Greater Than

Third grade math was a blast. We kids competed like Olympians when Miss Barbara passed out the timed drills. We knew what equaled what and we sported paper crowns to prove it. Then came the big bump in the road: inequalities. That meant slowing down to compare objects and figure out which was larger and which was smaller, however similar. Gone were the crisp parallel lines. In came the arrowheads, pointy ends accusing the smaller and open arms reaching for the larger.

The memories of early math days tumbled back this week when I came across a paper headed “God is Greater Than.” GOD marked the left side of the page and a few things that turn most of our heads were on the right. I took the liberty of lengthening the right hand column.

GOD fears

failures

embarrassments

conundrums

conflicts

sin

death

loves

hopes

plans

abilities

creativity

reputation

accomplishments

Just one of the right side items can feel like a weight only a truck scales could handle. Add the jumble together and they could sink the earth right out its orbit. And then I remember this God, the God of Scripture, God alone, measures the universe in the hollow of His hand like I used to cradle tad poles weighing slightly more than a speck back in third grade.

Someone has said writing requires reverence, really seeing and being awed by the wonders everywhere around us. No doubt. I drive blind through a lot of life, one day plowing down the interstate of fear and confusion and the next day turning off to feast my eyes on every scenic bend in the route to achievement.

Writing forces me to repent. Writing demands me to pull the car over right now and do a one-eighty whether I’m stewing on all that has gone, is going, or will go wrong or delighting in successes I can see for miles. Writing insists on the about-face, turning the back on both the worst and the best. Only then are any of us free to face square into God.

And then we’ll get it right as any child. We’ll draw the pointy end toward ourselves and all that concerns us and draw long arms sporting a very wide angle toward God, who is greater than all.

Surplusage

Occasionally (though not as often as my wife would like), I pick a boxful of books from my library and trundle them to the nearest Half-Price Bookstore, where they are sold. Invariably (as my wife will attest), I return with a few others I have bought. She puts up with this because the net result is less apartment space devoted to my books. It forces me to unpack another box of books from the back bedroom, and brings us closer to the day she can use it as a genuine guest bedroom.

On last month’s trek, I snagged a copy of Theodore A. Rees Cheney’s book, Getting the Words Right (Cincinnati: Writers Digest Books, 1983). It has been in print continuously for nearly thirty years, so it may already be a trusty companion of yours; but it’s a brand-new discovery for me, and well worth the shelf of books I traded to find it.

Two paragraphs from Cheney’s first page have become a smoldering ember deep within my mind. I’ve been exploring the book for the past month, alternately blowing hot and cold over its detailed instructions for revision, but those two paragraphs keep kindling a fire under me. Here they are:

Seventy-five percent of all revision is eliminating words already written; the remaining twenty-five percent is improving the words that remain. Although experienced writers may do all kinds of revision almost as they write, they are apt first to try reducing the quantity of the words.

The Victorian writer Walter Pater said, “All art doth but consist in the removal of surplusage.” The secret is in knowing which words are the surplus words (Cheney, 1).

Michelangelo learned this. Eleven years before he was born, another artist began roughing out a 14-foot block of marble that was to be a majestic statue of King David, but he made a mistake: He chipped off a large chunk of marble on the figure's chest that he did not intend to remove, leaving an ugly crease and bulge that ruined his vision for the piece. The sculptor found no way to fix it, so his unsightly attempt was abandoned for 36 years. On September 9, 1501 (the event is recorded in Florence’s official history), Michelangelo chipped off that bump and soon finished the project.

Reportedly, when someone asked his secret, Michelangelo said, “I just got rid of everything that wasn’t David.”

The removal of surplusage--it's the secret of all masterful art, including masterful fiction.

Hope or Fear: It Really Is Your Choice

© istockphoto.com/fmatte

One unexpected thing I have learned from freelancing full-time is that being fearful is a choice. You can all too easily let fear eat away at your time and your talent – leaving you frozen in place when things don't go exactly as planned. Or, you can keep plugging along, trusting that God is truly guiding your way. In no other job have I ever actually been able to really see God intervening on my behalf. [I'm sure it happened, but I wasn't able to see it as clearly.]

