Posts Tagged ‘Blogging’

8 Mar

Introducing a New Series on Receiving Others as Gifts

Posted by Jennifer Clark Tinker in Community. Tagged: , , , , , , , , .

20131206-163719.jpgI wrote a post in December based on a portion of the Deaconess litany about the idea of receiving others as gifts. I said then that this is a topic that I wanted to write more about.

Then in January, inspired by an old post from my friend, David Housholder, about finding your “life message,” I did some journaling about my own life message. I came up with three parts:

  1. I want to help people know to the core of their being that they are dearly beloved by God in a right-now, no-matter-what way. (I realize now that this is why I love to preach so much.)
  2. I’m passionate about seeing all of God’s gifts unleashed in his created people and I want to support others as they walk boldly in their gifting for the sake of others.
  3. I envision a world where people respect others and receive one another’s ideas & service as gifts. I believe that we need each other, not to control each other but to serve one another.

Notice the third part–there’s that phrase again–about receiving others as gifts. So, as you can see, this kept popping up as a theme.

Meanwhile, I was growing frustrated with the blog here. I mean, I was faithfully posting every Friday, but I felt like I wasn’t being very purposeful about my topics. When I sat down to do some brainstorming about blog topics, once again many of the topics I came up with seemed to relate to the idea of receiving others as gifts!

So all of that is why I am officially starting “Receiving Others as Gifts” as a series here on the blog.

To get an overview of my thinking on this topic, be sure to check out my previous post, Receiving Others as Gifts. I have also created a list of ten topics that will each become a post in the series. Here are those ten topics:

  1. We Need Each Other–Mutually Giving and Receiving
  2. Companionship Over the Long Haul
  3. The Giftliness of Others
  4. The Giftedness of Others
  5. Holy Others Belonging to God
  6. Sanctity of Life
  7. Working Together – Cooperation & Collaboration
  8. Finding Common Ground when Values Compete/Conflict
  9. Honoring Differences in Style, Personality, Approach
  10. Gratitude for & Gracious Reception of One Another

These are subject to change and I may add to the list. But, in general, unless the Spirit moves me otherwise, these topics will be on the blog over the next 10 Fridays.

I have no idea if any of this will make sense outside of my own brain, but it is in me to write it and I need to get it out there. I would love your feedback as this goes along. Please tell me what makes sense and what doesn’t. Let me know what you’d like me to expand on. And, if something rubs you the wrong way, I’d be honored if you would tell me that too.

 

 

Read all the posts in the Receiving Others as Gifts series:

14 Feb

So Far: 100 Posts -plus- Seven Things I Would Do 100 Times

Posted by Jennifer Clark Tinker in Community, Vocation. Tagged: , , .

So, I’ve been sick this week and got to today and realized it’s blog day–Friday is my day that I post something original here whether I feel like it or not. But my head is so cloudy that I didn’t know what I was going to write about. But then, I noticed that I have published 99 posts and this would be my 100th!

So, In honor my 100th post, I’m going to share some other things I would do 100 (or more) times:

  1. Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario: This is my all-time favorite vacation place. I would go there 100 times if I could. My husband and I learned of a lovely cottage there by referral from my mother. We haven’t been there in years, but I’d love to go back time after time after time.
  2. Doodling my name: I love all forms of handwriting and handlettering. I could sit and doodle my name over and over 100 times in different styles and scripts.
  3. Carmine Park: There is a little park in the middle of my small town in Texas. It has natural interest, with a creek running through it and a lovely valley at one end, but it also has lots of great play equipment. I like to take my son there to blow off steam. Sometimes I play with him, but sometimes I take a notebook and sit and write. I could go there 100s of times.
  4. The library: I love to go to the library–sometimes to get books, but sometimes just as a quiet place to study or write. My son likes to go there too. It’s especially great to go there when the weather makes outdoor play unpleasant so we don’t go stir-crazy. I could go to a local library 100s of times and enjoy it every time.
  5. Pedicures: I haven’t had one in months, and I think I’ve only done it half a dozen times, but I would get a 100 pedicures if I had the chance! What’s really interesting too is that my favorite pedicurist told me that it was her favorite part of her job, I just loved going to her.
  6. Frozen: Okay, I have to say it. Frozen quickly became my all-time favorite movie. I know we joke about kids watching their Disney movies over and over and making us sick of them, but I personally could watch Frozen 100 times and not get sick of it. (To read more of my thoughts on the movie, try clicking these titles: Disney’s Frozen and the Misuse of Power, Disney’s Frozen and My Rant About the ‘Rents, and Disney’s Frozen and Using Power for Good.)
  7. How Great Thou Art: Somehow this one has become my favorite hymn and I love belting out all four verses (from memory) at the top of my voice. I could sing this one 100 times. I sometimes dream of recording myself singing it and then sharing it online, but I’m too chicken for that.

