When Nate was under stress, he used to talk to himself, loud enough so anyone could hear if they were so inclined. Inevitably the subject was work-related. Sometimes he was rehearsing how a difficult meeting would go, or he might be sorting through a complex legal predicament.

When I asked him about it, he said self-talk helped him sort out tough problems. It was tantamount to the way I used journaling, for the same purpose. Instead of using pen and paper, though, his journal was verbal.

Today I talked to myself in a new way, not out loud as Nate had done and not through a journal. It was by the pages of a book I wrote that’s about to be published. The final edit was due today, but before I turned it in, my editor wanted me to rearrange the 60 short devotionals into a new order we had both agreed would be beneficial.

I decided to do it by using my 60 hard copies rather than flipping “pages” on a computer, since I needed to see them all at once. I spread them out on the bed and began organizing them by topic but ran into trouble when their titles didn’t remind me of their contents. The only thing to do was speed-read each one and label them with content-clues to help me.

That’s when I started talking to myself. The words of one devotional in particular jumped off the page and came alive with a relevant application to an issue currently heavy on my mind. I started to cry in response to the words on the page and received a blessing from that particular devotional. I didn’t recall being so moved when I’d written it, but today God had somehow infused it with a remarkable power to fit my need.

There’s no end to the ways God wants to help us. He’s never without a fresh idea of how to reach deep into our hearts to uplift and also challenge us, and today he knew I was wrestling with a tough issue I couldn’t sort out in my journal or in my thoughts. I needed his help. So somehow he used my own words on the devotional page to reassure me, ascribing double duty to the effort of writing the devotional in the first place. And amazingly, when I was finished reading (and crying), I felt like I had heard from God, not me.

We have a very clever heavenly Father. Whatever flawed offerings we put into his hands, even if it’s just a simple page of words, can be converted by his authority and power into something valuable and important, something problem-solving or even life changing. It’s all because of his touch.

So my prayer for this little devotional book is that those who read it will experience the same powerful, custom-made influence of God like I did today, and that it’ll be on every page. And if they want to read it out loud, that’s fine by me.

“All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me.” (Matthew 28:18)