by Eva Marie Everson
John Wesley (1703-1791) the English cleric who became a leader of a revival movement known as Methodism, once wrote these words:
After my return home, I was much buffeted with temptations, but I cried out, and they fled away. They returned again and again. I as often lifted up my eyes, and He “sent me help from his holy place.” And herein I found the difference between this and my former state chiefly consisted. I was striving, yea, fighting with all my might under the law, as well as under grace. But then I was sometimes, if not often, conquered; now, I was always conqueror (Journal of John Wesley, “I Felt My Heart Strangely Warmed”).
As we writers prepare for upcoming conferences, whether we are new to this writing thing or not, we often find ourselves returning home with a source of positivity pulsing through our arteries and veins that declares, “I can do this! I can write a book . . . an article . . . a blogpost . . . a devotion . . . a poem.” We have everything we need now. Someone told us we canwrite. Someone else showed us how to beef up the weak areas. Someone pointed out where our strengths lie. We sat under the masters of the craft and took copious notes. We returned home and pored over them and, then . . .
