heart overflows in the words a person speaks; your words reveal what’s within your heart. (Luke 6:45)

A waterfall is a metaphor of our writing life as believers. Before a waterfall occurs there must be a source of abundant water. The headwaters of a river often begin high in the mountains where glacier melt and gravity create a water flow gaining speed and volume as it runs downward. When it reaches a precipice, the water plummets over, creating a waterfall. Just as a river is fed by ice melt, rain and ground water, we need a pure source of living water filling our spirits before our words overflow beneficially to others. Jesus is the only source of living water able to saturate spirits with the truth of who He is. But first we must drink of Him˗˗fill ourselves to the brim with His living words until they overflow into our writing.

Jesus said, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to Me and drink. Whoever believes in Me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.” (John 7:37-38 NIV)

A waterfall creates a lush environment. Flora and fauna thrive around it as it releases oxygen-rich mist into the air. People are drawn to the music and scent of its rushing waters, stimulating calm and meditation. Do your readers grow spiritually from reading your writing? Do you provide refreshment and enrichment with your words? Does the abundance of joy and peace God pours into you overflow on the page, providing hope to your readers?

I pray that God, the source of all hope, will infuse your lives with an abundance of joy and peace in the midst of your faith so that your hope will overflow through the power of the Holy Spirit. (Rom. 15:13)

After spending time by the waterfall, I felt renewed and energized by its bounteous flow. I know there are scientific explanations as to why a waterfall makes us feel good. I choose to see it as a beautiful picture of God’s blessings overflowing into the minds and spirits of His waiting children, so they in turn, overflow these blessings to others. 

 

Valerie Ronald writes from an old roll top desk in Portage la Prairie, Manitoba, with her tortoiseshell cat for a muse. A graduate of Langara College School of Journalism, she writes devotionals, fiction and inspirational prose. Her purpose in writing is to encourage others to grow in their spiritual walk.

What God Will Do by Marcia Lee Laycock

When I read the prompt for this month, asking what ministry opportunities God has provided through my writing, I immediately thought of all the blessings I have seen and heard about over the years because of my small column in a local newspaper.

When my husband took on the senior pastor’s position in his first church one of the things he had to do was write a weekly article for the newspaper. It was due the day after we arrived in the community. Already a bit overwhelmed with his other responsibilities, he asked if I could do it. That was the beginning of my faith column, The Spur. The column ran for about eighteen years and is now still running in a coffee news flyer that is distributed all over the province and beyond.

The title seemed fitting since we were now living in the middle of cowboy country and the verse from which it was taken was also appropriate – “And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds.” I had no idea, when I chose that verse and that title, how much God was going to do just that.

Since my photo was usually published with the column, people would often stop me on the streets of that small town and talk about what I had written that week. Sometimes they just said thank you. Sometimes they asked for prayer. Sometimes there were tears. Emails arrived in my inbox from all over the province and beyond. I was often awe-struck by how God had used the words I had written to help, to heal, to draw people closer to Himself.

And then they started asking me to put the column into book form. Hesitant at first, when I finally gave in I was again amazed at how far that little book travelled. I received emails from as far away as India and England and was asked by a man in South America if he could translate it into Spanish and give it away to the believers there. At a speaking event a woman rushed to tell me that she had given The Spur of the Moment to her neighbour, a woman she had witnessed to for years. “She called to tell me she had read the book from cover to cover and gave her life to Jesus!”

My other books, too, have used by God. After reading One Smooth Stone a young woman called her mother to tell her that “I know now that in spite of everything, God really does still love me.”

It just doesn’t get any better than that.

The verse often comes to mind that “God is able to bless you abundantly, so that in all that you need, you will abound in every good work” (2 Corinthians 9:8). And Ephesians 3:20 – “Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.” 
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Marcia Lee Laycock writes from central Alberta Canada where she is a pastor's wife and mother of three adult daughters. She was the winner of The Best New Canadian Christian Author Award for her novel, One Smooth Stone. The sequel, A Tumbled Stone was short listed in The Word Awards. Marcia also has three devotional books in print and has contributed to several anthologies, including the Hot Apple Cider books. Her work has been endorsed by Sigmund Brouwer, Janette Oke, Phil Callaway and Mark Buchanan.

Abundant Rain, an ebook devotional for writers can be downloaded on Smashwords or on Amazon. It is also now available in Journal format on Amazon. 

Her most recent release is A Traveler’s Advisory, Stories of God’s Grace Along the Way.

Visit Marcia’s Website

Sign up to receive her devotional column, The Spur

Flipping the Perspective Coin - M. Laycock

This is the season of golden light in Alberta. This fall has been glorious with temperatures remaining in the mid twenties, Celsius, for some time. It's the kind of weather that makes me want to go horseback riding, a hobby I have loved since a young child. Unfortunately my riding days are over due to a leg injury that happened when I fell while rock climbing on the cliffs of Lake Superior's north shore. The injury has finally caught up with me and keeps me from doing some things I have enjoyed in the past. It's a loss I feel deeply at times, but then, the doctors once warned me I might be in a wheelchair by now, so I'm counting my blessings.

