One Brave Yes

Thirty years ago, I said yes to something that made my knees knock.

Not a yes to danger or fame or anything that would impress my teenage self. Not a bungee jump or skydiving. No. This was far more terrifying: Creative writing.

Even saying it still feels strange in my mouth, like speaking a second language I never imagined I’d learn. Because back then, I was a maths guy. Numbers. Proofs. Neat edges and satisfying conclusions. In high school English, it was as though someone dimmed the lights whenever I walked in. Everyone else seemed to know what was going on, while I sat there blinking through fog. But trigonometry? Calculus? That made sense. There was certainty there. Structure.

And then I found myself reading Matthew’s Gospel. Wondering if this was true or a fable to be ignored. When I read the Sermon on the Mount, it wasn’t just words on a page. I put down my calculator and followed.

It was as if someone struck a match in the deepest part of me. Suddenly, I began to feel. Novels didn’t bore me anymore; they moved me. Sometimes I didn’t even know why. The world began to crack open—not neatly, not analytically—but tenderly, and something in me changed.

Then came that moment in the mentoring course, when the facilitator asked us to do something that scared us. And without thinking, I knew: writing.

I took a breath and called the local community college. They had two courses—Beginners and Advanced. Beginners sounded safe enough, so I signed up. But a week later, the call came: the Beginners course was cancelled. Would I like to try Advanced?

It felt like being tossed from the kiddie pool into open ocean. I was out of my depth before I even began. But—I said yes.

That first day, we were asked to bring 1000 words. I had no training, just raw nerve. I wrote something and turned up. To my shock, it wasn’t terrible. And more than that—the teacher was kind. She encouraged me. My piece wasn’t better or worse than anyone else’s. That was all the permission I needed.

So I kept going. I soaked it up like a sponge. I joined a Writers group. I entered a competition for unpublished writers—and won. The maths nerd won a writing award. The person who had always felt dumb with words became a storyteller.

And none of this was planned. One accidental class led to three years of learning, to sermons that became stories, to courses that became conferences. What began as an act of fear became a pattern of joy.

Writing never became about chasing publication or producing the next great novel. For me, it became a way to play. A way to reimagine how I approached Scripture, how I preached, how I helped others grow. I began experimenting with sermons—less about explanation, more about experience. Some of those sermons got published. I created a course to help others find the same freedom. What I thought would be a one-off workshop turned into an invitation to teach a hundred seasoned clergy in Perth. I still remember the sound of laughter echoing through the venue.

That one trembling yes opened a door into a whole new room of my life.

Eventually, I did a doctorate on preaching. Part of it explored the role of play in biblical interpretation. The Bible—odd, disjointed, irrational, contradictory, paradoxical, ironic, and scandalous—became not just my source text but my creative playground. It gave me permission to be human and imaginative, not just precise and correct.

I taught for two decades, helping the next generation of ministers learn to preach. But more than titles and roles, I kept coming back to this: helping people find their voice, their calling, their fire.

Now, I’m writing again. Not to be published. Not to prove anything. Just because I love to help people grow. To help them wrap words around their legacy. To find hope and offer it to others.

I—the maths nerd who feared fog and metaphor and everything “English”—became a midwife for other people’s stories.

I—the one who once saw novels as boring—was swept up in the strange beauty of parables, poetry, and paradox.

I—the reluctant beginner—ended up helping others dance.

There’s something wonderfully biblical about all that. A life that doesn’t unfold like a linear proof, but more like a wild encounter. The kind of story where God delights in calling the least likely person in the room and saying, “You. Come follow me.”

It was one small yes. A leap into the fog.

And it unearthed a universe I never dreamed was there.

I was not the likely one—
a maths man, drawn to order,
lost in the fog of metaphor.

Then a voice on a hill
spoke blessing to the broken,
and something in me stirred.
Not logic—
longing.

I said yes.
Not to skydiving.
To writing.
The thing that scared me most.

The beginners class was cancelled.
The advanced one called.
I went.
And somehow, I stayed.

Words became play.
Stories became sermons.
Laughter echoed in unexpected places.

I never wrote a novel,
but I helped others
find their voice.

This is the shape of my life—
not a tidy ascent,
but a grace-soaked arc.
Where fishermen lead,
stammerers speak,
make meaning with words.

All from one small yes
into the fog.
And the universe
bloomed.