As part of getting my book finalized for publication, I’ve been working on several online projects “behind the scenes.”
You can now visit the website for St. Peter’s Brewery at :: http://www.stpetersbrewery.info, follow the conversation on Twitter (@stpetersbrew), become a fan on Facebook and join our Flickr group and share a picture of your favorite sanctuary/sanctuaries.
Continue reading One step closer
Some of you may recall the prayer requests shared for Lanessa Allman last year (She’s Chris Allman’s sister-in-law and attended UMHB with us.)
Last year she was struck with encephalitis and several other complications after giving birth to her fourth son.
And now that she’s had time to heal and recover, she’s put her story into words and self-published a book, “Restored – To the Land of the Living.”
Continue reading Restored – To the Land of the Living
I got a copy of a great DVD last week in the mail — Francis Chan’s “Crazy Love.” The DVD is a companion to the book of the same title and is put together as a great resource for small group discussion.
I watched four or five chapters right off the bat and loved the simplicity as well as the quality of the videos. I instantly thought it would be a great resource for our small group in the coming months and I’ve asked all the other community groups at encounter to consider doing the same.
The DVD is broken into 10 chapters, to correlate with the book. In each “chapter” of the DVD, Chan talks about various topics related to the same chapters in the book. The videos then wrap up with several questions for the group to discuss.
Publisher’s Weekly writes about the book:
Chan, senior pastor of Cornerstone Church in Simi Valley, Calif., offers a radical call for evangelicals to consider and emulate in this debut guide to living crazy for God. Chan’s own life compels him to live with urgency, and with good reason. His mother died giving birth to him, his stepmother died when he was nine, and his dad when he was 12. As a pastor, Chan says that conducting weekly funerals for people younger than himself has likewise sobered him to life’s unexpectedness and frailty. Chan writes with infectious exuberance, challenging Christians to take the Bible seriously. He describes at length the sorry state of lukewarm Christians who strive for a life characterized by control, safety and an absence of suffering. In stark contrast, the book offers real-life accounts of believers who have given all—time, money, health, even their lives—in obedience to Christ’s call.Chan also recounts his own attempts to live crazy by significantly downsizing his home and giving away his resources to the poor.Earnest Christians will find valuable take-home lessons from Chan’s excellent book.
Just the first few “chapters” on the DVD alone had me re-thinking my relationship with God and how lacking it can be. Chan makes the point early on that he realized as a teenager that his prayers really seemed to be lacking – he never really “prayed to anyone.” His prayers were more about rattling off a list of requests than actually talking with someone.
He shared that as he began to read about the God of Scripture (in places like Revelations 4) and saw the mighty power and majesty of God, he began picturing coming before this mighty God each time before he prayed — it suddenly changed his heart, his mind and his thoughts. Suddenly he was no longer just praying out into space, but he was talking to his creator and God.
I’m looking forward to going through this book/DVD with our group and seeing and hearing what they take from it as well. If you’re in the DFW area and want to come join our discussion – let me know! We meet every Saturday at 6 p.m. in Red Oak.
And to get your own copy of the book, Amazon has a copy of the book in paperback, or you can buy the Crazy Love CD/Audio version,
Or for more information about the book and DVD visit http://crazylovebook.com/ or read other reviews at http://viralbloggers.com/2009/01/crazy-love-interactive-dvd/
Yup, that’s it. My month long challenge of writing a novel has come to an end – a full day early. M$ Word says I finished with a 50,737 word count. Nanowrimo says I finished with an official 50,849 word count and Google Docs says I finished with a 51,716 word count.
I’ll be honest, I like Google’s number better, but Nanowrimo is the official score, so I’ll stick with that for now.
At times it was much harder than I imagined (aka writers block) but at other times it was as if the words just jumped off pages. It was an enjoyable process none the less and depending on how the editing process goes, I may just do a followup next year – we’ll just see if Laurie lets me :-).
As for now, I’m putting my writing on hold and plan to spend the month of December catching up on sleep and enjoying some books I’ve been putting off.
Jan 2, 2009 I plan to start the horrible process of editing the book and then we’ll go from there. I’m looking to self-publish the book either with Lulu or CreateSpace and depending on the editing process, I’d love to have it ready to go by March? We’ll see how it goes.
