From time to time in this space, WestBow Press publishes articles written by our authors in which they share some aspect of their self-publishing journeys. The following are the words of Mike Lovett; author of “The Country Road Through the Book of Matthew.” To begin your self-publishing journey, get your free WestBow Press publishing guide today!
I’ve always known there was an author inside me. 
There, I said it.
But knowing that fact has never made the ink flow any faster. I can remember, as a kid, writing short stories. As a teen, I even managed to win a major writing contest. In my adult years I became a prolific technical writer for whatever career I was in at the time. After coming to Christ, I wrote several pamphlets that were used at my church for newcomers to the faith. But the author in me was never able to write the book that kept stirring inside my soul.
Did I mention that I am also impatient?
I was the kind of kid that couldn’t wait for the next day. I used to use a razor knife to open my Christmas presents ahead of time to see what I got and then retape them and put them back under the tree. I would even get in front of my siblings at the dentist’s office because I simply could not stand to wait!
Which brings me back to the problem of writing a book. Every time I would sit at the keyboard, I expected the book to just start flowing out. It never did. I would become frustrated and walk away. But after giving my heart to Christ, I began to understand that things don’t really happen according to our plan. God’s timing controls this universe, even though we like to play like we have control over what we do. So even though I thought I was an author, I decided to give my plans up and allow God to show me what it was that He had planned for my life.
About four years ago, I began sharing scriptures on my Facebook page. Each day, I would post random scriptures to share with my friends. Soon I began adding a small devotion along with them. Then I felt that I could reach more people by making a Facebook page that could reach beyond my circle of friends and so I began The Country Road. About the same time, I was struggling with how to live out Paul’s admonition to Timothy that all of scripture is inspired and useful (2 Tim 3:16) and so I set out to use The Country Road to take those who were following the page sequentially through the New Testament. After about three years, I paused one day to look back and realized something. When I wasn’t even trying to, I had written a book! Not just one, but several. When I gave up what I wanted and committed to follow God’s plan for my life I received what I had been looking for and so much more!
With The Country Road Through The Book Of Matthew now in print, I look back and see how God worked things through His plan in ways that I never could. The years that I thought I was spending living in the waiting room, He was spending teaching me and guiding me down a path that lead to this moment. When I was wondering if I would ever write a book He was clearing the path of obstacles I never knew existed. And while I was questioning if the paragraph I was writing every day was even worth the effort, He was compiling a series of books that allow the reader to spend time with Him daily as they stroll through the New Testament together. Even the desire He gave me to use a Christian publisher led me to Westbow, a company that I have come to know holds the same values that I do.
So my advice to new authors is simply this. If you feel like you have a book inside of you but you can’t manage to put it on paper, try giving it up to God instead. Follow what He has planned for your life and, if a book is part of it, it will find its way to paper. If not, He will always have some other way in mind for you to get out the message you have in your heart. His ways are always better than ours.
I’ve always known there was an author inside me.
There, I said it.
But now I know that the Author inside of me is the Holy Spirit. And I have discovered that what I once thought of as the waiting room is actually the life that He had planned for me all along.
-WBP-
WestBow Press authors who’d like to share a 350-600 word experience related to the self-publishing of their books, are invited to do so by sending a message through the WestBow Press Facebook page and follow the WestBow Press Twitter account @WestBowPress. WestBow Press reserves the right to edit stories for content, grammar, punctuation and length.