Sweet friends, receive my offering.
You will find Against each worded page a white page set:—This is the mirror of each friendly mind
Reflecting that In this book we are met.
— George MacDonald, Diary of an Old Soul
George MacDonald is, thankfully, becoming more widely known. Much has been said about him in recent years as the world grows increasingly aware of his enormous influence—most of it posthumous—through the effect of his writing on individuals like C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien, and G. K. Chesterton.
His book Diary of an Old Soul begins with an invitation to look at our own reflections in his words. If you’re fortunate enough to slow down and read the entire book, you’ll find it is a series of poems—prayerful conversations with God—reaching steadily toward wholeness and transformation.
There are plenty of authors writing today for money, fame, or entertainment. But what the world truly needs is writers who see their craft as a calling—who write as an act of vocation. Writers like MacDonald, who offer their words not for attention, but for the sake of truth, beauty, and spiritual formation. These are the writers who leave a lasting impact.
Few authors can be said to have written unto transformation as consistently and wholeheartedly as MacDonald. His fairy tales, novels, poetry, and prose consistently invite the reader into an experience of God’s love and faithfulness. As you enter into his work, you encounter a space made ready for you by his diligence and care. It’s not just a place to be entertained, but a garden where we can grow and thrive.
I. We Do Not Write to Be Understood
C. S. Lewis, who spoke of himself as indebted to MacDonald for the baptism of his imagination, once observed, “We do not write in order to be understood; we write in order to understand.” When we sit down with pen and paper, often our first thoughts are about what we have to say. Lewis is instead inviting us to see writing as a journey toward understanding. As we write, mere thoughts become solid words. We lean in, we focus for extended periods of time. Is it any wonder that in the process we ourselves stand to be transformed much more than our audience?
II. The Poet Must First Be Fed
One of George MacDonald’s most beloved characters is Donal Grant. In the novel Sir Gibbie, he spends years as a shepherd because it leaves him more time to read and think than the higher-paying positions he is qualified for. Later he is given an opportunity to attend college but always maintained an awareness of the simple beauty of writing as art. In the quote below he is confronting a man, Fergus Duff, who has always seen education and writing as a means to fame. Fergus has just been bragging about some lines in a sermon he is writing when Donal responds:
“The poet whose poetry needs an audience, can be but little of a poet; neither can the poetry that is of no good to the man himself, be of much good to anybody else.”
Fergus Duff has all the education Donal does, and a great deal more money and opportunity. But Fergus himself has not appreciated the written word enough to be transformed by it. Before our words can nourish others, they must nourish us. Before they can be a gift, they must be real. Writing that lasts comes not from a hunger for attention, but from the writer’s own hunger for truth—for wholeness.
We do not write merely to impress. We write to metabolize. To understand. To become.
III. The Discipline of Wholeness
Madeleine L’Engle reminds us in her book Walking on Water that the creative life is not indulgence, but discipline:
“The discipline of creation, be it to paint, compose, write, is an effort towards wholeness.”
She continues:
“The artist is a servant who is willing to be a birthgiver. In a very real sense the artist… should be like Mary who… was obedient to the command.”
Many have experienced a moment’s inspiration that results in something that seems to come from somewhere outside of themselves. As Christians, writing must be prayerful. We lean into the guidance of the Holy Spirit, and create faithfully, expecting our own growth and wholeness. It is in this surrender that our mere words become filled with the transcendent.
IV. Hosting the Word
Malcolm Guite reaches for this truth in his sonnet Hospitality:
“I turn a certain key within its wards,
Unlock my doors and set them open wide
To entertain a company of words.”
Writing is an act of welcome. We do not conjure the words—we receive them. We open our inner doors and let the guests come in. Some surprise us. Some bring gifts. Some leave us different than we were.
As we tend to them, they tend to us.
V. Writing as Mirror
And so we return to where we began—with MacDonald’s mirror. The written page, and beside it, the white one. The words we offer, and the space where the reader—and the writer—may see more clearly.
To write unto transformation is to write from the soul, not from the ego. It is to allow the words not only to say something but to do something—in us.
Whether you write prayers or poems, essays or journal entries, your words are a kind of offering. Let them be honest. Let them be alive. Let them be part of your own becoming.
Write not to be seen. Write to see.
Write not to arrive. Write to become.
Bibliography
George MacDonald
- Diary of an Old Soul. 1880. Public domain.
- Sir Gibbie. 1879. Public domain.
C. S. Lewis
- Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer. London: Geoffrey Bles, 1964.
- An Experiment in Criticism. Cambridge University Press, 1961.
Madeleine L’Engle
- Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith and Art. New York: Harold Shaw Publishers, 1980.
Malcolm Guite
- Guite, Malcolm. Sounding the Seasons: Seventy Sonnets for the Christian Year. Norwich: Canterbury Press, 2012.
(Sonnet referenced: “Hospitality”)
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