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Now it’s your turn! I’d love to hear from you: what are some things you would do 100 times if you could? Comment below or post to your own blog and be sure to give me a link. Or send me an e-mail at livingfaithjct (at) gmail (dot) com.

7 Feb

This Writing Thing -or- And Now for Some Good News

Posted by Jennifer Clark Tinker in Vocation. Tagged: , , , .

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I have some good news for y’all about this writing thing…actually a couple of newsy bits…

A Real Writing Contract

The first news I want to share with you is that I am getting a contract to write for a Lent devotional for 2015 for Augsburg Fortress (the official publishing house of my denomination, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America)! I’ll post pictures when I get the contract in my hands, but I couldn’t wait to tell you about this. [UPDATE: I signed the contract on February 12, 2014 and you can see the pictures here.]

One of the coolest things about this gig is that it came totally out of the blue for me. I have this tension between wanting to put myself forward as a writer but also wanting to let the formal publishing side develop naturally. I can self-promote with the best of them, but it is tiring. And it can be discouraging when I don’t feel like I’m getting “noticed” despite my best efforts at promoting my own work. So to have a real publishing house come to me is a pretty nice bit of notice!

The other cool thing about this gig is the nature of the project. It is a devotional based on the book of Ephesians–which is one of my favorite books of the Bible. The deal is that I am assigned scriptures and a compelling photograph for each of my 15 entries. Then I find a non-biblical quotation and write a reflection. I love the call for a non-biblical quotation because I always have other sources floating around in my head that influence how I process my faith.

And finally, this gig is pretty sweet because I’m getting paid real cash money to write these! I mean, maybe the fact that I told you there was a contract involved implied that I was getting paid. But I wanted to make sure I highlight that because, well, real cash money!

A Promotion

The other bit of news is that I’ve been given a promotion at Life & Liberty. I am now the chief editor! It sounds so glamorous, right? Well, the truth is that it is work. But it is work I pretty much love. I’ve edited newsletters before, but then I had to deal with all the printing part. Publishing online is all the work I love about doing print publications with none of copies, labels and mailing.

I’ve made Life & Liberty my online home away from my own blog. You’ve probably noticed a lot of times I post here and then link to something over there. I’ve been pretty involved over there, helping to promote the site, posting with increased frequency, and learning the ropes of a bigger, self-hosted platform. And I truly believe in the vision of what Life & Liberty is all about–to promote a society that is spiritually grounded and truly free. So, this is a pretty natural progression for me to get to take on even more responsibility over there.

There are several benefits to me working over at Life & Liberty, but one that I most cherish is the way that I am encouraged to find my voice there. Any time I’ve asked if I could try something that seemed crazy to me, I’ve been given permission to do so. And as I try to hone my unique message for the world, I find that platform draws out some of my deepest convictions. There is a whole lot of nuance to my worldview and it is scary to say what I really think about things, but it is just a little less scary to say it over there among like-minded folks.

Along with my promotion to chief editor at Life & Liberty, I’ve also been encouraged to post there with even greater frequency. I’m not sure how often it will be, but at least weekly and I may settle in at twice a week or so. I will continue to post links here for my work over there. I don’t want you to miss anything there because, like I say, that place pulls something deep and important out of me.

This Place

Rest assured, even with my snazzy writing contact and my posh promotion I will still post something original here at Living Faith at least once a week. My standard day for posting original content here is Fridays.

I hope you will purchase boatloads of the Lent devotional next year and that you will click over to all my great content at Life & Liberty! But if not, just know that I appreciate you reading here and walking with me on life’s journey.

I owe a lot to the ongoing positive feedback that y’all give me. You keep me going and propel me toward these cool new milestones in this writing thing. So, let’s keep doing this “Living Faith” thing together!

P.S. Although my devotional project won’t be ready until next year, you can order the 2014 version online now: Too Deep for Words: Devotions for Lent 2014, based on Romans.

8 Jan

The Madness of Writing

Posted by Jennifer Clark Tinker in Brokenness, Vocation. Tagged: , .

Now that I’ve stepped through this door, broken this threshold, and entered The Writing Life, I simply must stay. I must keep writing no matter how maddening it can be.

But it is maddening putting these words out here and wondering if, hoping that they will be what somebody needs.

20140108-114507.jpgThe truth is that I don’t know anyone else quite like me, but my brain is the only one I know to write from.

And so I pull these truths, these stories, these musings out of me and put them out here for…well, for someone…

I am touched by the people who read regularly. There are people I see in-person that tell me they’re reading. And they tell me it is good. And I am so grateful.

