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Kindle Notes & Highlights
You can better understand a devotional’s function by thinking of a tool box.
A devotional is not designed to do heavy lifting in the spiritual journey, nor is a devotional meant to be the centerpiece of guidance in a reader’s walk of faith. Those tasks are better left to Bible study, in-depth teaching, a meaningful prayer life — the power saws in the tool box.
But by design, a devotional has a different job to do. Its brevity and single focus make this form a unique and useful device, much like a small hammer or a match or a piece of flint. If used properly, a devotional can complete one small task. It can create a spiritual spark. That spark can drive the reader’s next step.
One spark — from your devotional — becomes a pivot point in a reader’s life of faith. That’s why it’s important that devotionals stick.
devotional — a short, inspiring illustration with a biblical takeaway.
learn how to write your message in a way that sticks with today’s busy, distracted readers.
But leaving chemistry aside, let’s consider what happens here. In order for an item to stick to another item, two conditions need to be met. One item must be sticky — that is, have adhesive properties. The other item needs to be compatible — stickable — in order for the adhesive item to attach to
The adhesive on the tape is sticky. The piece of paper and the refrigerator are stickable.
The writer is stickable: his heart is positioned to hear and record truth from God. The reader is stickable: she is positioned to receive truth. The content is sticky: truth is presented so the reader can relate to it and understand it.
This book explains all three of these players: The writer (you!) The reader The content.
For a devotional to be effective, all three players need to be stickable or sticky.
Always ask: Am I stickable? What’s the writer’s stickabliity? Is this content sticky?
“Write the vision; make it plain on tablets, so he may run who reads it” (Habakkuk 2:2).
God’s instructions to Habakkuk are a practical writing blueprint for you and me to follow today.
Like Habakkuk, you are to be open to how God speaks to you. You are to wrestle with what He shares with you so you can discern nuggets of truth. God’s instructions are clear: don’t let the insight you receive fall into oblivion. It is this step in the process — being a stickable writer — that we will discuss in more depth in this section.
You need to know how your readership can receive this information so you can write it to make it stick. How readers use the truth you share is their responsibility. Yours is make it available and stickable, which we will address in Chapter 9.
When you are entrusted with a revelation or truth or vision or insight from God, it is incumbent upon you to communicate it in a way that others can understand it. You are to explain it clearly — to “make it plain.”
It starts with the writer — a writer who is ready to hear what God has to say.
Pay attention to life as it happens around you. Talk with God about it and hear what He has to say. He will help you grasp the vision of truth that He reveals. And be ready to write it plainly so others can read it.
Readiness to see, readiness to hear, and readiness to process what God’s says: being ready to do those things makes you stickable.
The stumbling block is pre-writing. Pre-writing is the work you do before you work on any writing project. In this case, it’s the work you do before you write the devotional.
Pre-writing creates an obstacle because we wrongly believe that if we are not typing or scribbling or crossing out or adding words — when we’re not “officially” engaged in the physical act of writing — then we are not writing. Don’t be fooled.
Pre-writing is one of the activities in the process. While the writing itself — the formation of outlines, sentences, and paragraphs — is a constructural activity, pre-writing is a conceptual activity.
Decisions you make during pre-writing give you a sense of direction allowing you to get from Point A (a devotional to be written) to Point B (a completed devotional) in the shortest route possible.
When writing devotional content, pre-writing offers one other indispensable component: it allows you to uncover truth.
A similar pre-writing process works for you and me. You get ideas by observation. You capture ideas. You process ideas so you’re ready to write about them.
Stickable writers know that pre-writing is the key to producing quality work. The time spent here is essential for writing devotionals that stick because it is rooted in authenticity.
“Why me?” you may ask. “Who am I to write down the truth God revealed so that another person can read it?” Why NOT you?
You are qualified because you have a unique perspective and because your observations are one-of-a-kind.
Figure out a way to dump the pride so you can get back to the business of looking at God’s movement from your God-given unique perspective.
Do you want to be a stickable writer? Then adopt this mindset: ideas are all around you. Look for them.
The antenna is the go-between that connects the transmitting signal and the end user. When it comes to getting ideas for devotionals, you are the antenna — the go-between.
God regularly sends out signals,
Are you receiving them? You want to make sure those signals can get through. You get ideas for devotionals by making sure your writer’s antenna is “up.”
There is a simple way to “put up your writer’s antenna”: use the 6Ws.
You haven’t truly adopted the “ideas-are-everywhere” mindset until you figure out a way to capture the ones that come your way.
when you have a system to capture your ideas, you do more than just record a fleeting thought. You also free your mind from worry that you’ll forget that thought.
The physical act of recording the thought adds emphasis. Reinforcement heightens awareness and I become more aware or more sensitive to other examples of that principle.
The point is for you to have a system to take notes or record ideas as God gives them to you. That way, when you sit down to write a devotional, you don’t need to start writing from scratch.
If you capture ideas, you’ll find you will process your ideas eventually — when the time is right.
It doesn’t matter how you capture ideas. What matters is that you do.
use colored pens or pencils to note devotional ideas.
As you review an idea, bring it before God and ask Him to show you any connection that He wants you to see. Say to God, “Speak, Lord, I am listening. Does this observation show me something about You — and if so, what do you want me to see?”
You invite God to direct the process of sorting.
When I pray, “Speak, Lord, I am listening,” am I giving Him lip service? Perhaps I pray that prayer to “check it off my list“ but in reality, I want to pursue my own agenda.
There may be times where you make a compelling observation but do not understand how it is connected to a biblical truth until you dig deeper into the scriptures yourself.
When it comes to being a stickable writer, make sure you bring your captured ideas to God and let Him do the sorting with you.
A devotional is made up of three key elements: a biblical truth, an illustration, and a takeaway. (In Chapters 13 -15 we’ll discuss each of those structural elements in depth.)
As you process ideas, you examine each one to understand what kind of “dot” it is. Is it a scriptural principle … an illustration … or a takeaway?
you can use any idea as a launching point for writing a devotional.
