Category Archives: Bible study

Bible study, Christianity, Daddy Daughter Day

“I Will Awaken The Dawn”

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A few posts ago, I mentioned that I had three Bible verses that I tried to start each day with. I also confessed that I wasn’t always that faithful with saying these verses. I’m getting better at it, however. I started this about two years ago, though two of those three verses have been special to me for longer than that.

The first of these verses comes from the Psalms. I find it in two places there: Psalm 57:8 and Psalm 108:2.

I will awaken the dawn.

Actually, that’s not the full verse. I should quote the full verse.

Awake, my soul! Awake, harp and lyre! I will awaken the dawn.

While I have probably read this more than once, it first grabbed me when we were doing a study of Psalm 119 maybe four years ago. For some reason this verse in Psalm 108 must have been cross-referenced to something in Psalm 119.

This, as I say, grabbed at me. What did it mean exactly? To try to find out, I checked other translations (the above quotes are from the NIV). I found they were surprisingly the same. The New Living Translation has Psalm 57:8 as, “Wake up, my heart! Wake up, O lyre and harp! I will wake the dawn with my song.”

What did it mean? I pondered it for a while, internalizing it, and concluded that the psalmist woke in the morning excited about the day that was before him. He couldn’t wait for the sun to come up so that he could be about living another day joyously in service to God. So he wrote, “I will awaken the dawn.” I will call upon the day to start so that I can get to my daily chores, my work, my career, or whatever it is he had to do.

That struck me as a good way to start my days, to be anxious for what God had in store for me today, and what the world has for me. C’mon day, let’s get going. C’mon sun, I need your light so that I can be out and about, meeting people, serving God, serving mankind.

First, I had to think, is this how I really feel? Am I excited to have another day to live? Thankful, of course. But when nature calls early in the morning, and I swing my feet off the bed to the floor, and I anxious for the day, so anxious that I say, “I will awaken the dawn”? I decided yes, yes I am excited to be living another day.

What about that Saturday in late February, when I spent three hours chopping ice in the driveway and shoveling it off so that I would be able to get to church on Sunday and teach Life Group? My back was tired, my hip was tired, my mind was tired. I woke up that Sunday with many more aches and pains than usual. Yet I was able to say, “I will awaken the dawn,” get up, and get to my normal Lord’s day activities.

What about income tax season? I have a love-hate relationship with income taxes. I enjoy the challenge of doing them myself. Yet, it’s a lot of work and often frustrating. In early March, when I work on the partnership taxes, and then in early April when I do our personal taxes, saying, “I will awaken the dawn” isn’t all that easy. Still, I say it anyway, realizing I have another challenge to tackle and overcome.

Then there’s the daily “grind” of writing. Yes, it is a grind. I can’t say it any other way. Sometimes it’s almost a drudgery. Yet, again, there’s that challenge waiting me in the morning, to get my coffee, walk down the stairs to The Dungeon, have my time of devotions and prayer, check overnight e-mails and social media, then get to whatever book I’m working on. While it severely cuts into my retirement idleness, I can joyously say, “I will awaken the dawn” as I open a book file and begin typing.

I actually wrote a poem that kind of sums up, or maybe expands upon, what this verse is saying. It’s the second poem in my book Daddy-Daughter Day.

That says kind of the same thing, I think. Written in 2005 (or 2006), it speaks of wanting the day to occur and being excited about the adventures that await you.

So, what happens on a day when I wake and just don’t feel ready to claim the day as my own? When I don’t particularly want to awaken the dawn? Yes, I have days like that. I still say the verse. And the verse seems to get hold of me, once again. My attitude quickly changes. And I get on with the adventures that God has for me today.

Bible study, Christianity, goals, self-publishing

February Progress, March Goals

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Last day of the month, a short month. Time to see how I did on reaching my monthly goals, and to set some goals for next month.

It has taken over a year of work to get to this point, but finally we are within a couple of weeks of going to print. I said this last month, but it seems closer now.

First, the progress on goals I set back on January 31.

