It took me too long into my adult life to realize that God had given me the gift of words. When I think back, I see that I should have recognized it much sooner. I actually wrote my first book when I was in third grade. That might have been a clue. It was called “How Peter Learned to Swim.” It was a simple story of overcoming the fear of water and ultimately pushing one’s self to conquer and learn. I do remember my teacher being very excited about my accomplishment, so she helped me create a typed copy that I illustrated and she had bound for me. I still have the book saved today.

Despite that early literary accomplishment, during the school years that followed, I maintained interest and exceled in all of my classes–in History, Science and Math as much as English. At one point when I was planning for college, I had even considered studying to be an accountant. Ultimately, I chose to major in English to become a teacher, but I chuckle now when I remember that I ever consider working with numbers as a career. Because what I know now, with absolute certainty, is that God definitely did not give me numbers! I may have enjoyed a few years of understanding and success in Mathematics through grade school and secondary school, but that ability has long since faded, while my love and passion for words had only increased more and more each year, and that is because God gave me words.

Over the thirty years since graduating college (yes, it has been that long), God has been using the gift of words in my life in many different ways. I love to look back and see what I was not able to see at the time in each season–that He was preparing me for the next step that only He knew was ahead. When I was teaching English for more than 15 years, I had no idea that I would ever do anything else. But God did. So He moved our family from Long Island, NY to the Pocono Mountains in Pennsylvania, where my journey in pro-life Pregnancy Center ministry began.

It was in this next season that my my writing and speaking began to grow. Although as a teacher, writing and speaking were an integral part of what I did each day, it was different now. As God called me to protect and promote life, He was calling me to use the voice He gave me for those who had not voice. When I would write and speak, it was for a greater purpose–to save lives. So with the passion for life that the Lord birthed in me for this work, I have spent the past 18 years using my voice for Life.

Speaking, writing, teaching for Life is something I continue to do today and will continue to do as long as God gives me breath. Yet, God continues to grow my gift with words, and as He leads, I am using my voice in other ways for His Kingdom as well. God gave me words…words I can use for writing and speaking…words I can share at events, over air waves, on the internet, and with one heart at a time. God gives me words, and I give them to you.