All posts by David Todd

Bible study, Life Group lessons, poetry

The Message of the Un-Said

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In my study of 2nd Kings 4:8-37 this week, as I finished preparations to teach it in our adult Life Group today, I was struck by how well the story was crafted. The full story came out only when I examined what the author didn’t say–which I learned by examining what he said and filling in gaps, examining factors of time and space, and assessing motives of people based on what little the author told.

I’ve thought about this before as I have critiqued poems at the Absolute Write poetry forums. The poet has presented us with a few lines for some purpose. He/she made choices of what to include in–and exclude from–the poem. Looking at the inclusion is easy, for the few words are there for me to pick apart, to ponder as a series of lines and as a complete work. Exclusion is harder to evaluate. What has the poet chosen to leave out? The choices are as broad as the language itself, as deep as human experiences of body, soul and spirt, though clearly narrowed by the context of what is included. I only do this occasionally, for the exercise can be very time consuming and mentally draining. I actually wrote one poem using this method, consciously thinking inclusion-exclusion as I wrote each line.

Back to 2nd Kings 4, and the story of Elisha and the woman from Shunem. How much the author has said by what he has not said! I must digress briefly to consider the nature of writing in antiquity. Paper, in the form of scrolls made from papyrus strips laboriously cut, wetted, woven, dried, and trimmed, was expensive. Ink, made up of fire ashes, water, and other ingredients, was expensive. The writing process, without the benefit of computers, typewriters, erasers, even cut and paste, was difficult. Dissemination of the completed work, through manual copying and hand delivery, was both expensive and difficult. I think writers must have learned that every word counted; hence repetition, fleshing out of characters, and back story were all kept to a minimum. We actually have a story significantly condensed from what could have been written. Often I wish the Bible were ten times longer than it is, doubling he length of the stories it has and giving five times the number of stories. Ah, but better it is as it is, methinks.

Back to the story, this passage includes five characters: Elisha, his servant Gehazi, the man and wife from Shunem, and their son, born following Elisha’s prophecy. The actions of Elisha, Gehazi, and the Shunammite woman are somewhat well described, though even for them some inclusion-exclusion analysis aids in understanding the passage. The husband, however, must be the strong, silent type, for we hear little from him. We know that he was responsive to his wife’s requests for building a rooftop room for Elisha, and for the donkey and servant to go visit Elisha. Otherwise, we see him only in the matter of his young son becoming sick while they were out in the fields with the reapers: he sends him back to his mother.

Consider, however, what we can learn about the husband from these actions of the wife, or by the actions of others.

  • He did not invite the traveller Elisha to the hospitality of a meal; possibly he was out in the fields when Elisha came to town.
  • He didn’t think about building the room for Elisha, to better aid the man of God in his travels.
  • Elisha didn’t ask what could be done for him, but what could be done for his wife. It appears, by this, that he did not develop much of a relationship with Elisha.
  • After his son died, and his wife went to see Elisha (having hidden the boy’s death and her grief from her husband), he doesn’t seem to have enquired about the boy, hasn’t found his body in the prophet’s room, hasn’t arranged for his burial.

From this, we can draw interesting conclusions about the Shunammite husband. He is somewhat absorbed in his work, not even bothering to develop a relationship with the premier man of God in Israel who regularly sleeps under his roof; he seems to love his wife and is responsive to her requests, but their relationship is best described as strange.

I have more to write on this, but the post is too long now. I will try to get back to this tomorrow, or the next day.

miscellaneous, Writing

It’s been a so-so week

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Back at work; hard to concentrate; too much self-starter stuff and not enough firm deadline stuff. Somehow I’ve got to do better on the self-starter stuff. Discipline, discipline is the key.

At home, I have just barely finished my Life Group lesson for teaching tomorrow. I’m printing multiple copies of it right now. I was two weeks ahead, until I had to begin getting ready for Ridgecrest. Last night and today I spent a fair amount of cleaning gutters–not of leaves, but of accumulated dirt, pollen, and grit from the shingles. The house is 20 years old, and I doubt they have ever been cleaned. The gutter guards keep the leaves out, and taking the gutter guards off and re-installing them is a pain. In one gutter on the back, above the deck, about half the gutters (or 2 inches) was full of this stuff. I spent so much time on the ladder that my legs were quivering. A thunderstorm hit this morning before I was done with the back one, and, since I worked “upstream to downstream”, it now has a small puddle.