  • Make any edits to the church Centennial book and deliver it to the printer. I guess that means we will have to make a decision on the printer, but that decision is actually almost made. This goal depends a bit on the cover designer, but it’s a fairly simple cover so I don’t see this as a problem. I sort of achieved this goal. I made all the final edits, and am now just waiting on the cover creator. I received one new photo from the descendant of a former pastor. While waiting on the cover, I’ll see if I can work that in.
  • Related to that, though not necessarily writing, finish pulling my research notes together into a format and organization that will make the job of a future researcher easier. I assume someone, in 25 or 50 years, will do something similar to me at a future milestone anniversary. Nope, didn’t work on this at all. Once I picked up some of my notes and tried to put them in some kind of order, but gave it up. It takes a different mindset to do this kind of task, and I’m afraid I never had that mindset this month. I’ll add it to next month.
  • Make any edits necessary to There’s No Such Thing As Time Travel. I want to get a few more chapters through my critique group, and of course I’m waiting on the beta readers and then the cover artist. Assuming that all comes together, I’m looking at publishing either in March or April. This project continues to move forward. I’m waiting on two key beta readers to get back with me, which I hope will be this week. I was supposed to have met with the cover artist last week, but two days of snowstorms got in the way of that. While waiting, I’m going through the book one more time, looked at suggestions the critique group made, and seeing if I can make other, similar changes. I would say that March is unlikely for publishing at this stage. April is still possible.
  • Complete significant work on The Last Supper Bible study. I’ve had some trouble coming up with the right format; or rather, I’ve had trouble seeing how the format I came up with a year ago will work. I have to get some words on paper and see how well it comes together. As such, this goal is a bit unfocused. Just as this goal was unfocused, so was my work. I did accomplish a few things. First, I got all my files together. I moved words already written around so that they were in the right place. I temporarily gave up on Chapter 1, which was giving me much trouble, and moved to Chapter 2, which I all but finished. While I wish I was further along, I feel good about where I am. I’ll have to get a little way into Chapter 3 before I can say, for certain, that this is a viable project.
  • As always, attend writing group meetings, both in person and on-line. That will likely be five meetings, three of which will be in person. Well, between pandemic and travel and snow, some meetings were cancelled. I had one in-person meeting, of the Scribblers & Scribes, and two on-line meetings. March promises to be better.
  • As always, blog twice a week on Monday and Friday. Did this, though one day I remembered late in the day that I hadn’t posted anything and rushed something and posted it. Hopefully that won’t happen next month.

Okay, so what do I plan to do in March? Should I set high goals, or just what I can accomplish without a lot of effort? Since two projects are dependent on others…well, we’ll see.

  • Repeat from last month: Finish pulling my research notes for the church Centennial book together into a format and organization that will make the job of a future researcher easier. I assume someone, in 25 or 50 years, will do something similar to this at a future milestone anniversary. I want to leave my notes in a condition that will facilitate their work. This is likely to take several days or even a week of concentrated work. This task includes writing a short document (short as in 10-15 pages) “Notes for a Future Researcher”. That document, however, is most likely a task for a future month, say April, or May.
  • Continue to shepherd the church Centennial book to publication. I have minor things I can do while waiting on the cover, slight improvements to be made. Almost certainly this will go to the printer in March.
  • Continue to plug along on There’s No Such Thing As Time Travel. I’ll finish going through it this last time, getting critique on two more chapters, while waiting on beta readers. I’m not sure of the timing of the cover, but should know this week.
  • Make good progress on the Last Supper Bible study. I’d like to finish three more chapters in March.
  • Begin work on a Gethsemane Bible study. Since I’ll be teaching it beginning next Sunday, I hope to make my notes this time in publishable format, being essentially done with it by the time the study ends. I think tonight I’m going to do the final “programming” of this study, figuring out the chapters, estimating length, etc.
  • Attend writers groups. I expect this will be three online and three in-person meetings. I don’t think we’ll be doing any traveling this month (though I’m not sure of that), winter weather is less likely (though not impossible), so I expect these meetings to happen this month.
  • Blog twice a week on Monday and Friday. This should be a bit easier this month. I have three blog posts that I know I’m going to write, and four book reviews to write, so I think I’m good.
  • I’ll throw in one more for good measure. For a while, I’ve wanted to revamp the “Available Works” page on my website. I made a small beginning on this in February, and would like to make significant progress on it in March.

So, there’s the goals. They are somewhat lofty, especially what I want to accomplish with the two Bible studies. I’ll check back in, probably on April 1, and let you all know how I did.

Bible study, Christianity, critique group, family, Harry Potter, travel

A Mishmash While Away From Home

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Elise, working on her “word” for earning money from Grandpa, while Nitwit surveys the scene from above, watching out for Useless and Nuisance.

