Writing

The main focus of my work is on writing the seven volumes in the WordPoints Daybook Series. Currently, five of the books are finished, and the sixth is now in the very early stages of composition. Begun in 1999 and scheduled for completion in 2028, the entire set of books (comprising over a million words) will have taken nearly 30 years to write, if it is the Lord’s will for the whole series to be finished.

1. Enthusiastic Ideas – A Good Word for Each Day of the Year. What are the time-tested ideas that our character should be based on? Enthusiastic Ideas provides a short essay on a positive word for each day of the year, a word suggesting some principle or value deserving a place in our hearts.
2. More Enthusiastic Ideas – Another Good Word for Each Day of the Year. Giving readers a second year of positive words, More Enthusiastic Ideas reinforces the idea that we can choose our principles. Better things happen in our lives when we choose better ideas to guide our decisions.
3. Diligently Seeking God – Daily Motivation to Take God More Seriously. Based on the idea in Hebrews 11:6, Diligently Seeking God urges the reader to be passionate, careful, and persistent in seeking God. We must not be content until we have the relationship with God we were created to enjoy.
4. Reaching Forward – Daily Motivation to Move Ahead More Steadily. In Philippians 3:13, Paul encouraged Christians to leave the past behind and reach forward to what is ahead in Christ. This book recommends the advantages of a forward-oriented faith: the gospel of Christ is about heaven!
5. Obeying the Gospel – Daily Motivation to Act on Our Faith. If a person wanted to become a Christian, what would he actually need to do? Obeying the Gospel looks into the Scriptures to answer this crucial question, exploring both the “how” and the “why” of becoming a Christian.
6. Walking in Christ – Daily Motivation to Grow in Our Commitment (currently being written, scheduled for 2025). Walking in Christ examines the Christian’s character and conduct, both as an individual and a member of the Lord’s church. What does our commitment require of us? How do we lead lives of authentic discipleship to Christ?
7. Going Home – Daily Motivation to Make the Final Journey (scheduled for 2028). What happens to our hearts as we get closer to the goal of heaven? Going Home contains 366 heartfelt meditations on heaven, the home of the soul. For Christians who dread the day of their death, this book will be a wake-up call.

As the name of the series indicates, these are “daybooks” — each consists of a one-page reading for each day of the year. They are “devotional” books, but they are characterized by more substance and depth than many of the modern books in this genre. If you’d like an idea of how much these books have meant to readers, see “What Readers Are Saying” for a sample of readers’ comments.

If there is any time left to me after completing the WordPoints Daybook Series, here are some other books that I hope to write before I die, if it is the Lord’s will. Already, these are on my mind and in my prayers. I am studying, pondering, and jotting down ideas for these.

1. Seeking God in the Psalms. This will be a 52-lesson set of study guides that can be used either for individual study or small-group discussions. These lessons will be in the same Monday-Friday format as the Daily Family Bible Studies that have been familiar to readers for many years.
2. Ecclesiastes. I believe the message of Ecclesiastes is what modern people must hear — and accept — or they will never acknowledge their need for Christ. I’ve been studying Ecclesiastes all my life, and before I die, I would like to write a full-blown textual commentary on this great book. In preparation for that, I am currently spending time each week re-learning the Hebrew language, a language which has, I’m sorry to say, slipped away from me since graduate school days.
3. Encountering Christ. Of all the works on my “bucket list,” this is the most important. I hope that Christ has been at the center of everything I’ve written in the past, at least implicitly, but I would like to end my life as a writer by devoting an entire book explicitly to Christ Himself. This would be a book encouraging the reader to dig into the Scriptures and “encounter” Christ there — the messianic prophecies about Him, the portrait of His life in the Gospels, and the exposition of His doctrine in Acts-Revelation. In this book, I would hope to do what the evangelists in the New Testament period always did: show from the Scriptures that Jesus is the Christ, the Savior of the world.

Websites, etc.

The content contained in the books I have written is distributed to readers in various ways. Printed copies of the books are available, of course, but in addition to the books, readers can access the material by other means.

1. I maintain a website at WordPoints.com. This website is the main repository for my teaching material — daily pages from my books, sermon outlines, daily family Bible studies, downloadable Bible study materials, and more.
2. A new component of my work is the AreYouaChristian.com website. This content is oriented to the non-Christian and will provide a growing list of e-study courses, discussion guides, etc.
3. I provide a free WordPoints Mobile App, available in both the Apple and Google app stores.
4. Readers can receive content by email subscription to several mailing lists
5. Content can be read via several social media platforms.

Preaching

At the present time, health problems (not to mention the difficulties of the pandemic) limit my ability to travel and speak to live audiences, but I am hopeful the time will come when I will be able to resume this part of my work, at least on a limited basis. I miss the travel, the interaction with the Lord’s work in various localities, and, most of all, the opportunity to teach the Scriptures to groups in a first-person, face-to-face setting. If you have the occasion to pray for me, I hope you’ll pray that I might regain enough of my health to be able to do this again.

Thanks for your interest in the work that is being done. If you have any questions or need further information, feel free to email me.