"Could the forming character of a Writer, Author or Publisher actually be more important than the publications produced?"

Spiritual direction for Writers, Authors and Publishers

Apr 26, 2026
About the Author

What does our writing and publishing say about us?

CONTENTS
+ character
+ HOW DO WE RELATE?
+ ANOTHER’S STORY AT PLAY?
+ HOW DOES THE SPIRIT MAKE US?

Dear Christian Writers, Authors and Publishers, what does our writing and publishing say about us? A question of reflection. Is our writing and publishing ahead of our character? At what point does writing and publishing become a form of guidance or ministry, and could that change the kind of accountability expected?

Writers and Publishers character

If Writers and Publishers know their works may shape how people live, think, or believe - what do they owe those readers, even if no one is requiring it of them? At what point does writing and publishing become a form of guidance or “ministry,” and could that change the kind of accountability expected? Could the forming character of a Writer, Author or Publisher actually be more important than the publications produced?

As people, our human expressions are biographical in every moment of our lives. Even our best presented versions of ourselves leak the truth of who we are. What we write and say, how we interact, what we leave between the lines, all speaks of us, specifically of how we relate.

"The greatest competitor of devotion to Jesus is service for Him"

Oswald Chambers

How do we relate?

Perhaps our writing is ahead of our character? Do we offer a “digital-spirituality” a “belief-performance”, where we may present our possession of truth, our abilities to render this eloquent and sublime - intellectually, analytically (hmmm, to myself) and with humour - but we are much less able to live these truths in our own day-to-day relationships with those closest to us?

And Publishers may ask good questions of Authors, and publish with high integrity, but the same relational failures cannot be gate-kept. Inescapably, this is not a story of vocation and industry but one of human condition.

But is there another’s story at play?

I think beneath the performance and the pretence, is a real transforming human. Perhaps surprisingly, and the thrilling point of writing this post, our failures are often a biographical expression, revealing a deeper humanity underneath. A desire, a fear, a wound, longing for belonging, even genuine hunger for truth that hasn’t yet found the ground of faith in our lives.

How does the Spirit make us?

From a biblical perspective, Christian spiritual direction too (clues in the wording), instead of just condemning us and the gap in our failings, this becomes something to be discerned amidst the movement of the Spirit in our lives, as He forms us.

The gap can be the epicentre of the Spirits move and formation in our lives, and not just the exposure and clarification of failure. A Spirit revealed revelation of our failure, the awareness of our gap, is already movement toward His formation. In other words, the Spirit - mercifully - moves not only in our authenticity but also through our distortions, bringing them into clarity and then transforming us.

Our failures - genuinely recognised, dislodged by the Spirit, and us broken - is less an endpoint to expose and reject, and more of a beginning. A threshold to pass through, a relationship to walk in, as the Spirit lovingly forms us.

"God never gives us discernment in order that we may criticise, but that we may intercede."

Oswald Chambers

Writers, Authors and Publishers, if you’d like an informal conversation over a coffee, around your life and your faith, get in touch.

-Andy.

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Introducing: Ministry of Imagination Journal

"Imagination’s truest purpose is not invention, but revelation."¹

Journal Ministry of Imagination

"Could the forming character of a Writer, Author or Publisher actually be more important than the publications produced?"

Spiritual direction for Writers, Authors and Publishers

What does our writing and publishing say about us?

Journal Ministry of Imagination Latest thoughts

"Spiritual direction: Relationship rather than a Service. Four questions to ask when considering spiritual direction and a spiritual director."

"What does our writing and publishing say about us?"

"Is a better educated mind the same as a transformed mind?"

"How do we live transformed rather than collapsing our identity into our vocations and callings?"

"A new encounter is new - transformation arrives from beyond ourselves."

"Thoughts on “At Eternity’s Gate”, the biopic of Vincent Van Gogh, and on becoming tired of our own, sometimes inexhaustibly creative answers."

1 "Andy Maitland, iPad drawings, An Imagined Garden One, from figurative to abstraction 2011-22".

This work sits within a wider practice of imagination, art, and reflection: Ministry of Imagination