We are back in West Texas for a visit with our daughter’s family. I know, we were just here a month ago, but they had need for a babysitter last Friday night, and we said we’d come do it. We drove here last Thursday, and will likely leave for home tomorrow, though possibly not till Wednesday.

It’s been an easy gig. The four kids were reasonably compliant with doing their chores on Saturday. Even little Elijah, 5 years old, was given two chores. He had his sister write out a to-do list for him, as she was doing for herself. Grandparents can usually ride herd on the kids in a way the parents can’t. At least, they seem to do somewhat better with us in some ways, being a little quicker to jump-to-it when we ask them to do something.

Sunday was church. I went early with the three oldest kids, Lynda and Sara and Elijah coming later. Richard, as pastor, was already there. I attended men’s class for Sunday school, then, during church, I found an unused room, connected by Zoom, and taught our class at our home church remotely. The attendance was good, and the class went well. Of course, that mean I didn’t sit through a church service yesterday. Hopefully I can do so today on the replays.

Elijah had fun cleaning his play area in the sunroom, then checking it off as a job done.

It was difficult to work on writing during this time, so I’ve done a lot of reading. As much as possible, to be an example for the grandkids, I’ve been reading in a print book. So far, no real indication that it’s doing much good. Except maybe for Elise, who is reading Harry Potter: The Order of the Phoenix in a print book—but she has been doing that for a while. I was able to review two chapters for critique group, which meets on Thursday. I guess on Friday I managed to spend on hour on the Bible study I’m writing. I don’t feel like I got very far with it.

We brought a surplus bookcase from our house to help organize theirs. Elijah’s other chore was to put books and toys on it, which he did with much help from Elise and guidance from Grandpa.

We have also had to care for Useless, Nitwit, and Nuisance, the three pets. Except, it’s now four pets. One grandchild was unhappy that he didn’t really have a pet, so they arranged for a rescue kitten to come join the menagerie. Except, the rescue kitten was in Oklahoma City. So we stopped there on the way here, met up with the rescue woman, and brought the new kitten here. The grandson named her Sapphire. While she is transitioning into the household with three pets there already (actually, more than that if you include the bearded dragon and the goldfish), she is needing a lot of attention. While I was wondering what nickname I could give the new kitten, Elise said it ought to be a name about a girl who needs a lot of attention. Obviously, I immediately named her Diva. Hopefully, with this pet the zoo is complete.

Diva is isolated from the two older cats, she being a female and them being not-yet-neutered males (kittens who are almost cats). I didn’t spend a lot of time with her—if you don’t count the 6 hours in the car between OKC and here.

My plan is to leave the zoo tomorrow. We’ll take their recyclables and drop them in OKC, then get home by a good time, though too late to join an on-line writing group.

One bit of writing I did accomplish (besides this blog post). While sitting on the front porch yesterday, reading for 30 minutes before the onslaught of 20 people from their small group at church for a Super Bowl party, before reading I set my mind to writing a short poem. Nothing major, just a cinqain (a five-line poem). I don’t know if it’s any good, but it’s sitting there on my phone, waiting for me to decide what to do with it.

So, I will see you all on Friday, back home, probably in The Dungeon, in old routines.

 

Bible study, family, miscellaneous, The Forest Throne, travel

Random Friday Thoughts

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Dateline: Jan. 20, 2022

Between leftovers and some takeout, I had to fix only one meal. Grandpa’s Mythical Sandwich was a hit, as always.

Yes, the dateline shows that I’m writing these Friday thoughts on Thursday. At least I’m beginning these thoughts then.

Yesterday (Wednesday), we drove back from West Texas from having babysat our four grandchildren last weekend and staying a few extra days. We might have come home on Tuesday, but Lynda had a stomach bug, so we delayed a day. Actually, we had been uncertain of which day to come home on.

But yesterday morning before we left, our son-in-law was sick, went for a covid test, and was positive. So we have been exposed. As it turns out we hadn’t been all that close to him in the house, so maybe we will be okay. But, let the quarantine begin. I guess 5 days. Except, I have prescriptions to pick up at Wal-Mart and a few after-trip groceries I must get. I’ll do that this morning.  I’ll have to miss the monthly meeting of the Scribblers & Scribes, our critique group, Thursday night. I’ll send my piece to them by e-mail.

