SEND - Issue #1 - January 2022
SEND - Issue #1 - January 2022
A collection of articles for the glory of God and the good of his people
This week I have a special treat for you all. Behind the scenes, I have been working on a Magazine called SEND with a number of other writers, all of which I hope you’ll love. I’d love you to take a look and discover other writers you will love and that your heart will be encouraged by. The following article is my editor’s note for SEND, which you can also find in this PDF:
My father is an odd man. A kitchen fitter by trade, he’s spent the whole of his working life working with his hands. Here’s what makes him odd. He can’t stop. When he arrives at a hotel room, a friend’s house, or a room that contains anything which is even slightly broken, his Leatherman pops out and within the space of a few minutes, everything in the room is fixed. Memories of this natural propensity, to reset to his default settings no matter where he found himself, came back to me over the last two weeks while I edited this magazine. The first reason was that I'd had a severe panic attack, the worst I'd experienced in around half a decade. The second reason was the writers and the articles they'd entrusted to me.
The panic attack came after a particularly hard week, I'd been badly ill but still had a huge project to complete. In addition, I'd made several other commitments, all of which were vying for my attention. There was no specific instigating event, everything simply happened.
My heart raced, my breathing became hard to control and all of a sudden it began to feel like every surface had an equal gravitational pull. My wife, by my side, was trying to help, but because it's been a fair while since my last incident, she couldn't remember what to do.
Click.
Like my father, standing in a lousy hotel room, even in that state, I pulled out the mental leatherman which contained every tool I needed to get back to myself. I found the floor and grounded myself. Though I was shaking I didn't focus on that, I needed something to do with my hands so Anna ran to grab a spare keyboard switch I could click over and over and over. Finally, though sometime later, I began to recite prime numbers. I'd proven to myself what was real, I'd found a way to focus my body, and then my mind.
I've been in that situation many, many times before, and though it's been a while, having rehearsed these things, I was able to click back into fight mode. I knew what to do because I'd trained myself to do it.
The writers in this volume are much the same, though some write because they can do no other, they all, myself included, have learned to write themselves out of situations, write themselves towards conclusions, and write themselves towards God.
All of us have places we write, newsletters, blogs, and we do so because God has given us a gift, but there's a very real sense of mission here too.
SEND exists to bring together writers who send, but who have also been sent. Writers who have been through hard times and decided to fight to write their way through, inviting others on that journey.
Within the pages of this magazine are many articles about water, or that reference the water. Water is necessary, water is dangerous, water is life-giving, water can kill. Water is water. We've sailed these waters and told the tale. We're still telling that tale.
Short and sweet today as I’d love to check out the magazine. I’ll be back to my old tricks with a review of the Joy of Hearing by Tom Schreiner on Wednesday.
Grace and Peace,
Adsum Try Ravenhill
