If I said "Tell me what happened in your life in September 2001," most people would tell you all about September 11th and the impact it had on them. Maybe some people would talk about how they got married that month and others would talk about how that was the day their child was born. However, for the average person, we associate that month with one event.
However, I am one of those that is an exception. September 2001, indeed, brings to my mind the images of smoke billowing from the Twin Towers in New York City. I was eleven years old, and I remember many things clearly. However, one other big life event happened to me that month: that was the month I began to write.
The stories had been floating around in my head for years and years, ever since I can remember, but for me, the time had now come where gel pen must be applied to notebook, and the story must begin to take shape.
Approximately six drafts and over twelve years later, I'm still not any closer to publishing the first book of that series, but that's okay. Over time, I have grown as a writer, and I've grown closer to God through my writing. Believe it or not, writing fiction and inventing things has actually taught me more about God than I would have ever thought.
1. God's Will vs. What God Allows to Happen--This is kind of an unusual one, but I learned it while writing. If you are as close to your characters as I am, you become their friend. You created them out of your own head, and you are in charge of your little world. If you decide to move an entire town to another state, then you are free to do that. You are free to kill off characters, and you are free to decide certain characters are unnecessary and delete them before anyone ever sees anything. No one will ever know a certain character existed if you never admit you created them. You choose which stories about your characters are important enough to print. In short, a fiction writer is the god of his/her own world. But at the same time, your characters (and please do not think I am insane as other writers have experienced this) have their own personalities and sometimes make their own decisions. I kid you not, I have argued with fictional characters over what I want them to do. Sometimes, in the end, no matter how much I want them to do the right thing, they'll end up doing the wrong thing, and I am then left with a huge mess to help them sort out, which could have been completely avoided if they had just listened to me in the first place! Now, am I in control of my characters? Yes, just as God is in control of all that happens to me. But must I sometimes let my characters do what they want? Yes, I have to, just like God lets me do stupid things sometimes so that I learn what is best. If my characters always did it the way I wanted them too, they would never grow. Either way, I am in control.
2. An Increased Appreciation for God's Creative Ability--I mean, seriously, God has made a wonderful world, and He seriously is always going to be a dozen times more creative than me because He's Almighty God, and I'm just ordinary human Katrina. But, seriously, I have to pour hours upon hours (days upon days, years upon years) into creating a character, trying to decide what he will look like, develop a personality, figure out family dynamics, create his house/school, arrange friendships among other characters in the story, etc. It is an exhausting process, and you know how much time it takes God to do all that for me? I mean, from before time began, He knew all this about me, about every person on this planet. He created a world out of nothing--a real, physical world. I'm trying to create a mental world, which I can only use words to describe (due to the fact I couldn't draw a picture to save my life), and it drives me insane sometimes.
3. God's Perfect Plan--Occasionally, I am called to a very difficult and delicate task in writing: namely that of killing off a character. I usually know when I create a character whether they will die or not, although within the past six months, I have killed off two characters that I didn't think I would kill when I invented them. However, killing off characters is never something that leaves your other characters untouched. In some cases, because I write Christian fiction, they begin to question if God even cares about them. They wonder why things happen sometimes, even if they are upset about something not related to death. They cry and become upset, and I as the author can't come to them and say, "It's okay. I'm going to make things better. Wonderful things are coming, but I need to get you through this first." Even though I have the ability to jump ahead to several years in their future when everything comes together, and they see how life is okay, when I am writing that scene, I cannot let them know that. (Once again, please do not think I am insane because I have this sort of relationship with my characters. Other authors have experienced this same connection.) In this same way, God has always known exactly what will happen in my life. He has planned it all. In a certain way, my characters trust me to know what is best. When I "talk" to them, I sometimes have to assure them, "Don't worry. I have a plan. Trust me." Is this not the same thing God frequently has to tell us as Christians? That He has planned it all and that we just need to trust Him to get us through? He has seen the end, and He knows how he will guide us.
4. Gratitude That God Is Never Surprised--Honestly, no matter how much I tell my characters, "I have a plan," there are times when I seriously don't know what's going on. I know Point A and Point Z, but it's B through Y that's all a little fuzzy. Furthermore, there are times when all of a sudden an idea will hit me, and I'm like, "Oh, yes, this is wonderful!" Then I go and plunge my characters into a situation, and after I come out of my "This is awesome!" reverie, I all of a sudden realize I have no idea how in the world I'm going to get them out of this or how this even relates to the greater story. Hey, I've even had revelations about certain characters not being saved, which usually results in me popping open the laptop or putting myself into the "Do Not Disturb" thinking mode until I can come up with a salvation story for them. But, you know what? God is never shocked by anything that happens in my life. He never has moments where He says, "What in the world am I going to do?" As an author who can barely be god of her own characters some days, the fact that I am constantly in the care of a God who can never be surprised by anything is utterly amazing. The freakouts I have that leave me wanting to pull my hair out are something He never has to experience because He is perfectly in control.
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