With The Forest Throne done and waiting on beta readers, and with the church Centennial book done and waiting on proof-readers, I’m about to spend time on my next writing project. As I said in my annual writing goals post earlier this month, it would be a Bible study. But which one? On Tuesday, I consolidated my various files from the Holy Week study I taught last Lenten season, on the Last Supper. Thursday morning, I found my hand-written teaching notes and will go through them over the next several days.  I have a feeling I will make this my next book rather than the study I did on 1 and 2 Timothy some years ago. But we shall see. I should know by early next week.

I’m in the process of contacting an artist about a cover for The Forest Throne. Hoping to make contact on Thursday. Also, the first beta reader of TFT is my granddaughter Elise, 8. She loved it. She also picked up on a number of subtle things I put in the book.

I’ve been brainstorming the concept of individualism, having posted on that before and wanting to do a follow-up or two, possibly even write and publish an essay on that. I have come to the conclusion that the opposite of individualism is collectivism. I even found a quote by Dr. M.L. King that agrees with that, but I can’t trace it back to the actual speech or document, so hate to use it. I don’t know that this essay will ever happen, or if it does it will be anything more than serialized blog posts.

The drive home from W. Texas was pleasant. I was worried about road conditions near the end, in our own county, as the forecast was for a wintry mix that afternoon. As I looked at radar that morning, frozen precip was showing over Oklahoma City, where we were making a brief stop to drop recyclables from our daughter’s accumulation. But after driving an hour and a half, and checking the predicted radar again, it showed the OKC precip abating by the time we would get there, and that what would fall toward the end of our trip would be minor at most. So on we drove. We stopped about 45 minutes from home and made a couple of phone calls, learned the roads were fine, and so we continued on home.

I’m in the midst of reading three different books (well, four if you include the one I read 3 or 4 pages of on my phone a day—no, five if you include the book I’m reading for Life Group teaching), two of which are books about writing. I took those two with me to Texas, and made good progress in them. One I should finish in three days or so; the other will likely take over two weeks. It’s interviews with 20 writers, and I’m just reading one interview a day.

That’s enough random thoughts. I hope to head to the sunroom later, with my handwritten notes, and get to work on the Bible study. See you all on Monday, when I hope to get back to something on my list of upcoming blog posts.

Bible study, book reviews

Giving Up On A Book

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I rarely, rarely, start a book and don’t finish it. Sometimes I put it aside for a while, either because another book requires I read it, or because the book is not to my liking and I have to be in just the right mood to finish it. But I have just laid aside a book, unfinished, and placed it in the sale/donation pile. I won’t pick it up again.

Sorry, Messieurs Whitcomb and Morris, but your book didn’t speak to me. I abandon it and exile it to the sale/giveaway table.

A while ago I went looking for a book I was pretty sure was in a certain spot on our downstairs bookshelves, about the biblical book of Genesis, one I’ve been planning on reading but had kept putting off. But when I looked, I couldn’t find it. Another book was more or less in the place I thought that book was: The Genesis Flood. Fine, I thought. I’ll read that one since I found it and worry about the other one later.

Big mistake. TGF turned out to be a difficult book to read. It is filled with scientific names. It is also, to a great extent, composed of quotes from many sources rather than the authors’ own words. I have read books like that before, and large blocks of quotes tend to make the book difficult. Maybe boring.

I think the authors were building up to the creation of the world as having taken six literal days, rather than six periods of time. I think. They were holding their conclusions close to the chest. They began the book by looking at the different theories of historical geology, and how geologists have interpreted data throughout the ages, and why these different interpretations were insufficient to explain the data. I found this section not as well written as I would have liked, and was glad it was over.

But the next section, where they started to explain how the biblical flood explained the inconsistencies in the geological data wasn’t any better. I concluded these authors weren’t writing for me, or to be a popular book, but rather a scholarly book for geologists. I’ve read a couple of such books before. I finished them, but found them most difficult to get through.

Will I ever find the book I was looking for? Maybe I’m confusing The Genesis Flood for the book I was looking for. Or maybe it’s in a box somewhere. Ah, well, I have plenty of other books to read, so no need to spend a lot of time searching right now.

Bible study, Church History Novels, goals, self-publishing, Sharon Williams short stories, Writing

September Progress, October Goals

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October 1, falling on a Friday—a regular blogging day for me—is the perfect day for recording what I accomplished in September, and for establishing some goals for October. Here’s the progress.

