Letter from the Editor
Greetings to each of you and thank you for joining this incredible God journey with us! My team and I are so excited about all that God is going to do within this year. We’ re even more excited that you are here to experience the relaunch of our newsletter. As you can see, God is stretching the vision so we are now publishing a mini-magazine. It’ s both an exciting and scary time simultaneously.
I want you to know that we are going to put our very best effort into producing an excellent product for you. We are looking forward to presenting you with insightful articles, new resources and encouragement for your daily life.
One of our visions for this part of the ministry is to expand to a full print magazine. Woohoo!!! We are in a place of celebration now and expectation of how God will bring this vision to pass. In the meantime, we will continue to work diligently to present you with an excellent digital mini magazine.
We also want to present you real life testimonies that will encourage you and point you to Jesus Christ. Our hope is that with each edition, your relationship with Christ is deepened and your hope in Him is built up.
My personal testimony about the newsletters is that it was challenging. I had this great vision from God that started out with a one page letter of encouragement and began to grow. The mailing list continued to grow and I was encouraged. By year two of publishing the newsletter, I was completely discouraged and literally pressing each month to share. The more discouragement set in, the more depressed I got.
When it was time to start the newsletter for year three, which would have been 2016, it never got off the ground. I went into shut down. I had no desire to write. I felt a sense of no support or help in this area. In my mind, I figured it wasn’ t working and it was just time for that season to end.
Even more, I couldn’ t understand why the offers that were extended to promote other people’ s work, books, ministries etc., was not accepted. There was no charge and it came from a pure place of simply wanting to sow seeds of help.
What have I learned? Rejection will help you in all areas! Yes it will! Over the course of the year, the Lord began to show me that it simply wasn’ t for everybody. It didn’ t mean that it wasn’ t a great newsletter. It didn’ t mean that it wasn’ t effective. It simply meant that it was time to re-evaluate the target of this product and realign with the vision that God gave for it.
So after a year off from this portion of the ministry, the Lord brought me back to it. He stirred me up when I subscribed for another Pastor’ s newsletter, Pastor Clarissa Johnson, and eventually wrote an article for her. He simply would not allow this to die! I hope that encourages you today. When God has something for you to do and it’ s ordained by Him, He will not let it die! He may allow delays but not death!
So along with this renewed fire, he rekindled the desire to publish a magazine. I believe that was another reason that I succumbed to discouragement by the end of 2015. I actually attempted to start a print magazine. I spent money having a cover designed, paid writers to write articles for it but it fell to the ground.
What did I learn? That wasn’ t the process the Lord wanted ME to follow. That design may have worked for others but He had different instructions for me. First, before this goes to the“ world,” I’ ve been instructed to feed it for free to the many faithful readers that have connected with this ministry.
So, I picked up the abandoned issue from January 2016 and I asked the Lord-what should be in this mini magazine / newsletter? I asked Him who should be on the covers, what should we focus on and who should be contributors. He has answered and I’ m excited about what this year will hold! He has given me the instructions on how to proceed and as I move forward, my prayer is that we will be able to serve even more beyond our current mailing list.
My testimony is that even though I abandoned the idea initially to expand the newsletter to a mini magazine, God has brought it back again. While I am grateful for this opportunity to make impact in the lives of God’ s people from this platform, I truly hope that you learn from my testimony that God can rekindle your fire and passion for your vision. He can bring it back to you and will instruct you so that this time around, it won’ t fall to the ground. This time, I will see it through to the end! I’ ll need your help, support and feedback to do it but it will be done.
Now, what can you do to help us? We’ d love to have your feedback! Actually, we need it. We’ d love to know what topics you’ d like to see discussed in the magazine. What do you have need of? We want to serve you and hearing from you will help us to do so more effectively. Talk to us! We really do want to know! Email us today at latricespeaks @ latricewilliams. com
Blessings & Peace LaTrice