She Speaks

Back in January I wrote about how God is showing me my passions. He brought writing, the Bible, and, more recently, teaching the Bible to the forefront of my mind. He has been showing me that these are the areas I am passionate about, and He is calling me to action.

Over the past couple of months, I've been researching the book publishing process. And as I've reviewed blog entries, I decided to move away from the book thing right now and toward submitting articles to magazines. I've been looking for publications that target Christian women and parents. Slowly, I am learning about the process of being a freelance writer. I've also attended a couple of American Christian Writers meetings at my church.

I've picked up a few pointers, here and there, but, really, I am just blindly trying to find my way through this process. Recently, I discovered there are workshops that teach you how to write, get published, etc. I've been considering attending one in May the American Christian Writers are putting on locally. But, today, my sister-in-law sent me an e-mail about a conference in Charlotte.

Per their website, the She Speaks conference seeks "to encourage and equip women as they communicate God's Word through writing, sharing their testimony, leading a Bible study and speaking from the podium." As I read about the different breakout sessions that will occur at this conference, I got excited. There are several that seem to be exactly what I need to hear - Magazine Writing 101: Honing Your Writing Skills, From Blog to Book Deal: How I Got Published without Being Famous, and Self Publishing: Your First Choice.

Then I clicked on the "Registration and Payment" button.

$575.

Not including travel expenses.

Seriously?

As a single income family with two young children to care for, $575 for a writing conference is definitely not in the budget. But God loves to provide funds in creative ways in His timing. In fact, my sister-in-law's email had a link to a scholarship contest for this conference! All I have to do is write a post like this one, explaining a little about the conference and why I would like to win a scholarship. I know it is a long shot, but the Lord can use a contest if he chooses. We'll see!