  1. Blog twice a week, on Mondays and Fridays. Done, though one Saturday I realized I had totally forgotten to post anything on Friday, so I got a post up a day late. And one Monday post, that I wrote the previous Friday, accidentally got posted on that Friday, #usererror. But every regular blogging day was covered. To help me be a little more regular with my posting, I actually have four blog posts started as drafts.
  2. Wrap up my research project on our church’s charter members. Done! Wednesday I made a final tweak in the list of probable charter members. I started putting my notes into usable form, which I should finish doing in October.
  3. Finish “Foxtrot Alpha Tango”, the short story I’ve been working on for two or three months. Done! I finished this around Sept 20 and sent it by e-mail to my critique group.
  4. Link the books in my Church History Novels series on Amazon. This is an easy process. I’ve been holding off until the new covers were done, but it’s time to just do it. No, I didn’t do this. Shame on me. It’s an easy task. I guess I was hoping to have the covers re-done first, so I kept putting it off. Back on the to-do list for this month.
  5. I still have a few more tweaks to do on the church centennial book. I’m going to work on it after I finish this post and may finish them today (Friday afternoon). Done! Though see what I put in my October goals.
  6. Attend my writers’ groups. At the moment all three are scheduled. Done! One was cancelled, the other two met in person and I attended. I also attended two meetings of a weekly on-line writing group. I don’t know whether I’ll be a regular there, but it was good.
  7. Document one Bible study idea I had and put it in the queue. Done! I recorded it in my journal. At some point I’ll have to transfer it to an ideas folder, either on paper or on the computer, but at least it’s documented and I’ve been able to let my mind sort of forget it. 

Alright, September was a productive month. I event added a couple of thousand words to my next work-in-progress, something I hadn’t planned on. Now, what about October? Be bold, or be cautious, in my goals. I’m just going to type and see how it comes out.

  1. Blog twice a week on Mondays and Fridays. I have a couple of conflicts coming up, so maybe those pre-written and to-be-scheduled posts will come in handy.
  2. Work on my work-in-progress, The Forest Throne. I can’t remember what I’ve written about that here. I may have to include a post on it. I won’t give a specific word count goal for now. Possibly I’ll edit this in a week or so.
  3. Link the four novels in my Church History novels series. Why do I keep putting this off?
  4. Begin formatting the church Centennial book. I received one of three outside contributions and pasted it in. I have a promise of receiving the other two very soon. Meanwhile, I’m proofreading the book, which has caused me to realize I have three blanks to be filled in. They are just names and dates, but, still, they will require a little work. I hope to have that done today or tomorrow. Then the formatting and photograph additions will begin. Possibly I will have the formatting done by the end of October and will be ready to go to print.
  5. Attend writers groups this month. I’m not sure how many it will be. I may have conflicts with the meeting dates of two of my regular groups. Maybe I’ll be able to get in on the new group a couple of times.
  6. Publish “Foxtrot Alpha Tango”, once I get critiques back from the Scribblers & Scribes. I have one back already. Publishing will mean cover creation, but I’m already pulling ideas together.
  7. Take a look at, but don’t necessarily write more on, the Bible study I was working on during the spring and early summer. I’ve been so busy with other things I don’t remember where I left off. Since I might start it soon, as in two months or so, it would be good to have it swimming around in my mind even now, occupying a few gray cells.

That’s enough. As with last month, there’s always the chance that something else could pop up.

Bible study, Christianity, Documenting America, Health, History, home improvements, reading, Sharon Williams short stories, Writing

Post Not Ready

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Six ads running for this, getting impressions, clicks, and a few sales. Other promotion is bearing fruit.

This morning I went outside to work shortly after I got up at 6:45 a.m. The temperature was 60°, and it felt good. I planned to work a half hour, mainly cleaning up a few things and pulling a few weeds from the backyard. When I did what I wanted and went inside, I was surprised to find I’d worked more than 45 minutes. I was way past scheduled time for my blog post, but I wasn’t worried about it since I had a post partially started—two posts actually—and thus could post it quickly once I got to it.

Alas, I finally came to my dashboard here, found there was only one post, and realized it is no where ready to be posted. Bad memory I have.

So here I am with nothing prepared to say. I could talk about any number of things off the cuff: what I’m writing, what I’m reading, how book sales are, what I’m doing for book sales promotion, life in general. I guess I could tackle all of those.

