Into the Fire

I doubt if I can recreate the humor in this experience for you—and it really has nothing to do with doors per se. It does have to do with our ineptness at times to know what we’re doing and where we are headed, not to mention how we’re going to get there . . .

I traveled to Europe at the ripe young age of 20 years old, shortly after that 20th birthday. Having talked a girlfriend into going with me, we’d worked and saved our money for a year and were ready for our nearly three month adventure. Eurail Passes gave us unabated railroad travel through Europe, and we made good use of the trains. We figured out how to leave the bulk of our luggage in one place and purchased backpacks to cart our necessities on the train. We soon learned how heavy those buggers could be with our clothing and cosmetics stuffed in every conceivable pocket.

I’m not sure exactly where it was, but I believe we were heading north to visit Sweden and Norway and hurriedly boarded a train, possibly in Belgium during the daytime. It was crowded and we stood in an alcove outside the main car with other travelers, perhaps commuters. My shoulders weren’t the broadest, and that fully loaded pack weighed heavily upon them. I looked for a “wall” in the SRO environs of that hallway between cars and spotted a short curtain which appeared to be concealing a door or compartment. Looked like a good spot to prop up that pack and lean against it to give my weary shoulders some relief. When I got in position and leaned back, I quickly discovered there was no solid anything behind the curtain and I literally tipped over, feet in the air, incapable of righting myself.

Needless to say, my girlfriend and I were hysterical at the faux pas, and she helped me up as we giggled and laughed about my clumsiness. It was all the mostly gentlemen standing in the area could do not to smile or laugh out loud themselves, but they used great restraint and managed to remain silent through the brief ordeal. We attempted to control our laughter as well after observing their reactions to the fiasco, but it wasn’t easy for two young American girls eager to laugh, and since any decorum we might have managed had been dissolved and upended, we just had brief fun with the silliness. The memory still makes me laugh.

Okay, about the door . . . quite often we have no idea where the door itself is, let alone the right door. With all the writing instructions, suggestions, demands, and surefire directions, no one knows which door, if any, is the door to walk through for the answer to career solutions. Aahh, we think we’ve found the right one, but when we reach for the doorknob, it turns to ash or powder in our hands and nothing we do provides an entry to whatever is behind it. But wait! We followed all the tips, we jumped through all the hoops, we worked and polished and buffed our manuscript, query, proposal, synopsis, and pitch. They all couldn’t get any tighter if they were rubber bands in launch positions. But the door isn’t opening—in fact, it seems to have disappeared. Just like that curtain concealing an empty space, we fall into nothingness.

When you’re young and, let’s face it, full of it, you might approach challenges with a little more defiance. Sort of with the “cannot be denied” attitude. And I think that’s good because in the process of knocking your head against the wall occasionally and experiencing a measure of true success at other times, you begin to sense that things aren’t always dependent on you and how you manage to do them. Sometimes there’s a door where you had no idea one could possibly exist—and boom! you’re through it with next to no effort on your part after striving and groveling to get through a different one.

As a Christian, if you really believe you can do everything “right” according to all the instructions issued to writers to get “published”, then by all means pursue them to the letter. Just be prepared to fail anyway. What works for one person won’t necessarily work for you. You and I both know, if we’re honest, there are novels published all the time which don’t exhibit this near perfection, this new voice, this fresh idea. If you want to serve God with your writing, find out what directions He has for you to follow. Which of all the instructions and talking points made by authors, agents, and editors are the ones God is leading you to follow? Because contrary to what many of the professionals have to say, not everyone who sticks to the “letter of their laws” is going to see publication. If it was just a paint-by-numbers process, we’d all be published. No, there are too many of us shoving our way through the mind bending rules to find the right door, when really the “right” door is the one God is holding open for us when we finally discover His way to operate our dreams and desires and yield them all to serving Him.

The door that counts is the one He has ready to open. You can wrestle and wrench one open maybe, but in the long run it’s debatable whether or not you’ll find peace with your decision. True success comes in pleasing the Lord, not some editor or publisher although they can certainly occur simultaneously if Jesus is in charge. Let it soak into your soul: apart from Him, you can do nothing. Nothing of lasting value and real significance.

Father, thank you for the lessons of life, for upending us to show us your truths—we are nothing without you. If we insist on following man and ourselves without you, we will fail. In the midst of so-called success, if we haven’t followed you, we have failed. Help me not to fail, Lord. “You’re all I’m livin’ for . . .” In the Name of Jesus, Amen.

*Please continue to pray for Kristy Dykes.*