Writing is often a tool of necessity, art, or social engagement. But have you ever used writing to connect with God?
Writing can be a powerful way to reflect on your journey of faith, to interact with scripture, to pray, and to discern God’s calls to you. Plenty of writers (I don’t know who said it first, but I’ve seen this attributed to both Flannery O’Connor and Joan Didion) talk about writing in order to think—rather than getting all their thoughts figured out first so that they can write. I think a similar paradox can apply to faith: people can write to believe. Writing can illuminate, grow, and sustain a person’s faith. The process of putting words on a page, whether in the form of a fictional story, poem, meditation, prayer, or diary entry, to give voice to or reach for that which awakens your spirit can be almost sacramental.
One way to connect with God through writing is by journaling prayers. The method I have used for this practice is to sit down for 15-30 minutes and write out my concerns, frustrations, or joys from the day or week in conversation with God. Often, though not always, by the end of the prayer, I have arrived at a place of clarity or new perspective. Praying through journaling has enabled me to wade through the fog of confusing thoughts and feelings to discern what matters to me in various situations and to bring it all to God.
Creative writing can also be a spiritually formative medium. I have composed poems to engage scripture imaginatively, to reflect on moments in the liturgical year, and to make sense of my faith. I have also ventured into fictional prose to write stories about scripture. Creative writing has helped me gain new insights about all-too-familiar elements of Christian faith, inhabit a posture of openness to the mystery of the divine, and uncover the prayer my life wants to pray in that season.
Even if creative genres are not your thing, a spiritual writing practice is something anyone can do. You don’t have to love writing, be a grammar expert, devote hours to it, or even use words. Iconography, after all, is a form of writing. The point is simply to be who you are before God through writing—whether searching, doubting, struggling, rejoicing, petitioning, lamenting, raging, or hoping.
A spiritual writing practice is something anyone can do. You don’t have to love writing, be a grammar expert, devote hours to it, or even use words.
If you aren’t sure where to start or how to find a writing practice that works for you, here are some ideas that might inspire you:
1 | Write out already written prayers
Sometimes when words elude you, the prayers that others have shared can give you the words you need and guide you toward your own prayer. Try writing the Lord’s Prayer, a familiar psalm, a favorite hymn, or a liturgical prayer as a spiritual writing practice. You can copy the whole text verbatim or tailor it as you go to your situation or context.
2 | Freewrite
Prayer does not have to be formal or grand. It does not even have to be coherent or put in complete sentences. If you have concerns over saying the right or proper words to God or fears about writing a good enough prayer, freewriting may be a helpful spiritual writing practice. Freewriting involves writing down whatever words come to mind as quickly as possible without editing or making corrections along the way. You don’t have to use capitalization or punctuation. You don’t need to worry about complete sentences. You don’t have to have a topic or goal in mind. You just write and let the words and phrases come as they will, whether they make sense or not. If you don’t know what to write, then you can just write, “I don’t know what to pray.” If you want to have some structure to your freewriting, you can begin with a topic in mind, or you can set a timer for 2, 5, or 10 minutes or so to keep the practice manageable.
3 | Write one-word prayers
Who says prayers have to be long? If you prefer to try a short, succinct writing practice, write a prayer each day that consists of just one word or phrase, like “compassion,” “eat,” “among.” If you need a few more words than that, you could try writing a Twitter-length prayer of 140–280 characters.
4 | Write creatively
Stories, poems, and imaginative writing can open up people’s hearts, minds, and souls to encounter God in ways that other modes of writing may not facilitate as well. If writing your prayer directly to God in journal entries does not resonate with you, try taking a creative or imaginative approach to your writing. Compose a fictional story that expresses your prayer. Write a screenplay dialoguing with God. Draft a poem or a song. Write an imaginative monologue of a figure in scripture raising their prayer to God. Craft your spiritual autobiography or a memoir style story.
5 | Draw
Writing does not have to be done solely with linguistic symbols. Drawing can be a form of writing too. If you prefer to illustrate what you want to say to God, try drawing your prayers through pictures or sketching. You don’t have to be an expert at visual art to practice this mode of prayer. One creative way to draw prayers that requires no drawing experience is by “praying in color,” a method of prayer developed by Sybil MacBeth in which you doodle on paper to bring a person or situation into God’s presence. You can check out her website here to find out more about this practice.
6 | Write with your voice
Writing also does not have to be done with your hands. You can use voice recognition programs to write by speaking. If you need or prefer a way of writing that you can do vocally, try speaking your prayers with voice recognition and transcription. You can also try prayer vlogging by creating a video journal of your prayers.
