I thought it apropos to talk about gifts during this Christmas season.
There is one gift in particular that has been given to us year round. You.
As a reader of this blog you give us the gift of your time, energy, and attention. According to Google Analytics there have been over 70,000 users who have visited our site more than once this year. I had no idea. If only one percent of those returnees have received something valuable, it is all worth it.
[Disclaimer: It is likely that most of those “returnees” are internet bots which crawl repeatedly through the internet, indexing data. I doubt if an audience the size of Pawtucket, Rhode Island has visited us more than once!]
Despite the disclaimer, there’s a take-away for writers in this statistic. Your words have no impact or ministry until they are read. The work you put into your writing is done so that when (not if) your words are read, they take on meaning to the reader. No matter how few or how many readers there are, you meet each one, individually.
And that is the gift. The gift of writing. The gift of reading. The gift of growing through that experience.
My prayer is that you will continue to visit. That our words will be of some help on your writing journey. And that together we can help shine the light of redemption into a world stumbling in darkness.
Merry Christmas to all!
Fun Fridays – December 15, 2017
Amen… Your site have help me in my writing journey and shine the light into my darkness. Thanks. God bless u.
“No matter how few or how many readers there are, you meet each one, individually.”
In her book on writing, Margaret Atwood, spoke about the individual and intimate experience of one single reader with a book. Not with the author, but with the work. She identified this one reader as the reason writers write. I think I can believe that, especially for the Christian writer, because the Lord even spoke about leaving an entire flock to go and rescue the one who is lost.
So, yessir, I’m with you. Lord, this coming year, bless our work so that “together we can help shine the light of redemption into a world stumbling in darkness.”
Thanks so much, Steve.
Thank you for existing for that purpose: To “shine the light of redemption into a world stumbling in darkness.” Your faithful instruction in that direction compels me to click on that enticing email each day. Thank you.
Merry Christmas to all of you! I do appreciate all the blog posts you have published. They teach and encourage. I love that all of you take the time to answer our many questions. I may not comment on every post, but I read most of them. They have been helpful-you all seem to know exactly how we think and feel! 🙂
Merry Christmas!
Steve, I can safely say I receive something valuable every time I visit. Thank you so much.
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you, your team, and all my friends who read this!
As one of those who returns for every post here, I’m very grateful for all the information and advice you provide. But I love coming to your site as much for the community as for the content. Many thanks for both, and may God continue to bless you and your team as you help us all in our efforts to share the light.
What a touching post. Your words are indeed a gift, encouraging us to reach those who are “stumbling in darkness.”
Thank you for all the gifts tucked into each post: lessons on the craft itself, the business-side of writing, and expressing the deeply personal and spiritual impact writing can have not only on our readers but on ourselves. May we all continue to grow closer to God through writing and reading. 🙂
And if I may, I’d like to offer you a gift to say “thank you” for helping me along my writing journey…a short Christmas story: https://trainingforeternityblog.wordpress.com/2017/12/18/a-christmas-story/
Merry Christmas, Steve! And God bless you.
Joey, that was a precious story.
Thank you so much, LK! God bless you and Merry Christmas.
Merry Christmas all. Thank you to the propriotors for building a community based on wisdom and mutual encouragement. I rejoice in the personal connecting that drives the loneliness of writing into that darkness.
Merry Christmas all. Thank you to the proprietors for building a community based on wisdom and mutual encouragement. I rejoice in the personal connecting that drives the loneliness of writing into the darkness.
I read your posts each morning I receive them. Some are pearls and some are not.
This community’s a very important part of my life; y’all give me hope when it gets very dark.
Thanks to all of you for the gift of encouragement and edification these blogs have been to me this year. Worthwhile content. Professional presentation. Great experience, like visiting with friends over a meal.
May the bots keep spreading the word. 🙂
Thank you. I appreciate the content offered on this blog.
Thanks for your faithfulness to this, Steve. I appreciate the blog very much.
Yours is the best writing blog I’ve found and the one I trust the most. Thank you!
Merry Christmas, Steve and everyone! I am blessed to know you, virtually speaking.
Merry Christmas back to you, Steve. Thank you for the gifts you give throughout the year. I pray they’ll be multiplied back x100.
This blog is a true gift, Steve. Merry Christmas to you and everybody at the agency.
Steve, your blog reminded me why my co-writer and I started this journey many years ago. Our prayer from the beginning has been that God might use our stories about the past to encourage women of today in their walk with our Heavenly Father.
Thank you for those honest, encouraging and enlightening blogs. Yes, I’m in that one percent. What a blessing you and your staff have been! Merry Christmas from Cheryl in Texas.
I’ll probably never become a best-selling author, but several times I’ve learned things I wrote made a difference in the lives of readers. That certainly makes writing worthwhile.
I want to say thank you to each of the writers of this blog. I have been blessed many times by this blog and am grateful for all the information and heart you all put into it.
I will. They will. We can … by God’s grace.
Merry Christmas to you too.
Beautifully expressed, Steve! Happy New Year!
–Bev Lewis