I have found a new writing critique group. They meet on Thursdays, twice a month, including this week. I did not attend due to the busyness of life, but I’m hoping I can become a regular at this and somewhat find an answer to a question that’s been bugging me: Is my writing good enough?

I was able to write this Life Group lesson only with great difficulty. I’m not sure why, but I couldn’t concentrate, couldn’t find the words to express what I wanted to. Part of the reason is I’m trying to help the class find things in the Bible based on what is not said, rather than on what is said; or to whom the words are spoken, instead of who else they might have been spoken to. I found that difficult to write. I may blog on that tomorrow.

I still have much follow-up to do from the Ridgecrest conference: e-mails and proposals and sample chapters and summary paragraphs. My schedule right now looks like I should be able to attack some of that in the week ahead.

Well, this was a dull post. Just a report on the week following the big conference in the life of one wannabe writer.

miscellaneous

More on the Culture Gap

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At the Ridgecrest conference, the culture gap was again hammered home by a couple of classes I attended. In a class about writing “curriculum” for small group studies, all the examples shown were videos with a little bit of writing in a book; the intent being to watch the video and discuss it, using a few simple questions from the book. The videos were the typical run-from-scene-to-scene, or shot to shot, with almost no time spent on any one shot. No time to focus on what is being said, to absorb the points made. Just run, run, run. One video-based study we spent a little time viewing was The Trouble With Paris. We watched the first five minutes, which was totally unmemorable to me. I think the on-camera narrator said something about our culture being a problem, but the study title was not explained. After watching, our class instructor said Paris referred not to Paris, France, but to Paris Hilton, as a symbol of what’s wrong with our culture. Funny thing was, the video itself seemed to me a symbol of what I don’t like with the trend in the culture. I immediately decided this was Gen-X stuff, and I can’t write it.

Another class was on fiction writing. The instructor, talking about the importance of conflict in the modern novels, said, “Knock your hero down with angst, then shovel angst all over him.” Later, I talked with this same instructor in an informal setting, and mentioned I liked best the sagas, such as written by James Michener and Herman Wouk. He said, “You and three other people.” They won’t sell. A novel over 100,000 words won’t sell. We live in a TV culture world, and books have to compete with American Idol, Survivor (another show I’ve never watched), Lost, etc. The population at large has fewer readers than we used to, as a percentage of population. Words aren’t enough to captivate the mind. We must now have fast-paced visuals as well, and more of that than of words. Don’t let description crowd out dialogue. Don’t let dialogue crowd out conflict and angst.

I suppose every generation decries the culture of the next, and I’m no different. All this stuff saddens me. It seems like the culture has been coarsened by television and the Internet. More and more I find myself further and further away from the mainstream in America. I once wrote a poem that included this couplet:

for I, I must with sorrow state
was born two centuries too late.

More than ever I think that is true. Maybe not really 200 years, but at least fifty.

I leave most writers conferences, after some initial time of wondering “why am I here” with a feeling of “I can do this.” Then, a week later I realize what “this” is. It means writing things I don’t particularly like to read just to get published. It’s a form of prostitution. I guess I’ll have to think about it some more.

Writing

Culture Gap

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Am I the only one in America who does not watch American Idol? Who doesn’t talk about it at coffee pot or water cooler? Who doesn’t care whether this David or that David won? Okay, obviously I’ve heard enough to know that it was David vs. David in the final, one young, one younger. And a bunch of us were sitting in the lobby that evening during the writers conference when people began receiving text messages saying which one had won. Last night and today I’ve been catching up on the week missed on the blogs I read regularly, and almost every one of them had something about that show. Most had several somethings. Christian and secular, literary and political, all were the same.

At the writers conference, Monday night was faculty talent show, and they did a sketch “Ridgecrest Idol”, where the faculty played the part of famous writers through the ages, reading the first page of some famous work. Three others of the faculty formed the panel, acting out the part of the three judges. I’ve seen enough sound bites from the show to know what was going on. I couldn’t have cared less, and probably should have left the show.