I’m still working on little changes to the church centennial book. I got some new information yesterday that will require a minor change. I also have decided to double-check a couple of places in the book. One I’m fairly sure will require a change, the other one maybe or maybe not. Still, I come closer to done on this every day.  Also, my short story inches along. Every couple of days I open the file, re-read it to remember where I was, and add a few hundred words. I need an uninterrupted , undistracted couple of hours to finish it.

For reading, my time is taken up with Way Truth Life, the book for our Life Group lessons. I’m also reading a book on the Genesis flood. Sorry, I don’t remember the exact title, except that it might be The Genesis Flood. It is a scholarly work from the late 50s-early 60s. I’m not enjoying it a whole lot, but will stay with it a while longer. As to recently finished books, I have four sitting here on my work table waiting for me to write my book reviews.

Book sales are good in September. So far I have 14 sales outright, and I think two accesses from Kindle Unlimited with both people finishing the book. This is my first time to have KU reads (not many of my books are in KU), and I need to figure how to account for them in my stats. I suppose as 2 sales, bringing the total to 16. That’s a good start to the month.

Sometime soon I’ll make a presentation to the local Civil War Roundtable. That will be my first author event since June 2019.

I have been a little more active in book promotion the last week. I still have my Amazon ads running for three books, and they seem to be generating sales. I contacted two influencers in our denomination, both men I’ve interacted with in the past, about giving a shout out to Acts Of Faith. I heard back from one on Friday and he is going to put a promo in his next newsletter.  Another promotional item concerns my Civil War book, Documenting America: The Civil War Edition. Back in July I gave a copy of it to the president of the local Civil War Roundtable. I heard back from him yesterday. He liked the book and wants me to make a presentation to the Roundtable. I don’t yet know when that will be, but should know today or tomorrow. So book promotion is in progress and, at least a little, seems to be working.

Life in general is good. I’m still having trouble losing weight, but in general my weight is dropping very slowly. My blood sugars have been under control, though just a little higher than I’d like. This morning’s was good. My right knee has been hurting more of late. Perhaps replacement surgery will have to be moved up. Although, the last three or four days I’ve done a few different things to try and ease the pain and it seems to be working. Four nights of good sleep in a row. Yardwork is in much better shape than in past years. Household projects are slowly being done. My devotional life remains consistent, with room for improvement.

Life goes on. I’ll have a better post on Friday, and will start getting some of these book reviews done.

Bible study, Christianity, Documenting America, goals, Writing

Writing Goals for August 2021

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No new work on this, except to link the three main volumes in a series. I sold 4 copies of The Civil War Edition in the last ten days. More about that in another post.

Well, July came and went without me establishing any writing goals. Yes, you astute observers will have noticed that I didn’t post goals at the beginning of July nor give a recap of how I did with my June goals. When July started we were busy heading to Chicago for a family event. I prepared a few posts ahead of time and scheduled them to post while we were away. Writing progress and new goals wasn’t something I could write early.

But here are my June goals and how I did on them over a two month period. You can get through them then see my August goals after that.

  1. Finish the church anniversary book. I think I’m doing well on this, and should be able to add the final portions and declare it done by the end of the month. …I have some more interviews to conduct, which may hold it up, and some contributions by some others. I won’t say that I’ll have those contributions, but without these interviews the book won’t be done. The book is DONE! I’m at the point where I am so far ahead of schedule with it that, if I had to go to press today I would be satisfied with it. However, since I still have time available, I will continue to tweak it. Maybe do a few more interviews, work on some more photos, etc. It will still be an August goal, and probably every month going forward until it goes to print.
  2. Blog twice a week on Mondays and Fridays. With this post I’m well on my way toward achieving that. I achieved this goal.
  3. Explore a little more the linking of a series together on Amazon. I have four series among my Amazon publications, none currently linked.  This was on my list of things to do last month but didn’t get done. Not only did I explore this, but I managed to get two series created, linking existing publications with their related publications. That was the Danny Tompkins short stories and the Sharon Williams Fonseca short stories. No, wait, it was three series. I also linked my Documenting American non-fiction books into a series.
  4. Work on this website, creating a new landing page and updating some content. I did not do this, technophobia taking over I suppose. I don’t think this is a difficult thing to do, but I put it off and allowed other things to fill the time.
  5. Work with the cover designer concerning new covers for the Church History Novels series. This is somewhat out of my control, based on her schedule. I haven’t checked with her in a couple of weeks. I stayed in touch with the cover creator. She has had a very busy summer, interning somewhere. She contacted me last week to say she is just about ready to get back to them and wanted the print book dimensions. So this is good news, and a goal sort of met.
  6. Watch some Amazon videos on how to better do Amazon ads. They keep sending me e-mails about available webinars, several of which look beneficial. I’d like to watch at least one a week. Goal partially met. I watched two Amazon advertising webinars. They weren’t very helpful. I also re-took the 5-day Amazon Ad Profit Challenge in July, the fourth time I’ve gone through it. I created six ads for Acts Of Faith, bringing me up to 16 ads running. Are they profitable? I’ll cover that in a future post.
  7. Continue work on the next volume of Documenting America. I’m still mainly in the reading for research phase, though I also did some of the book planning and created the book file. I want to at least complete the basic reading (40 more pages) and move on to some other sources. I think that is very do-able. I did finish reading the source materials. I also add somethings to the book file and even began the process of editing down the source documents. But, I would have to say I did not complete this goal.
Six ads running. Not a lot if impressions or clicks, and only one sale in July.

