Editors
Originally scheduled for June 16
Editors are ghouls and cannibals — Dorothy
Sayers.
It does not take very great experience in
writing to encounter the usefulness of the editor. There are people
in this world who get paid to read your material and fix it. To
those who are not writers, this may seem a little bit odd. After
all, can’t you just read your own stuff and correct it? That’s what
my high school English teacher told us to do. So here’s what they
do:
·
The simplest form of editing is copy
editing — fixing your spelling and most particularly your
grammatical mistakes. It’s amazing how often you make those mistakes
even when you know better.
·
A more complex (and more expensive)
form of editing is content editing. This service provides you with
feedback and correction on how you’ve organized your material and
whether or not your quotations came from a valid source or your
imagination.
·
Finally, for the very serious author,
you can hire an editor as a coach. It’s not just fixing your
mistakes; it’s preventing the next ones.
That’s what editors do. They exist; therefore
someone must need them. But why is it that writers need editors?
·
The truth is, you can stare right at
your own mistakes and miss them completely. Your brain knows what it
meant to say, and that’s what your brain sees on the paper. The
editor sees what’s really there.
·
Sometimes you really don’t have the
correct grammar in your head. For example, do you know when to use
“shall” as opposed to “will”? (Neither do I.)
·
Sometimes, you simply need
encouragement to continue writing. There are days when you stare at
the blank sheet of paper and haven’t the foggiest notion what to put
on there for the first word.
In a way, the Holy Spirit is the editor of your
life. The process of editing is most apparent in communion, for it
is there that we are cautioned to examine ourselves carefully. So as
you do that today, I would encourage you to ask the Holy Spirit for
these three things:
·
First, ask the Holy Spirit to reveal
to you what it is you’re staring at and not seeing. Ask him to show
you those things which are obvious in your life to everyone but you.
Ask him to bring them out so that you may repent and strive to do
better.
·
Second, ask the Holy Spirit to reveal
to you those areas in your life in which your thinking is incorrect.
If you have “thought amiss” then let him reveal it to you for
correction.
·
Self examination often results in
discouragement; some of us fail rather often. Ask the Holy Spirit to
bring you comfort in this and encouragement, knowing that Christ’s
sacrifice for you on the cross is not in vain.