It seems there are always two sides to the perspective coin. You can either look at all the frustrations and barriers that will continue to arise in your life and in your career, or you can focus on the obstacles that have already been surmounted and the answers to prayer that helped you leap over them.

There are times when I get frustrated with the barriers in my life and writing career, but then I remember …

My second novel, A Tumbled Stone, was published because of the generosity of a friend and the answer to the prayers of many more.

I’d prayed about the money needed to submit to A Second Cup of Hot Apple Cider and three speaking engagements popped up, giving me enough to submit and purchase a few copies. God supplied what I needed just in time.

A spontaneous decision to submit a YA manuscript to Steve Laube at Write Canada led me to ask for prayer and that led to an encouraging interview and his request for the full manuscript. Once again, prayer opened doors.

Recently I prayed that God would begin to open up speaking engagements for me. After being out of the loop for over a year due to a battle with cancer, I was a bit worried that it would take a while to build up that part of my ministry again. Then I was asked to speak at a Spring Tea; another woman called to ask if I would speak at a few Christian Women's clubs in Central Alberta and another invited me to speak at a retreat in Saskatchewan. I'm now in the place of having to pick and choose which engagements to accept. God answers. God provides.

Sometimes the perspective coin lands on the wrong side and when it does I am blocked by the burdens of frustration and disappointment. It's at those times that I have to make the choice to flip the coin over. Counting the blessings releases the joy of contentment and renewed enthusiasm.

So go ahead, flip that coin.

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Marcia's devotional ebook for writers of faith, Abundant Rain, is now available on Amazon. Visit her website for more information on her speaking and writing ministries

And What About the Others?

The faces keep coming back to me.

I was scrambling to put together the last few articles for the next issue of the magazine. I had the copy for a brochure on our relief and rehabilitation program to write. Then there was the prep for that Bible study on the 6th commandment. All the pieces came together when I remembered the intense discussion our congregation in Caracas had gone through years ago when we were choosing a name for our church. We eventually settled on Isaiah 58:11 and named the church “The Spring.” Sometime after the decision was made I looked at the context of the passage and had an “aha” moment—a moment that came back as I put together the magazine, wrote the copy, and prepared the Bible Study.

Bill Hybels (and others) mentioned in his comments about the sixth commandment, “You shall not kill,” that we can kill by neglect, neglect of those who are dying of illness or hunger when we have the resources to help them live. The promise from the passage in Isaiah from which we chose our church’s name is contingent on looking after the needs of the oppressed, the poor and the naked. The article for the magazine and the copy for the brochure were about children in refugee camps in Somalia.

“The Lord will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail” —Isaiah 58:11, NIV.

“Success,” whatever we apply the word to and however we interpret it, depends on how we respond to the needs of others. God’s blessing on our lives and on the communities with which we fellowship, depends on how we care for those who can’t care for themselves.

It’s an “aha” moment. Now to respond to it.

Abundance

"Give and it will be given to you; good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over will be put into your bosom. For with the same measure that you use, it will be measured back to you." - Jesus, Luke 6:38

Who doesn’t salivate at Jesus' word picture of abundance? Yes, bring it on!


But I wonder how often I don’t recognize the abundance I already have.

We have an abundance of food in our freezer and a well-stocked pantry


We have an abundance of books (this bookshelf x about 5).

I have an abundance of clothes.

We have an abundance of good memories in shelf-fulls of photo albums and many more photos in boxes and on computer disks.


We have an abundance of CDs (these are just the ones in my office).

I have an abundance of pens, pencils and paper.


I have an abundance of Bibles (many more than this!)

You get the picture?

I think this "good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over" has already hit me in many areas of my life. I think what I'm needing most now is an abundance of thanks!

Brick Walls - M. Laycock

I've been fighting frustration lately. Frustration with people who seem bent on destroying something beautiful, frustration with doors that slam in your face, frustration with pounding on brick walls that show no sign of crumbling. I confess I was ready to quit a couple of days ago. Ready to turn my computer off and walk away.

But then I managed to have a good night's sleep. (Amazing what that will do for your atttitude!) And then I received an e-mail from a woman telling me how much she is anticipating my sequel. And then I found this video clip.

It's of a university professor named Randy Pausch, giving his last lecture because he was dying of pancreatic cancer. He showed slides of his CAT scan, then he talked about acheiving his childhood dreams, dreams about creating something worthwhile, dreams about doing something important, dreams about just having fun.

I watched in awe as he laid out the pattern of his life - a life in which, in one way or another, he had managed to accomplish all of his childhood dreams. There was no spiritual message in his lecture, yet seeing how his life unfolded you couldn't miss the blessings of God.

He made a few statements worth noting.

The first one is - "Luck is where preparation meets opportunity. So be prepared."

The second is - "Brick walls aren't there to keep you out. They're there to show you how badly you want to accomplish your dream."

And the third - "Enabling the dreams of others might just end up being the best part of all, and certainly the most fun."

I listened to this video as I cut up another stack of bookmarks - another small battering ram for that brick wall.