But I do get discouraged because those doubting voices try to mess with me and say that something can be good but still not meet a real need.

I don’t want to be a good writer.

Lots of people can write well even with nothing to say.

I want to say something.

But I don’t just want to say something, I want to say something that somebody needs.

And while I get lots of “attaways” from people, I still wonder if I’m meeting a need.

Of course, that itself is a rabbit hole of madness to wonder because how can I even know? How can I possibly measure?

And what if simply reading what is on my heart meets a need all on its own? Maybe, just maybe, the regular readers are having a need met by reading and the reality of them sticking around should clue me in to their satisfaction. Just maybe.

But no, I’m far too mad to let that be enough.

I want more notoriety. Somehow I reason that I will know my writing is needed if I get noticed by more and more and more people.

I’m not sure how or when the desire to be noticed became so strong in me.

Only this…I get jealous when I see a clever post from someone else get shared and reshared around the Interwebs. And I think I write clever things and I wonder why my links aren’t flying through cyberspace.

And it sounds so silly to admit this petty jealousy.

I am petty indeed.

And it is maddening to be so petty.

And I know in my brain that this all takes time and I can’t expect to go from obscurity to notoriety in 10 silly months.

I know, I know, I know…

But the madness is that I hoped I would be the exception. Of course I know I can’t expect overnight success, but I wanted it anyway.

So petty.

This Writing Life messes with me like that. It draws from my deepest, wisest and best while simultaneously exposing my pettiest, silliest, and worst.

So maddening.

But I refuse to let the worst in me be an excuse to squelch my voice. I’m going to keep writing from this brain, this heart and I’m going to keep hoping that somehow, sometime, something of it will be needed.

The only thing more maddening than this Writing Life would be if I quit. Luckily, I’m just crazy enough to stick with it.

3 Jan

Starting a New Year Presently

Posted by Jennifer Clark Tinker in Community, Family, Vocation. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , .

present

Over the past few years I’ve noticed bloggers doing this thing where they pick a word for their year. I don’t totally know how it is supposed to work, and since I was doing well just to start this thing part-way into last year, I didn’t worry about picking a word. I just needed to start.

But this year, I wanted to pick a word. Well, it’s not so much that I wanted to pick a word as that God kept laying this one idea on my heart–over and over. So, I wanted to put a word to it for 2014.

The idea that God has been nudging me toward has come with a number of different words: “showing up,” being “incarnational,” and such like.

Basically, my natural inclination is to retreat. When I’m super stressed out, I probably need a good stretch of solitude to right myself.

I don’t withdraw to avoid conflict. In fact, I’m surprisingly comfortable navigating interpersonal rifts and engaging opposing viewpoints.

But I do like to escape into my inner-world. I have a super-active thought-life that doesn’t slow down–ever. In my previous post titled Why I Love Conferences Even Though I’m an Introvert (click the title to read that post), I explained, “I can be in a crowd of people and be totally withdrawn into my own thought-world.”

I don’t consciously try to shut people out, but this natural inclination to retreat does mean that I have to consciously make myself get out, reach out, and be connected to others.

At first when we moved to this super rural community I was a little troubled by the fact that there wasn’t a paying job for me way out here in the Texas countryside. As time has gone on, what I have found is that this easy country life has been a great opportunity to do the writing that I have wanted to do. And the preaching & speaking opportunities have come just often enough that I can bring in a little income for my family.

All the same, this country life has made it easier than ever in my life to retreat to a fault. And my dear husband is so supportive of my writing and preaching and speaking that he lets me retreat whenever I need to. This is great when I need it, but not great when I am needed elsewhere.

So the big challenge for me is pushing myself to get outside of myself more despite how easy it is to retreat. With that, my word for 2014 is…

Present

I’ve never been very big on New Year’s Resolutions–mostly because making resolutions all-of-a-suddenly, out of nowhere seems like a recipe for failure. But this word, this idea of being present has come from quite some time of reflection and I am indeed resolved to work at it in 2014.

Some specific ways I want to live this out are:

  • Getting up & ready by X time everyday, so I can be ready for unexpected opportunities to be present with others.
  • Putting events on my personal calendar as soon as I learn of them so I can make sure to be present at events that are too easy to forget without planning for them.
  • Writing on the blog 1-2 original posts each week so I can continue to cultivate a consistent online presence.

This is new territory for me in choosing a word and making resolutions. But New Year’s is generally an upswing for me as my birthday falls on the third day of each new year (yes today). So, I am optimistic about my resolve to live into this intentionality of presence. Pluswhich, somehow 2013 was the best year of my life so far, so I want to be fully present for whatever 2014 might bring.

This post is part of the January 2014 Synchroblog: New Beginnings. See what other Synchroblog contributors are saying about their New Beginnings:

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