So all in all, June and July, while not stellar with accomplishments, did have their moments. Lack of July goals has reflected in that lack of accomplishment.

Now, time to set some goals for August.

  1. Continue to tweak the church anniversary book. I can think of only two more interviews to do. I may add in photos this month. I have a bunch in the file now, but have more I could add. As I do this, I will first format the book for print dimensions. That will let me bring in photos at the right size.
  2. Finish a short story in the Sharon Williams Fonseca series, tentatively titled “Foxtrot Alpha Tango”. I wrote four pages in July to share with the Scribblers & Scribes critique group when we met that month. With just under 2,000 words written, I believe it’s 2/3 done.
  3. Work on the middle grade novel I started in July. The Forest Throne is technically to be co-authored by my oldest grandson, though I’ll do most of the writing and he will edit it, helping me to understand what 10-13 year old boys like. I wrote the first chapter of this in July and sent it to him for comments, receiving his approbation of the sample. I’d like to add another 5,000 words to it this month to go with the 1350 written so far. I’ve brainstormed out most of the plot but not specific scenes.
  4. Blog twice a week, as always.
  5. Do some work on my website. I’m not sure what, but I have to overcome this technophobia and improve it.
  6. Attend meetings of my three writing groups, assuming they don’t get cancelled because of local corona virus outbreaks.
  7. If the cover artist gets the covers re-done, re-publish the three older church history novels, updating them for new copyright info and list of works, as well as link them in a series.

That’s it. See you in September with a progress update.

America, Bible study, book reviews, Christianity

Book Review: The Harbinger

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While we were in Orlando in May-early June, we took a morning to go to a Books-a-Million store near where we needed to pick up some first aid supplies. Lynda cut her foot on a barnacle-encrusted rock at the beach and had stitches. I also needed to take care of something at the pharmacy. Our errand completed, we went around the corner to the book store.

This book has an important message for the USA, but they way that message is presented rates it 2-stars from me.

That’s a favorite activity of mine, to go to a book store (or a library works just as well) and browse, select, read while drinking coffee, and probably not buy. On this day I bought a writer’s magazine, and Lynda bought The Harbinger by Jonathan Cahn. Cahn is a Messianic Jew, and Lynda listens to his podcasts. I’ve listened some too, but haven’t heard them enough, or paid attention enough (I’m always multi-tasking) to get a good feel for what his message is. This book was our evening reading for much of June.

The subtitle of the book is “The Ancient Mystery That Hold The Secret of America’s Future”. The book essentially draws out parallels that Cahn sees between Isaiah 9:10-11 and the events of 9-11 and the years since then. It’s a warning—a harbinger—for America, to turn back to God.

In Isaiah, God’s protection was prophesied to be removed from Israel (the Northern Kingdom) and, because their response to God’s rebuke was incomplete, another judgment would fall on Israel. This happened to Israel, just as Isaiah prophesied.

The literary technique used by Cahn is a dialog, or actually two dialogs, between Nouriel and 1) an investigative reporter named Ana and 2) an unnamed prophet. It was this prophet who gave Nouriel a series of seals. Nouriel had to investigate what the seals meant. As he followed the clues, the prophet would suddenly appear and help him to understand what the seals meant, what Israel went through, and what the USA was going through.