7 | Write God’s response
Most prayers are written or practiced with a focus on people’s own points of view. But what if you were to pray by imagining how God might respond to your prayer? How might your requests and thanksgivings sound in God’s ears? What hopes might God have for the situations you are praying about? Instead of only writing prayers from your point of view, try writing a message that God might send to you about your prayer. The goal is not to presume to be God, to put your words in God’s mouth, or to get God’s thoughts right. The purpose of the practice is to listen, reflect, inquire, and relate to God—and to let God relate to you in a different way. Write by listening for how God may be listening to you. If the prospect of writing God’s response is too intimidating or uncomfortable, then write about how Jesus might respond to your prayer.
I also invite you to consider these tips in order to develop a spiritual writing practice that is meaningful and feasible for you:
Remove “should”
Prayer can quickly get engulfed by all the shoulds that Christians have imbibed. The pressures of not praying long enough, often enough, with the right formula, with the right attitude, or in the right circumstances can make prayer so guilt-ridden that it never happens or becomes a source of dread. If you find yourself gravitating toward some should in a prayer practice, see if you can discern where that “supposed to” pressure is coming from and then pave an alternative path to your practice that is grounded in God’s liberating and life-giving love for you and all of creation. Ask yourself, What if, instead of approaching prayer by focusing on all the ways my practice or life doesn’t measure up, I begin by letting God love me?
Name your needs
Prayer practices are not one-size-fits-all because everyone’s life situations and needs differ. What works for one person may not work for a hundred other people. Prayer is not about contorting and neglecting yourself or your life to fit one particular practice. You are allowed to design your prayer practice to work with—rather than against—who you are and what you need. So identify what you need in order to begin or develop a prayer practice that you can sustain and that can sustain you. Do you need a quiet space or time of day? Do you need a neighbor to take care of your children so that you can journal in the park? Do you need to pray in community? Do you need a practice that you do three times a week rather than every day? Do you need variety or repetition in how you pray?
Start small
The excitement of starting a new activity can be supplanted by overwhelm if the activity is too big, complex, or undefined. So begin with small, manageable steps into your practice. Start with praying one day a week or 2 minutes a day. Make your initial goal to show up and put one word on the page. If a small step like this is all you can do, that’s okay and good. No step is too small if it helps you cultivate a practice that you can return to. If you have energy and time to increase your practice after you have established a rhythm with your initial step, that’s okay and good too.
Prepare
Practices usually take some amount of planning and organizing in order to get done. Once you know what you need and how you want to get started, make whatever preparations you need to do so that you can start your practice. If you use a schedule or planner, put your practice on your calendar. If you need a notebook dedicated to your spiritual writing practice, get a notebook and pen and put them in a place that is easy for you to access. If you want to take a walk before you start, set aside time to go for a walk. Organize your time, space, and materials to help you do your practice. The intention here is not to give yourself more work to do or to create ways of procrastinating; the goal is to make your practice easier for you to accomplish.
Pray as you are
One of the greatest temptations with prayer for Christians is to dress up our prayers or ourselves for God. Certain topics, feelings, or ways of praying are treated as off-limits, so prayer becomes a practice of politeness or pretense that we’re fine when things are not fine. It’s as if Christians have been taught You can’t be human before God. But God created human beings and loves us in our humanity, not in spite of it. No topic, feeling, or experience in our lives is too much for God. God is not going to give up on you if you bring all you are and all you are going through into your prayers. God is not going to walk away if you shout at God, sob, tremble, and fall apart. So when you pray, do what you can to pray as you are. Pray when you’re joyful and when you’re despairing. Pray angry, pray anxious, pray wounded, pray hopeful. Just try to be yourself rather than some other person you might think you need to be before God.
What spiritual writing practice appeals to you? What tips or wisdom do you have to share from your own spiritual writing practice to help others? Please share your thoughts and questions in the comments below!
Notes & References
Joan Didion, “Why I Write,” The New York Times (Dec. 5, 1976), 270, https://www.nytimes.com/1976/12/05/archives/why-i-write-why-i-write.html
Flannery O’Connor, source unknown, quoted in Nava Atlas, “Flannery O’Connor Quotes on Writing and Literature,” Literary Ladies Guide website (Apr 27, 2017), https://www.literaryladiesguide.com/author-quotes/flannery-oconnor-quotes-writing-literature/
Featured image of journal and pencil is by Jan Kahanek on the Unsplash website, https://www.unsplash.com
Image of notes on bulletin board is by Gerd Altmann on the Pixabay website, https://www.pixabay.com
Image of “Support” letters is by Wokandapix on the Pixabay website, https://www.pixabay.com
Image of bar graph is by Tumisu on the Pixabay website, https://www.pixabay.com
Image of “Save the Date” stamp is by Darkmoon_Art on the Pixabay website, https://www.pixabay.com
Image of “Be fearless” letters is by Amanda Jones on the Unsplash website, https://www.unsplash.com