Why don’t I care? Not my type of music in general. Not much enamored by pop culture. Not much swayed by hero worship. My life is not changed by who wins the competition, or by which judge is meanest to which contestant. I guess I have a choice to make: get with the culture, or remain out of touch, further and further out seemingly on another planet. It’s bad enough I get pressured to watch Gray’s Anatomy, and Lost, and now Battlestar Gallactica, when I could care less about any of them.

I conclude that I am cut off from the current culture, adrift in a world gone mad over singers and stage performers. What hope is there for writers?

family, travel

2043 miles

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We are home again. The direct route from Bella Vista to Ridgecrest was about 880 miles. A little bit of back-tracking in the Asheville area, the diversion to see my sister in Evansville, Indiana, and the diversion to see our children and new grandchild in Kansas City made for the remainder.

I’m now in the process of post-conference follow-up. Sent two e-mails tonight, and may get one more done. I have to work on two non-fiction book proposals requested by an editor, and a novel proposal and a series of book summaries (for books I have not yet written) for another editor. I have a bunch of other e-mails to write, and many web sites to visit–as well as catch up on sites not visited while I was gone.

Then, in order to not forever be an arrow through the air, disturbing unseen gasses but never hitting a target, I need to figure out what my correct target should be. That will take some time, hopefully not too long. Then the real research and writing will commence.

technology woes

Strange things computers do

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We are en-route from Ridgecrest Conference Center back to Arkansas, with stops along the way in Evansville, Indiana and Kansas City, Missouri. Today was an easy drive. But, before we left Ridgecrest, we hiked to the peak of Royal Gorge Mountain. This is not the world’s tallest mountain, but it was a feat for us in the shape we are in. Maybe this will spur us on to do the things required for better fitness.

We took a couple to the Asheville airport, then double-backed a little and toured the Biltmore mansion in Asheville. This was an incredible house, and I may blog on it some day.

Here in the hotel, we tried to connect to the wireless Internet, and couldn’t. We confirmed with the desk that they did not have a network/router/access problem, then called tech services. The man there talked me through the problem. It turns out the feature to have Windows search for available networks was turned off. I didn’t turn it off, nor did Lynda. What caused it? One of the strange things that computers do. Then, on my user receiving e-mail is possible, but not on Lynda’s user. And neither of us can send e-mail–at least not with Internet Explorer. Yahoo is doing fine, and we can check e-mail through cox.net’s site–when we have Internet.

Why do computers mess up like this? We don’t knowingly change the settings to cause this to happen. What gives? This is one of the reasons I describe myself as a techno-phobe.

I’m so tired I’m going to post without proof-reading. I’ll look for mistakes another day.

Writing

Ridgecrest Diary, 22 May 2008

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[Lost the entire post; trying for a second time. I guess I’ll do the short version.]

I intended to post every day of the writers conference; however, our Internet service was slow when available and often wasn’t available.

The conference ended today with our last class, a closing assembly, and lunch. Ridgecrest is practically a ghost town right now. Perhaps it was just as well I wasn’t able to get on-line. On Monday the usual writers conference letdown got to me, when once again I was reminded of the extreme difficulty of breaking in as a published writer. I don’t know why I should think that breaking into this new field should be easy. I’d be upset if it were suddenly easy to break into engineering with minimal effort. Still, I had to work through those down feelings, which I did over the next couple of the days.

A few conference highlights:

– the class on novel plotting with Ron and Janet Benrey, husband and wife novelists.
– several other classes that proved most worthwhile.
– my meeting with an editor who asked for proposals on my two Bible/small group study guides.
– my meeting with another editor who asked for a proposal on my Bible study.
– my meeting with an agent who asked for a proposal on my baseball novel and for summaries of the series of “cozy” mysteries I’m planning as my next project.
– my meeting with another agent who has had my Biblical-era novel manuscript since November, and gave me hope for it.
– unplanned meetings at the coffee shop with other writers.
– late evenings in the lobby with faculty and other writers, discussing writerly things.
– meals, lines, pre-class sessions, and walking between buildings with other writers, with chances to discuss what we all are writing.

