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| Our view while driving on Italy's beautiful Amalfi Coast |
I decided to expand upon Patty's examples and create a list of my own:
Luke 1:3-4: Before tackling the actual manuscript, careful investigation and some form of organization in compiling research data is a must. Outlines are also a good way of sticking to your point and writing orderly. The apostle Luke said it well: "It seemed good to me also, having had perfect understanding of all things from the very first, to write to you an orderly account."
- 2 Corin. 1:13: Cut the fluff. Edit out anything that doesn't move the story forward ... and it must he readable. Avoid excessive verbiage that floats in the atmosphere above the average head. Aim instead for the heart. Here's the apostle Paul's take: "For we are not writing any other things to you than what you read or understand. Now I trust you wil understand, even to the end."
- Song of Solomon 7:3-4: Poetic prose is lovely and flows across the mind as well as the tongue. Stylistic devices such as metaphors, similies, exclamations and hyperbole can be quite effective. Take a look at how Solomon (attributed as the wisest man who ever lived) uses these devices in this make-you-blush passage to his bride: " How fair and how pleasant you are, O love, with your delights! This stature of yours is like a palm tree, and your breasts like its clusters. I said, 'I will go up to the palm tree, I will take hold of its branches.' Let now your breasts be like clusters of the vine, the fragrance of your breath like apples, and the roof of your mouth like the best wine." (Somewhat kinder than the beginning of chapter 7 when he compares her waist to a heap of wheat and her nose to the tower of Lebanon.)
- Jeremiah 10:13: A wonderful example of sensory writing (using the senses of touch, taste, vision, hearing, and smell) to engage the reader in the scene: "When He utters his voice, there is a multitude of waters in the heavens; 'And He causes the vapors to ascend from the ends of the earth. He makes lightning for the rain. He brings the wind out of His treasuries.'"
- Jeremiah 13:1-10: Use personal stories and anecdotes to make a point. Jeremiah makes his point very well here with this personal account: "Thus the Lord said to me: 'Go and get yourself a linen sash, and put it around your waist, but do not put it n water.' So I got a sash according to the word of the Lord and put it around my waist. And the word of the Lord came to me a second time, saying, 'Take the sash that you acquired, which is around your waist, and arise, go to the Euphrates and hide it there in a hole in the rock.' So I went and hid it by the Euphrates, as the Lord commanded me. Now it came to pass, after many days that the Lord said to me, 'Arise, go to the Euphrates, and take from there the sash which I commanded you to hide there.' Then I went to the Euphrates and dug, and I took the sash from the place where I had hidden it' and there was the sash, ruined. It was profitable for nothing. Then the word of the Lord came to me saying ... 'This evil people , who refuse to hear My words, who follow the dictates of their hearts, and walk after other gods to serve them and worship them, shall be just like this sash which is profitable for nothing.'"
- Matthew 19:23-26: The Bible is full of parables and word pictures using commonly known, everyday objects to illustrate a higher point, many from Jesus himself, such as this memorable one: "And again I say to you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."
Of course if you're an avid Bible reader (and I know you are), you'll find many, many more examples of the very things we're taught in writing workshops and conferences.
Not surprising, is it? That we get more than just life lessons from the Bible. The Book of all books. Like wise old Solomon said in the book of Proverbs, "There's nothing new under the sun."
*All scripture from NKJV translation
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