Last Friday I did some cleaning in my office. It is somewhat of a mess, and I figure I’d better get it organized before my retirement in a mere 4 months and 25 days. Every week I’ve been taking something home, reducing the amount I’ll have to bring home the last week or day.  It’s working. I see much less I’ll have to take care of in the months and weeks ahead.

So on Friday last, I was going through little piles of paper on my desk, mostly the back of sheets from my Dilbert desk calendar, which I use as note paper. One of those had some notes I’d made on some Bible passages, three to be precise. I looked at them, trying to remember why I’d made those so many months ago, and what I was trying to tell my future self, meaning me right now.

I soon understood. These were some biblical insights I had that I thought could be turned into a Bible study. Yes, I saw it clearly. Three passages, three insights, three lessons. The start of a Bible study for our Life Group at church; the start of a Bible study book.

Now, I’ve written about this before, how these ideas come to me of things to write about. Often they are book titles that I can’t leave, which, in my mind, I flesh out into plot (for a novel) or outline (for non-fiction). Since I’m so busy while still working, and since I can’t possibly fit anything into my writing schedule for the next decade or two, I usually document the idea by writing it, hopefully somewhere where I’ll find it again, and in a form I can understand, then try to put it out of my mind. If I didn’t do that I think I’d go crazy.

I found this one, and after a bit of thought understood what I had written and why. I pondered it a while. I’m always looking for something for Life Group curriculum, as I’m more or less in charge of that for the class. This looked like a good one. Three weeks isn’t really enough for a good lesson series, so I thought more about it, and easily came up with a half dozen more lessons on the theme. I felt like I then had something, stuck the paper, and a larger sheet newly generated, into my carry-home folder. That night I looked at it some more. I thought of how, if we did that series beginning in October or early November, I could tie some Christmas lessons into the them. I added those, making twelve lessons. Two more came to mind, making fourteen.

The experts these days say your lesson series should be a matter of about six weeks, or a little more. Fourteen lessons would work for Baby Boomers, but not for later generations. But, our class is a bunch of Baby Boomers. so the longer series should be okay.

Now, the questions to be asked are:

1. When do we start this series?
2. If Sept 9, which is the earliest day needed, can I get enough done to make that happen?
3. If it runs through Dec 16 as we would need it to, what do I do with it then? Should I immediately turn it into a printed Bible study? Or should I “shelve” it for the moment, to returned to when I have a more opportune time?

Enquiring people, including the author of this post, want to know. If I do this, what do I do with my publishing schedule? I’m so far behind on my novel-in-progress, and I’ve laid aside my research into the next Documenting America book. Do I totally trash the schedule and move the Bible study into first place on the writing list?

I have a few days to decide. For sure it’s something I’ll develop (at least a short-ish version if not the long one)  and teach, along with my co-teacher. And, some day, I’ll expand into a published Bible study. But for now, what to do, what to do?