I find it difficult to find any fault with what Cahn says in the book concerning the fate of the USA. He could well be right that we are on a declining leg of our up and down history, and there may not be a future up leg. Our zenith may indeed have happened and it’s all down from here. Cahn doesn’t lay out a litany of what’s wrong with America. Simply that we as a nation have turned away from God; that 9-11 was evidence that the hand of God’s protection has been removed from us; that we did not respond to that warning with repentance and turning but with defiance and bravado; that other judgments have come upon us and are still coming. I won’t say he’s incorrect about any of those. The book was copyrighted in 2011, and much has happened since then.

However, Cahn’s literary vehicle was not good. In fact, I’d call it bad. The dialogs between Nouriel and the prophet and Nouriel and the reporter were tedious and repetitive.  The seals were a contrivance to build the story on. A simple statement of the message Cahn wants to give (Wake up, America! Wasn’t 9-11 enough? Wasn’t the Panic of 2008 enough?) could have been given in 100 pages or less instead of the 253 pages in the paperback we read.

He could have avoided the silliness of the seals. He could have spared us the endless dialog, and scenes of lower Manhattan or of various places in Washington D.C., where Nouriel and the prophet met up. Rabbi Cahn, if you read this, those things detracted from your message, they didn’t add to it.

It seemed that every night as we read, and I waded through the dialog or descriptions of what was on a fictitious seal, I would say aloud, “Well, he just lost 5 stars,” or “No way I can give this 4 stars.” In fact, if I post a review on Amazon, I will likely give it 2 stars. It would be 1 star for organization and writing, but higher for message.

In my mind, this book is not a keeper. I don’t ever plan on reading it again. Lynda will likely want to keep it. So on the shelf it will go.

Bible study, book reviews, Christianity

Book Review: “Daniel”

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As we continue to try to whittle down our inventory of books by pulling some off the shelf or out of piles that look like they will be good to read but not necessary to keep, my wife pulled Daniel off the shelf. It’s a Bible commentary volume by J. Vernon McGee, based on his radio “Through The Bible” broadcasts.

Every now and then I would catch McGee’s program while driving in the Kansas City area back in the late 70s/early 80s. Years and years later, in the first decade of this century (I think), I would catch it again sometimes. I enjoyed the program. The latter round was just a re-broadcast of the earlier programs, with a new intro added.  I think Lynda picked up this book at a yard sale or thrift store. I know we didn’t buy it new.

It was an okay book. McGee’s broadcasts were for the layman and, since this volume is said to be more or less a transcript of his broadcasts (slightly modified as would be needed for a book), it’s easily read and provides some good information and explanations of the book of Daniel. I’ve read many other commentaries as I do my Bible studies and prepare to teach adult Sunday school, and find them almost written for scholars by scholars, not for laymen. This aspect of the book I liked.

I found the organization difficult. Where Daniel had his visions or where he interpreted the dreams of others, McGee put the  commentary of the interpretations with the dreams/visions, rather than hold them for the verses of the explanations. Then, when he got to the verses of the explanations, he had nothing to say but to repeat what he had already said. It seems to me that if the Bible is clear, the commentator shouldn’t have to say much. Of, if the Bible repeats itself (as it sometimes does), the commentator should say little. McGee did that to some extent, but perhaps not enough.

In his defense, it’s a tough thing to write a commentary in a repetitive situation. I don’t think I could do any better. McGee also did a good job sorting out the historical context. The Bible doesn’t give a list of the Babylonian kings, or those of the Medes and Persians. That has to be obtained from non-biblical sources. McGee gives that info—a good thing.

Right after reading McGee’s book, we got out the Matthew Henry concise commentary and Daniel read that, sort of as an exercise. When I’ve used Henry’s commentary before, I found it different than others, having more of a insights for living a Christian life feel to it than just a technical explanation of the Bible. I thought, therefore, we might gain some of those insights. Alas, it wasn’t as good for that purpose as I hoped it would be. It’s still a good commentary; just not something you can read as sort of a devotional.

I’m glad we read McGee’s book. I give it either 3 or 4 stars. But it is not a keeper. Today it will go on the sale/donate table. Nor will I go out of my way to acquire any others in the series. It’s good, but not good enough in our era of dis-accumulation.