To be a writer and an artist is to be given a gift and a responsibility. I am to care for the gifts and talents I have been given. At the same time, I should have fun with them.
That isn’t always the case. Sometimes, the writing comes hard. The art refuses to take shape on the page. I erase and erase and erase and ultimately push the page away in frustration. I know enough to get away from the work. I also know enough to stick with it; at times, the only way to get somewhere is to walk through the murky middle.
It’s to be obedient when the work isn’t easy or fun. I know that if I consistently come to the screen and to the page even when I don’t feel like it that I will begin to feel like it. Obedience brings joy. Waiting for joy to come does nothing. It’s like waiting for inspiration. Inspiration and joy don’t work like that. They have to be gone after with a club, as Jack London would say. They are only found through diligent, persistent, and often painstaking work.
David the psalmist knew this reality. In Psalm 119 he says he will run the way of God’s commandments for God will enlarge his heart. Obedience done in faith eventually leads to joyful, willing, loving and trusting obedience, i.e., fun. It is an obedience rooted in truth, not emotion, that ultimate delight comes from loving God and others through the gifts and talents I have.
It is then that the work becomes fun again. It may have been hard; it will be hard again. There will be more murky middles. I am not afraid of them for I have learned the secret to having fun longterm: seeking God and His glory first and forever.
Image: Roco Julie (Creative Commons)