This week, Acts Of Faith: Examples From The Great Cloud Of Witnesses went live on Amazon as an e-book. The print book proof is supposed to arrive today. Assuming it checks out as good, I need to swap out the cover for one with a few tweaks, then I’ll hit “publish” and it will be live, too. My first published Bible study.

Although this is my thirtieth item to publish, in some ways this one is making me feel more vulnerable than all the others. It’s kind of like when I published my first (and so far only) poetry book, Daddy-Daughter Day. That was my eighteenth book to publish, and it made me feel very vulnerable at the time. I remember it as a strange feeling. I had novels and short stories and non-fiction books out there for people to buy and either like or tear apart. Why did poetry make me feel so at risk? Perhaps because I’m not trained as a poet. All I know about poetry I learned through my self-study, late in life. What if I mess it up, if my poems are garbage? Poetry is heightened language, with rules that aren’t needed in prose. All this combined resulted in my feeling vulnerable. I hesitated several months before hitting the publish button.

Now I’m feeling the same thing with Acts Of Faith. This isn’t my first Bible study. This is actually my ninth Bible study to prepare from my own research. The other eight I’ve already taught (or co-taught) from my notes to the adult Life Group I attend. One of them, Entrusted To My Care, is being taught right now from my notes in another group. For that study I happened to make more extensive teaching notes, which I gave them to the other teacher. Four weeks in to the fourteen-week study, she says it’s going well.

So, I’m no stranger to Bible studies. Why then this feeling of ill ease?

It’s probably the same thing as with poetry. I’m an amateur in this field, a layman playing against a host of trained clergy, teachers, professors, evangelists. Look at all the Bible studies published that have become popular. They are published by those who could be called professionals. Is there room on this field for an amateur to step up and make an impact?

I didn’t take any of those other Bible studies the next step and turn them into publishable products. When I prepared Bible studies and taught them to our group that’s been together for a long time, if I made a misstatement as I taught, I could cover it over with a joke and keep right on rolling. Now, however, if I have a mistake in my book—and I would think that, as a layman, I’m more likely to make a mistake than a professional—it’s out there in print for everyone to criticize. Yes, and that makes me feel vulnerable.

But is that bad? In a recent sermon, our pastor talked about this. He said that God made Himself vulnerable when He came to earth and faced the same temptations as we do. One of pastor’s key points was, “Vulnerability deepens relationships.” He added that we need to be willing to make ourselves vulnerable. If he didn’t say it outright, he implied that being vulnerable is necessary to do effective work for the kingdom of God.

That sermon came as I was in the midst of publishing tasks for Acts Of Faith but had not yet hit the button. I had some but not all of the publishing files created. Didn’t have the covers finished. I was at the point where I could easily have decided to stop publishing it, shrinking back into my comfortable world of fiction, etc. But the idea of making myself vulnerable as a way of doing great things for the kingdom of God pushed me forward, and hit the button I did.

What’s to become of Acts Of Faith? I have a somewhat captive audience in my Life Group, and should have ten to fifteen sales there. I know of another five to ten people locally who will want a copy. That puts me a little over average for my sales. And, who knows? Perhaps this will be my breakout book.

Last week I put the finishing touches on Acts Of Faith: Examples From The Great Cloud Of Witnesses“. That’s not to say it’s perfect, but I think it’s in good shape. I’m pleased with it as it is. On Thursday, I think it was, I formatted the book for print, completing that in a few hours.

As reported in my last post, I set about trying to make a cover for it, and failed miserably. But fortunately I had the earlier cover for it and was able to take that, make a few modifications, and I had a more acceptable cover. People I showed it to thought it was acceptable. On Saturday I set about making the cover wrap for the print book. Here’s what I came up with, still subject to a little tweaking.

Yesterday I uploaded all this to Amazon for the print book. For the third straight book the files I uploaded, both book interior and the cover, met Amazon’s technical specifications and they said I could order the proof copy. I did so, and it should arrive Thursday or Friday. By that time I’ll have the print cover changed with any tweaks needed. I e-mailed the basic cover to my critique group, Scribblers and Scribes of Bella Vista, and will show them the full wrap when we meet on Wednesday.

So, yesterday I also began the work on the e-books. This is the opposite of my normal order. Usually I do the e-books, which I find easier, first, then do the harder print book. Since I’m under a tight deadline for having the print book available I didn’t want to delay that even a day, so I changed up my normal routine. I finished the Kindle version interior yesterday. The cover is, I think, all ready. Later today, after I complete a few chores and errands, I’ll upload the e-book. As soon as it’s approved I’ll publish it. That could be later today or, more likely, tomorrow. Then it will be on to the Smashwords edition.

It’s kind of exciting, but also kind of scary. I’ll write about that in a future post.

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?