(BTW if you’re glutton for punishment – I might be looking for some copy editors in 2009 :-))
I’ll end this post with another passage from the book. I haven’t decided if I absolutely love it, or if I’m scared of it yet (that probably makes no sense to anyone else) ::
“You know, I realize this week has been rough for various folks in our group,†Matt began. “But as I was reading this weekend and then talking with Julie about politics and other random malarkey, I began to think how different the Kingdom of God is, compared to the kingdom of man. It’s this upside down, twisted kingdom that I don’t know if we’ll ever really wrap our minds around.â€
Jimmy looked up from his plate and listened carefully as Matt continued.
“I hope that no matter what happens politically, no matter what happens in the world around us, it can be said that I serve the king of an upside down kingdom. A kingdom where the meek shall inherit the earth, where those who morn are comforted, where the last are first, where the oppressed shall be freed. Where rather than appearing in a palace to lead his kingdom with a sword, my king came and appeared in a lowly manager — surrounded by animals.â€
Matt continued strumming his guitar as Julie opened a Bible and began reading a passage that Jimmy was surprised sounded very familiar to him.
“You’re blessed when you’re at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule.
You’re blessed when you feel you’ve lost what is most dear to you. Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you.
You’re blessed when you’re content with just who you are—no more, no less. That’s the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can’t be bought.
You’re blessed when you’ve worked up a good appetite for God. He’s food and drink in the best meal you’ll ever eat…â€
As Julie continued reading, Jimmy leaned over and whispered to Kim, “What is that she’s reading, it sounds familiar.â€
“It’s from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, in Matthew’s Gospel,†Kim replied with a smile. “I think the beginning of the fifth chapter.â€
As Julie finished her reading, Matt continued telling his story.
“So as I’m thinking about this upside down kingdom and reading this passage in Scripture it brought me hope to know that when we’re at the end of our rope, that’s when God can really go to work. And when we lose what’s really dear to us, that’s when we’ll be embraced by God. Because God loves us all, especially those who suffer and mourn, in fact he says he will comfort them.â€
Matt continued strumming his guitar as he sat looking at the various faces in the room. Jimmy tried to focus on his food again, hoping not to make eye contact with anyone else in the room.
“And so for those of you who have had your kingdom and your world collapse recently, I want you to know that God offers a different kind of kingdom for us all,†Matt said. “And I want you each to know that not only does God suffer with you, but each of us suffer with you as well.â€
Don’t worry, this won’t be a 25,000 word post. I now know that would take 58 pages in a word document.
I have crossed the halfway mark for #nanowrimo on Nov 18! WOOT! (25,298 words to be exact as of 10:12 p.m.)
Now in all seriousness, the challenge is to reach 30k by tomorrow night at midnight. I’m doubtful that I’ll be able to get a 5,000 word streak going tomorrow, but if I keep punching out at least 2,100 words a day over the next 12 days – I’ll be done with time to spare.
So as a “teaser” for those who keep asking, and I keep shrugging off, here’s the rough synopsis of the book ::
A twenty-something moves to a small town to try and run from the troubles he’s had in his past. Along the way he meets up with a community of quirky friends who show him that real life is not life lived alone – but lived in community with others.
You knew it would have something to do with community now didn’t you?
So now the struggle begins. I’ve reached the halfway point. Have I put too much into the story so far that I won’t have enough storyline left to reach the end? Am I still still trying to squeeze too much into the storyline? Are my characters developed enough? Does it matter?
Time to stop thinking and worrying about it…..
As a side note – I’ve heard two different strategies on writing/publishing/selling books. One strategy says all you need to do is sell one book to one fan. The fan will take care of selling the rest (as he tells their friends, who tell their friends, who tell their friends.) The other strategy says that if you can’t sell 100 books, you need a different book.
Which strategy to you subscribe to? Maybe I can get 100 people to say they’ll commit to buying the book for say — $12 (or less hopefully) — and then it won’t really matter will it 🙂
Here’s my stats as of right now. I’ve gotten a little bit behind, as you can see I haven’t updated each and every day.
Starting out, I think you need an average of 1,666 words a day to finish all 50,000 words in a month. I think my average for the remaining 20 days is now around 1,950 words a day (that also takes in consideration the 2-3 days I’ll probably miss this weekend due to the marriage retreat we’ll be going on).
So anyways, I’m having fun, trying not to think about it too much as in making plot decisions, grammar and such (I think that’s the biggest suggestion everyone has given).
Here’s to hoping I’ll win and have something worth sharing at the end.
A few random trivia points thus far. See if you can piece the story together. 🙂
OK that’s all you get for now – unless you can track down my profile on Nanowrimo.org 🙂
Or you can follow my #nanowrimo updates on Twitter.
Or see what other writers are tweeting about.
And read what Kevin Hendricks has written thus far.