The Scene I Almost Cut by Heidi Gray McGill

The Scene I Almost Cut

by Heidi Gray McGill

“Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up”

(Galatians 6:9, NIV).

One day, an email arrived from a reader I had never met. She told me a scene in one of my novels helped her forgive someone she harbored bitterness toward for eleven years. She did not know I had almost cut that scene. She did not know I had spent months wondering if the entire book mattered at all.

There was no placement on a bestseller list to point to. No viral moment on my social media. Just years of daily work, sentences stacked upon sentences, released into the world with no guarantee anyone would ever read my book. I had been praying for a harvest. Her email showed me God had been asking me to tend the soil instead.

My pastor said something around that time that encouraged me. He said we spend a lot of time praying for the fruits of revival. But maybe God is calling us to cultivate the roots instead.

Seeds do not break the surface the day you plant them. They sit in the dark for weeks, sending down roots before anything above the ground shows a single sign of life. Unlike farmers, writers are not patient people. We want proof fast, like a review, a download count, or a message in an inbox. We want fruit because we can count fruit. Roots we cannot.

But the waiting is not empty. It is the cultivation itself, and it may be exactly what God is asking of you right now, whether you write novels, raise children, teach students, or show up faithfully to a job no one applauds.

That reader carried eleven years of bitterness she did not know how to release. She needed one scene, written by someone who almost deleted it. We may never see who our faithfulness reaches. God already does.

Keep planting those seeds through your words. Keep watering roots nobody sees. The master creator is at work in you, and his harvest is still coming.

Lord, thank you for the seasons that feel silent. Give me strength to keep working faithfully, even when I cannot see the fruit yet. Remind me I’ve not wasted time in the waiting, and you are doing something in the ground I cannot see. Help me trust your timing over mine. In Jesus’ name, amen.

Heidi Gray McGill is a Selah Award finalist and five-time NEST Award-winning author of Christian historical and contemporary fiction. Her Discerning God’s Best series has earned over 3,500 five-star reviews on Amazon. She began writing in March 2020, after retirement, and writes despite progressive vision loss. Connect with Heidi and receive a free prequel at HeidiGrayMcGill.com.

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