Good morning, God,

You gave me this writing *gift. You built it into my DNA and you want me to stir it up, and you are helping me to develop it. You bring people into my life to encourage me and to mentor me.

What’s more, you are the one who puts the ideas into my head, you remind me of the stories that remind me of concepts that I can develop into a piece of writing.

So it is not right for me to talk about my writing. It should be our writing. Or at the very least my/our writing. Help me today to keep your co-authorship in mind.

Thanks,

Jack

*2 Timothy 1:6

Good morning, God,

You are the Master Communicator so you understand when I ask you to help me reduce the words in my writing. I tend to rattle on, forgetting what one of your prophets said, *“Let your words be few. The more the words, the less the meaning, and how does that profit anyone?”

I want my sentences to be packed with meaning, and profitable to my readers. So, help me today to go through my/our writing and eliminate, cut back, shorten, delete and reduce. (See what I mean? Sorry.)

Thanks,

Jack

*Ecclesiastes 5:2, 6:11

Good morning, God,

I need to learn to refine my writing. You often talk about refining your people’s lives as a *silversmith refines the metal, skimming off the dross, or as a farmer winnows the grain, getting rid of the chaff. So I need to learn to refine my words by deleting thoughts, ideas, and words that reduce the value of my/our writing.

Help me to get rid of the chaff, the useless stuff that distract from the main point. Great Refiner, help me today to purify and refine my/our writing.

Thanks,

Jack

*Proverbs 25:4

Good morning, God,

You told me this morning, *“Wise words bring many benefits, and hard work brings rewards.” I would like some of these benefits, and some of these rewards, including financial ones.

Please help me today to sell the pieces you/I have written. I’m not fussy, paper books, or e-books, magazines or whatever. Please be my Marketing Consultant.

Thanks,

Jack

*Proverbs 12:14

Good morning, God,

Today I am driving all day. I get bored just steering and my mind goes all over the place, including bad places.

So help me today to *think about things that are true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious, beautiful and all the other good stuff. Like how about a plot for a story, or a memorable character, or maybe two? I’ve got my little recorder ready. Let’s go.

Thanks,

Jack

*Philippians 4:8

Good morning, God,

You have given me at least five senses, but I tend to use only one when I write descriptions. I write what I see. But I have a nose, and so do my/our readers.

I need to describe what I smell too, the good stuff as well as bad. Didn’t you complain about some bad people being a *smoke in your nostrils? Well, then, help me to develop my sense of smell, and my ability to write in such a way that my/our readers smell their way into the scene.

Thanks,

Jack

*Isaiah 65:5

Jack started writing stories for their missionary newsletters during the decades he and his wife were Bible translators in Brazil. For the past twenty years, he has blogged weekly on missions, church, Christian spirituality, and Bible translation. His current blog is INsights & OUTbursts. He has print published three books and e-published two books of story-based articles—all selected from his blogs. His storytelling ability makes him a popular speaker who averages sixty speaking events each year.