During times when the work has run dry, and therefore the funds have too, God has repeatedly found a way to sneak a little extra cash into our family accounts. One time it was in the form of an extra tax refund check when my accountant somehow forgot to ask if I'd been paying taxes on my own on a quarterly basis? (I'm still amazed that happened since my accountant is the one who had set it up for me to pay quarterly taxes the year before?) More than once it has been in the form of an insurance-related refund ... and most recently a partial refund for paying for all-day Kindergarten. None of the refunds were expected, and they always came when we were starting to worry over how we were going to scrape together enough money to pay the bills.

I don't mean this to sound like I feel like I could sit back, relax, and the Lord would just do my bidding; nor that I should go on a spending spree because 'magic cash' will just appear. Far from it. However, what it does mean to me ... is that as long as I keep doing my part, God is making sure my family's most basic needs are met. [It reminds me continuously of the bible verses regarding the sparrows ... Luk 12:7]

This gives me so much to be hopeful about.

Beyond money, God has also helped me make invaluable connections with people that have helped me grow as a Christian and as a business. Have you ever felt the prompting from God to write an e-mail or call someone you barely have a connection with ... only to find out that they were praying to hear from someone exactly like you? Yup, that happened to me.

It was a pretty amazing experience, yet the most powerful personal example for choosing hope over fear that I have is even more remarkable. During my first year as a freelancer I had a freelance client who stiffed me for over $700 worth of time already spent working on his company's web site copy. I had done everything I was asked to do, the cost had been quoted and agreed upon prior to the first draft, and I had every intent of revising the text until they were satisfied. But instead the client was quite rude, reacting as though my writing was in no way what they had asked for, and they not only refused to pay but refused to explain how it could be improved  - which meant I could not even try to improve it to make them happy. I was devastated. I was angry. And when further negotiations failed I began to question my writing abilities, and my business skills, more than I ever had before.

I had always had very positive client writing experiences in the past - even when changes were necessary. I had also never had someone treat me in so unprofessional a manner. It ate away at me in the weeks following, and I remember at my lowest point crying and praying for God to somehow let me know if I was meant to keep writing. I questioned if it was my will or His to be a writer. [Am I the only one who has prayed this prayer?]

I still get goosebumps thinking about this ... but all I did was walk maybe 20 steps to my office from where I had wept and prayed that prayer ... to do something as mundane as check my e-mail. I had already been on the computer most of that day and checked my e-mail many, many times. However, when I returned to my computer, moments after praying that prayer, in my e-mail inbox was a request to buy an article that I had written and submitted over 6 months prior to that day. Of note is that this was my first article I ever sold that wasn't written 'for hire'.  So this was a very big deal to me. It felt like winning the lottery - though I probably earned a grand total of $150 and it was only published on a blog.

The timing of that sale sounds like something 'made up' even to me. But I still have that remarkably timed e-mail, and I look at it whenever I need a pick-me-up. [I actually sold a second unrelated article only a couple of weeks later – one which was also submitted around the same time frame as the first one. Which reminds me ... I really need to submit queries more often!]

What about you? Have you had moments of fear about your calling to be a writer? Has God ever answered your prayers in a way that gave you every reason to hope and continue writing?

Suzanne Wesley works as a full-time freelance graphic artist and copywriter from her Indiana home. She is also a full-time mom of two girls under the age of 6. (Sometimes the two full-time jobs collide, but mostly it is the best job decision she ever made!) Between filling sippy cups, reading princess stories ... oh, and designing marketing materials, she sneaks in time to work on her secret passion for fiction writing.

She also reads and reviews Christian books and their cover designs on The Book and Cover Reviewer blog - found at www.suzannewesley.com

Alas, Poor Apostrophe!

I feel sorry for the apostrophe. It’s a perfectly fine piece of punctuation, but modern society holds little respect for this nifty little guy. Not only is the apostrophe (’) often omitted (especially in text messages), but—adding insult to injury—he increasingly gets replaced with his cousin, the beginning single quote mark (‘)! Unfortunately, even many budding authors don’t realize the difference.

Please allow me to defend my little friend, the apostrophe. Then, if you still choose to ignore or to abuse him, at least you’ll be doing it on purpose and not by accident.

So, what is the apostrophe’s purpose for existence? Half of the time, he shows the reader that something has been left out of a word for brevity’s sake. For instance, with the aid of our little hero, we can change slightly stilted word combinations into sleek, streamlined, single words.

