By Rachel E. Newman
I must admit, I come from a family that doesn’t fit the status quo. As one of eight kids with two strong-willed, passionate parents, my life wasn’t perfect, but it was also never boring! I suppose Mom figured out at some point that she would need some outside support to survive all of us. So from the earliest memories I have, we had a constant stream of Christian radio filling the background of our lives. And I’m not talking about just music radio, I’m talking talk radio.
From 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. every weekday, in every room of the house, somebody was preaching a sermon on God’s love, the Holy Spirit’s power, or our faith. And the station played gospel music every other moment of the day. The only time those radios went off was when we had a power outage. Otherwise, Mom had them going 24/7.
So what does this have to do with editing? I’m getting to that. When I left home for college, got married, and started a career in the legal field, I lost the habit of perpetually leaving a radio on. Actually, I’d lost the habit of listening to a radio at all. Television had replaced the background noise, filling the atmosphere with news or syndicated sitcoms. But at some point, I happened to be blessed with a job where I was allowed to listen to the radio station of my choice while I performed certain tasks. This is when Christian talk radio made a new impact on my life. I would tune in to sermons as I could, and I discovered that these short times of hearing the Word became oases in the middle of my days. I experienced a profound refreshing in my spirit, a quenching of a thirst I’d forgotten I had.
As I transitioned into my editing career, I took this new habit along with me. While editing requires full concentration, there are certainly other times in an editor’s life where talk radio can fit nicely. To maintain a healthy body and mind, an editor needs to take hourly breaks to stretch and move. Editors also need to schedule meal breaks and a chance to give our brains a reprieve from the focused analysis of text. And then, of course, there’s a household to maintain around a work schedule—dishes to be done, laundry to be folded, floors to be swept. All of these provide perfect opportunities to feed our spirits with some heavenly bread. And with radio now accessible online, you can easily listen on your computer or smart phone while transitioning from editing to other tasks. The living Word is literally at your fingertips.
I have found there is more joy and passion in my editing when my spirit is quenched with God’s love and His presence. Also, being patient with clients and viewing my services as an act of love become easier. If you’ve never tuned in to Christian talk radio before, if you’ve realized you’re going through a spiritual dry spell, or if editing seems to have become a chore instead of a delight, don’t wait another day. Take that fifteen-minute break before your eyes start crossing and tune in to a station where you’ll get a smorgasbord of sermons to support you.
KLTT 670 AM has a wide variety of preachers and programs to listen to. And besides having so much to offer, they are also supporting our beloved Christian PEN by sponsoring our annual editors’ convention this year, PENCON 2016.
Take a moment to check out their website and programming schedule at www.670kltt.com, where they make it super easy to tune in and listen online. If you have no idea where to start, some of my favorites are Andrew Wommack’s “The Gospel Truth,” Joyce Meyer’s “Enjoying Everyday Life,” and Charles Capps’s “Concepts of Faith.” But these are only a few of the many great options to brighten your day and feed your spirit.
Pleasant penning,
Rachel E. Newman, CP
Freelance Editor and Indexer
Certified Paralegal
www.RevisionsbyRachel.com
Editor@RevisionsbyRachel.com
Rachel E. Newman holds a BS degree from Northeastern State University in Oklahoma. She is a Gold Member of The Christian PEN: Proofreaders and Editors Network, serves as a judge for the Excellence in Editing Award sponsored by the Christian Editor Connection, and has served as a faculty member for PENCON, the only convention for editors in the Christian market. Rachel enjoys, among other things, dates with her husband, swing dancing, reading, teaching, discussing important issues, watching Star Trek, sewing, cooking, Pilates, horseback riding, water sports, playing guitar, and snow skiing.
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Photo credit: Alex Watson via Flickr Creative Commons
