“The act of writing itself is like an act of love. There is contact. There is exchange too. We no longer know whether the words come out of the ink onto the page, or whether they emerge from the page itself where they were sleeping, the ink merely giving them colour.”

-Georges Rodenbach, The Bells of Bruges

I've been a writer since I learned how to write.

When I first learned to write, I wrote lists the length of an Olympic swimming pool. I wrote on my mom's lists, experimenting with different fonts. I finished my very first journal by the age of nine. I wrote poetry every year for the Poetry Institute of Canada.

Because my grandparents lived in Australia, the primary method of contact was through the postal system. I believe it was then, back in 2007, when I first fell in love with letter-writing. I would write to my friends who lived in Australia, my friends who lived down the road, and my friends who lived too far away to visit often. It was a way of staying connected for me since at the time I didn't have a phone. Eventually, attending college began to crowd out my letter-writing efforts, which dwindled to include only a handful of people.

There is beauty in waiting for a letter, a package, or a postcard to be delivered. I think there is tremendous beauty to be found in waiting for anything, even though it sometimes feels unbearable and indeterminate.

There is also tremendous beauty to be found in the unexpected. Receiving a letter that you had no idea was on its way and realizing that someone was thinking of you and loved you enough to write to you is such a beautiful feeling.

One of the tremendously beautiful aspects of letter-writing is that it takes the long way around. It's not the easy route, it's not the road most traveled. It requires effort, deliberation, and even a couple of dollars. It means that someone slowed down in their life long enough to draft and handwrite a letter that would've taken half the time to type. It means that someone handpicked little surprises to tuck into the envelope. It means that someone posted it with the utmost love and joy, imagining how loved and excited you would feel to find the precious missive when you open the mailbox.

When my sister moved away to college last year, I realized that big changes were coming in my family and I wanted a way to remain in contact that didn't involve my phone. I decided that I wanted to bring back the art of letter-writing in my own life. But it wasn't until the start of 2023 when I moved out after marrying my sweet Lars that I got really serious about writing letters again. I embarked on a personal campaign to write more letters to the people I love, especially as I didn't have any other way of staying in contact with my youngest siblings.

However, after experiencing the joys of sending and receiving mail again, I wanted to expand my campaign to write letters to encourage and bless people who don't regularly receive them!

I was reticent to share this aspect of my life in public for a while. One of my heroes, Hannah Brencher, has her own letter-writing ministry, a fact I didn't learn about until this September. When I first learned about it, I felt discouraged. I thought that because she had done it first, my idea was discounted or less valuable. I thought that if I started my own letter-writing campaign, it would be less good or a copycat version.

Gradually, I began to open myself up to the idea that just because someone else is already doing something doesn't mean that my ideas and contributions don't have value. My sphere of influence is entirely different than sweet Hannah Brencher's, and we can both bless others if we are faithful to God's calling on our lives. The idea that we can't do something if someone else is already doing it prevents us from loving the people around us to the best of our ability because we are sloughing off our responsibility onto someone else.

Your efforts matter. The people you interact with matter. And you know what? The people that you encounter are likely not the same ones that I encounter. They're not the same ones that Hannah Brencher encounters. Your contribution matters because the person that you are loving right now might not get love from another source!

Everyone needs to know that they matter and that they are loved. But one person can't do it all! We each have to be faithful to love the person right in front of us as best we know how which will slowly and steadily cause a ripple effect. The people we love can go on to love others, and the process continues. We each bring something unique and valuable to the table - no one is going to love someone the exact same way that you do, and someone needs the kind of love you have to offer!

Once I began to believe this, I finally dared to share with my friends and family that I was writing letters to encourage others, and the response was overwhelming. Dozens of people requested that I write them a letter! So many that writing letters became a part-time job, and I realized that this is so much bigger than me. I can't do it all! There are so many people in our world who need encouragement, who need to know that someone cares about them, who need to experience the love of God through a real, live person.

So I'm inviting you to join me in writing envelopes of hope to those you know (and maybe those you don't know)! You don't have to write dozens of letters for it to matter. You just have to write one.

Start small. Start with the person right in front of you. And once you get started, don't ever look back! Write that one letter, share an encouraging word with the cashier at the checkout, or text a friend. Remind the people around you that they matter. In a world that has become so disconnected, we need those reminders now more than ever.

And it can start with you.

♪ - listen to The Commission by Cain.