Exhibit A:

     It is = It’s

     Could not = Couldn’t

Cool, huh? The apostrophe can also indicate possession:

Exhibit B:

     The home of Professor Tolkien = Professor Tolkien’s home

     The ice cream cone of Susie = Susie’s ice cream cone

Also handy: When an apostrophe shows that letters are omitted at the beginnings of words, it makes them more folksy or simply easier to say:

Exhibit C:

     Goodbye! = ’Bye!

     Sic them, Fido! = Sic ’em, Fido!

And this, my friends, is where the apostrophe has most often received abuse. Why? Because when personal computers became popular in the 1980s, word-processing programs (such as MS Word or WordPerfect) couldn’t tell for sure when an author wanted a ’ or a ‘. The programmers decided that, if a human hits that particular key immediately after a letter (see Exhibit A above), then the punctuation should curve to the left since it must be either an apostrophe or a closing single quote mark. So far, so good. However, the programmers also assumed that hitting that key after a space must mean the writer is about to begin a quote within a quote. (E.g., “John sends a warm, ‘Hello’ to all of you.”) Bad assumption! That’s why word processors replace perfectly good apostrophes with an opening single quote mark and incorrectly produce such as expressions as…

     Well, ‘til we meet again! (Abbreviating until should result in ’til.)

     Go get ‘em! (Abbreviating them should result in ’em!)

    

For a long while, I spotted such gaffes mainly in self-published works by people who didn’t use the services of an editor. Now, though, this cancerous error is spreading into professionally produced advertisements. The poor little apostrophe practically shudders. Is it doomed to follow dinosaurs and hoop skirts into the dust bin of history?

Dear friends, rally to the cause! If you need a little piece of punctuation to show you’re leaving something off the beginning of a word, then please always choose the apostrophe, never the opening single quote mark!

P.S.: If you’ve gotten this far and still can’t understand what I’m ranting about, then merely select a nice, sans serif font such as Arial or Calibri instead of Times Roman. Since the sans-serif fonts don’t curve their quotes and apostrophes, they’ll look correct every time!

The Story of You

Another January. The year 2012 is an empty notebook, the days waiting to be filled with the Story of You. This cooperative effort—co-authored by God and you—can unfold in various ways.

Perhaps you've already determined what your personal story will be, outlined it in detail, established goals to mark your progress, and asked God to assist you. If so, you may start with one idea only to discover circumstances or characters will drive you in a different direction, maybe even force you into places you'd prefer not to go and experiences you wish to avoid.

The Story of You may fill the pages of this year with heart-wrenching experience and deeper insight. You may even be taken to a place of complete dependence on God. It'll feel like a terrible place, but time will reveal that total dependence on God is the best real estate in the world and leads to an outflow of blessing.Noah couldn't steer the ark, he had to rely on God. Abraham couldn't force God's timing of the promised child Isaac. Joshua's victory at Jericho was God's doing not human effort.

Perhaps you are a timid, crossing the squares off the calendar while you wait for life to happen. The experiences you do have seem faded compared to the bright dream you foresee. Your prayers may grow into mantras of "Why not me, Lord?" The scriptural directive to rejoice with those who rejoice may taste bitter as others enter into your dreamland, leaving you behind.

You may demand an explanation, failing to see that God has been waiting on you to take a step of faith in the Story of You. David had to go out to meet Goliath. Mary had to say yes to God's plan for a virgin birth. Elijah had to pray, pray, pray for the raincloud that brought an end to the drought. Ruth had to bow to the instructions of her mother-in-law. To say no out of fear despite God's urgings can leave blank pages and gaps in the Story of You.

Chances are you fall somewhere between hurtling recklessly forward and frozen stiff. Whatever your approach to writing life, prayerfully ask God to give you a theme for this year's Story of You. Then stop long enough to hear His reply.

Having a theme for 2012 establishes a plumb-line for measuring your choices. Perhaps it's Relate More to Others or Be Gracious or Promptly Obey God's Directions. It may be Act on Every Writing Opportunity or even Mentor.

There will be a Story of You in 2012. 2013 will reveal in detail what it was. However, setting a theme now will unite all aspects of that story—spiritual, mental, physical, relational, ministerial, financial, professional, and recreational—into the greatest Story of You possible.

New Year's blessing on each of you ACFWers. My prayer is that you find a theme for the year and live it out. I've been doing this for a few years now. Anyone wanting to dialogue on it can email me. I'd love to help or encourage you.