Lynda and I decided to spend tonight here. We’ll take a couple to the airport in the morning, then do the tourist thing in Asheville for a couple of hours, then head west. It’s going to be a couple of busy weeks.

Writing

Ridgecrest Diary: Monday, May 19, 2008

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We arrived here yesterday about 1:30 PM local time, after a hard drive Saturday (757 miles) and a short, 2-hour hop yesterday. So we were able to check in early, and I was able to reconnoiter the camp for a hour or so. Met two fellow un-published writers during my wanderings.

At supper, one of the editors I was most interested in meeting came to sit at my table, and I was able to talk to him about my projects. I didn’t do a real pitch, since both of our wives were with us and it was somewhat casual. The evening session was good, with a very good keynote speech by Alton Gansky.

After that, I went to the coffee shop and talked with a couple of ladies who were at their first writers conference. I was able to help them understand some of the conference organization, and made a few suggestions on which sessions they could go to and which faculty to try to meet. Then I went back to our building and hung out in the lobby with a group of guys. Four of them were faculty, all published authors (mainly novels, but some non-fiction). Did that for almost two hours, and learned much from those four experts in my avocation.

Time to head to breakfast. Hopefully today will yield much more results.

Writing

We’ll try this one more time

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Tomorrow morning Lynda and I will head east, to Ridgecrest, North Carolina, to attend the Blue Ridge Mountains Christian Writers Conference. This will be my fifth writers conference in my eight years of serious writing. Classes to attend; agents and editors to meet with to pitch writing projects; meals with others in the industry; like-minded people to network with; a mountain setting; forgetting about work for a week. I’ll be trying to gain publication for two different Bible study books I’m working on, as well as for my two novels and my poetry book.

The odds of publication are still minuscule, but higher with this face to face time than simply by the mail. We’ll see what happens. I can’t keep plunking down beaucoup bucks year after year for these things, so this may be the last one for a while.

Wish me luck.

Wesley, Writing

If you find a good metaphor

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I found John Wesley’s “arrow through the air” metaphor in a letter he wrote to Anne Granville in 1730. After writing my first blog post on this, I decided I should see if anyone else had written about this. This resulted in numerous hits (including this blog!), but in reading a great many of them, I found they referred to a different passage in Wesley’s writing, to the Introduction to his printed sermons from about the year 1759. Here’s the passage.

“To candid reasonable men, I am not afraid to lay open what have been the inmost thoughts of my heart. I have thought, I am a creature of a day, passing through life as an arrow through the air. I am a spirit come from God, and returning to God, just hovering over the great gulf; till a few moments hence, I am no more seen; I drop into an unchangeable eternity! I want to know one thing, the way to heaven, how to land safe on that happy shore. God Himself has condescended to teach the way; for this very end He came down from heaven. He hath written it down in a book. Oh, give me that book! At any price, give me the book of God!”

So twenty-nine years later, Wesley is still using his metaphor, still seeing in his life a comparison to that rushing shaft on its way to a target, momentarily disturbing those invisible gases it encounters and leaving no mark during the passage. Only at the target does the arrow have impact. Wesley refined the metaphor over time. Here’s how he used it in his earlier writing:

“Strange, to look back on a train of years that have passed, ‘as an arrow through the air,’ without leaving any mark behind them, without our being able to trace them in our improvement!”

First the metaphor was concerning personal improvement, looking ahead to a life that should be full of impact, and fearing that will not be achieved. Later he wrote of the temporary nature of human existence on earth. Different concerns; same metaphor. Wesley’s use of quotes around it leads one to believe this is not the first time that metaphor has been used in print. Perhaps he read it and appropriated it for a sort of life motto.

I’m not sure I’m quite ready to draw life-changing conclusions from all of this. I like the original use of the metaphor better than the latter. The latter, however, gets much more attention in the post-Wesley world, and who am I to dispute the scholars? In fact, ‘twould not surprise me to find this popping up several more times in the writing of this great man. “As an arrow through the air”; how apt a metaphor.