Light yoke, easy burden

By the fall of 1990, I'd been on the road for four years, traveling seventy percent of my time, installing computer systems and training newsroom and classified ad reps around the world.

I'd been to Australia twice. Ireland, Spain, Venezuela three times (before Chavez, thank goodness,) Mexico, Canada, and traveled the U.S. from California to Maine.

Two weeks in Mexico magically stretched into three. And I had NO money the last week I was there, traveling from one little town to the next.

A personal weekend to New Zealand -- I had to see what kind of town was named Christ Church -- was nixed by my company when the Australian distributor wanted me to stay to do additional training. (Oops, Rach, yeah, we forgot to tell you about that...) During the training days, a married man pretended to be single and flirted with me the entire time. Thank goodness I was unmoved by his advances.

I came in from lunch one Friday with my co-workers to find I was on a three o'clock flight to Colorado Springs with one of the engineers. I had an hour to go home, pack, and get to the airport. We landed around ten mountain time and drove down to Pueblo. We arrived at the paper at midnight and worked until the wee hours. By then, I'd been up almost twenty-four hours.

Did I have plans for the weekend? A young, single girl? You bet. And it didn't include trouble shooting a down system.

I've sat in dark, out of the way offices and cried because the publishers were livid that their half-million dollars systems weren't working right. I've worked forty hours on weekends to get the output right for a classified ad section so we could make a Monday "go live" date.

I once trained seventeen Mexican typesetters gathered around one tiny fourteen inch monitor how to write production reports using Informix via a hired, outside, interpreter. A task complicated enough without a language barrier!

I'd done trade show in Las Vegas, Atlanta, and Melbourne, Australia. Toured Toledo Spain where the Christians were persecuted by the Muslims. Chains of remembrance were nailed to the side of churches.

I'd driven the highway from Sydney to Melbourne.

I'd laughed so hard I couldn't breathe. Once, I just fell down on the side walk and guffawed.

I'd shopped in St. Louis until I dropped.

I'd met amazing people, bonded with talented, fun co-workers, strenghtened my weak Spanish, faced enormous challenges and won. I'd both loved and hated that corporate job.

And I got tired. There was just a point where I said, "I can't do this travel thing any more."

So, that fall of 1990, I was in a hotel in Charlotte, NC, spending the night there before catching a plane home the next morning.

"Lord," I said just as an exhale from my heart, "Your Word says Your burden is easy and Your yoke is light. That if I come to You, You'll give me rest. I'm weary, heavy laden and I need rest. I don't want to travel any more."

The prayer was all I had because there were NO solutions in the natural. If I wasn't on the road training, there was no job. I was not technical enough, nor trained, to be an engineer. Customer support had two non traveling positions, but they were filled. We road warriors backed them up when we were in town.

Documentation was new and also filled.

Literally, outside of quitting my job, getting off the road was impossible. I'd asked. My boss had nothing to offer me. Another road warrior had tried to come off the road. Didn't work. They kept sending her out.

So, I flew home from Charlotte with a peace, but no hope of a solution. Monday morning of the next week, I went into work, prepared my expense and trip reports and checked the calendar for my next assignment.

December was blank. I had no trips. But the word Doc was written on all the weeks.

Same with January. And February. Doc. Doc. Doc.

In the course of a few days, on the heels of my prayer, a shift had changed in personnel and a position had opened up in Documentation. My boss slipped me into that slot and I planted my "glad to be home" self and never traveled again.

In 1991, the Lord began other changes in my life. My best friend, now known as Hubby, began to realize we were supposed to get married! That's a whole other story. We were engaged by the end of the year and married in March 1992.

God hears our prayers! His timing is perfect. But as we lean into Him on a daily basis, releasing our hearts to Him, He actually engages us on how to pray! And when.

That rest prayer was totally spontaneous to me. While I understood what Jesus was telling the people in that passage, I'd never applied it so deep and personal to my life.

The Lord Himself, by the Spirit, prompted me to pray, "You give rest, Lord. I need rest. Your burden is easy, your yoke is light."

He answered immediately. I believe He wanted to boost my faith. He wanted to encourage me. He wanted me to know He was intimately acquainted with the issues of my heart.

As you go into the New Year, ask Him what is on His heart. What is He prompting you to pray, to believe for in this season?

Author Intrusion

This happens to me frequently. I wake up in the pre dawn and in a twilight sleepy wakefulness, God speaks to me.

Story idea. Plot resolution. Encouragement. Ideas. Words for other people.

This morning, He spoke to me about "author intrusion." I shared it with our congregation as I led the way to Him in worship.

Author intrusion is when the story writer invades the story, telling the reader something the protagonist doesn't know. Often we see this written, "little did he know..."

Or, "By Tuesday, Jean would never want to see Frank again."

Really? How does Jean know. Trust me, I try to "see" into the future and so far, I'm blind about it.

Yet, a lot of older and classic fiction is infused with author intrusion. My guess is they used it as a way to build suspense. There are some modern, main stream writers who do this, but it's a technique I advise new writers to avoid.

Most books today are written in "third person limited" point of view. Meaning, the reader cannot know anything the protagonist(s) doesn't know. If Fred doesn't know what is going to happen on Tuesday, then neither should the reader. Unless, the clever and creative author switches to another point of view, Jean, where she confesses she's going to break up with Fred on Tuesday.

But the Lord spoke to me about author intrusion. HE, the author and perfecter of our faith wants to intrude our lives. He wants to take over in areas where we can't see. He wants us to trust He's writing a good and great story for us. About us.

But we struggle in our "third person," or "first person" limited point of view. If we don't know it or understand it, we don't believe it. Or think it exist. Or that "it" can happen.

But God is saying, "Yes it can. Trust Me."

Sometimes we just plain ole struggle with control and sin. We want to be in charge, dictate the story, tell God how it's to go down.

I always cringe when I hear writers say, "the characters just took over the story and told me how it was going to be." This is usually followed by questions of how to get out of their plot problems.

My characters say things all the time I didn't plan, but they never, ever change the direction of my story. I've deleted some really excellent dialog and scenes because they took the story to a place I couldn't use.

Let God write His name on your heart. Let Him author and perfect your faith. Listen to His story and believe. He is for you. He loves you. He has your very good in mind.