Yesterday I wrote about fearing men instead of fearing God. And while it is a big fear for me since I have experienced rejection first hand, it’s not the only fear I have.

As I have written about before, I stopped writing after college. It wasn’t until a year or so ago that I picked up writing again.

One of my biggest fears is that I’m starting too late. According to a survey Jim C. Hines conducted for his blog, the average age of an author publishing their first work is 36.2. When I saw that statistic, I was ecstatic.

I’m not too late! I still have six years to publish a book!

But, as I read on, my heart dropped. The commonality of these authors is they have written daily for years, often times even decades, before they published. Many have written several other complete novels. Most publish their third or fourth books, not their first. And each of those previous books took several years to write. Some authors even spent ten years on one book. (Check out Jim C. Hine’s blog post for more details.)

All I could think then is:

I am so far behind. I wasted ten years not writing. There is no way I have time to write two to three books before publishing one. And, why is it that I feel that this is the book I’m supposed to publish?

I have never completed a novel. I have many novels I started (most in my teens), but I have never finished one. I’ve never had the vision for a novel like I’ve had for this one. This is the first time I’ve written an ending before I have written the rest of the story. This is the first time I’ve written an ending, period.

When I was looking through verses for one of my last blog posts, I found this:

“I will repay you for the years the locusts have eaten– the great locust and the young locust, the other locusts and the locust swarm — my great army that I sent among you. You will have plenty to eat, until you are full, and you will praise the name of the LORD your God, who has worked wonders for you; never again will my people be shamed.”

Joel 2:25

This verse has stuck in my mind for the last few weeks. It didn’t really fit with other things that I had written, but it remained significant in my heart.

And, then I realized why I needed to hear it. The statistics are against me. By all standards, I am behind. I don’t have a large following. I don’t have an arsenal full of unpublished novels on my bookshelf. I wasted my prime writing years feeling defeated. What I’m trying to attempt is crazy. But, I serve a God who is bigger than all of that. He is capable of restoring those years that I lost in writing. With God, I can accomplish the impossible.*

“With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”

Matthew 19:26b

 

*I am not discounting hard work and will cover that topic in a follow-up post. Hard work absolutely plays into accomplishing goals.