Write it down!

Week 46
 
Revelation 1: 4-11
 
My wife has a longstanding habit of writing her shopping list before going to the supermarket. After all, there is nothing worse than beginning to cook something before realising we haven`t got all the necessary ingredients. She will spend time listing and then organising the list into shopping aisles in whichever supermarket she’s going to and then often forget to take the list with her!
 
It is said that writing things down can be cathartic, helping to release emotions. As a student and teacher of creative writing for more years than I can remember I have often witnessed how ideas we didn’t know we have are released when we write.
 
I recall vividly the very first creative writing class I attended. It was led by a well-known local writer named Jack Benson. Jack began every class by asking someone to “Give us word”. When an elderly Lancastrian chap piped up “Fourpence”, Jack told the class to write for five minutes about “Fourpence”. How was I supposed to do that? I had no idea what fourpence was. Now, I’m not at all poetic or lyrical. Any ability I may have to put words on paper is more journalistic and prosaic. Imagine my surprise then when I suddenly burst into satirical verse and wrote about “fourpence”. In the following weeks, I wrote lots of satirical verse and opened up a whole new area I wasn`t aware of.
 
Writing things down is hugely important to us as individuals and also to the wider world. God told many people in the Bible to write things down. The Prophet Habakkuk was told, “Write down clearly on clay tablets what I reveal to you, so that it can be read at a glance. Put it in writing, because it is not yet time for it to come true…….” (Hab 2:2-3).
 
Similarly, In the book of Revelation, John, one of Jesus’s disciples was instructed to write down everything he saw. “Write this, because these words are true and can be trusted” he was told (Rev 21:5). John was obedient and the result was possibly the most important book in the Bible. It tells us everything we need to know about Heaven and Jesus coming again.
 
I wish that I had always been as obedient as John. As a lifelong writer, you might have expected me to write down everything, but I haven`t done so until recently when I began to keep a prayer diary. My other diaries date back to Monday, September 1<sup>st</sup> 1975, the day I began work with a local firm of solicitors. I rarely look back at those dairies and their contents are really quite boring! My prayer diary began just a short while ago on Monday 10<sup>th</sup> July 2023 and has transformed my early morning prayer time and probably my relationship with God.
 
God’s promises to us are a constant reminder of His goodness and we can find them all in the Bible. My prayer diary, however, is a constant reminder of what God has said specifically to me when I`m reading His word and praying. Being reminded of those specifics serves to build up my faith as I look back at the instructions and promises He has made directly to me.
 
In my very first devotional, written many years ago I wrote about one specific word that was constantly jumping out from my Bible. “Proclaim”. One of the notes I wrote on the first day in my prayer diary said, “God saved me for something”.
 
What has God saved you to do? What are you going to proclaim, and how?
 
Prayer: Father, forgive us when it takes us time to heed and understand your word. Please fill us with your Holy Spirit and help us to sense your bidding more clearly.