Be a Better Writer -- INSPIRATIONAL WRITING
Posted: Fri Nov 28, 2014 10:16 am
Inspirational writing takes a narrative—either a 1st person narrative or an incident from the life of someone else—and draws from it a positive lesson or a spiritual message. It should not be heavy-handed or preachy or somber. If you’ve ever read Guideposts magazine, you’ve read inspirational writing. If you haven’t, just click the link, and find the column labeled “Inspirational” for some examples of this kind of writing.
Although inspirational writing has a lot in common with devotionals and Bible studies, there are some significant differences. Inspirational writing is not as academic as Bible studies are; although you may put a Bible verse in an inspirational piece, it’s not necessary, and you definitely don’t want more than one—maybe two. But the focus is not on analyzing the meanings of scripture verses. Rather, the focus is on the encouraging or motivating or inspiring lesson that can be gained from the narrative.
Similarly, while a devotional (or a Bible study) may make a theological point, an inspirational article is more down-to-earth, and more accessible by people at any point in their life of faith—certainly not just those who have been Christians for many years.
In fact, inspirational writing isn't necessarily Christian at all. The Chicken Soup books are in the inspirational genre, and the stories there are not overtly Christian, but they are inspirational in that they leave the reader uplifted. In fact, although it’s taken me five paragraphs to get to it, that might be a good working definition for inspirational writing: it’s nonfiction writing that leaves the reader feeling better for having read it.
With that in mind, I’m going to go ahead and pull some of the best tips from the “devotionals” lesson because those apply here, too.
1. Avoid “Christianese”—those words and phrases that come so easily to the minds of those of us who’ve been in churches for decades. If you’ve heard it or read it before, write it differently.
2. Start with a great hook.
3. Feel free to include characters and dialogue.
4. Nonfiction does not have to be dry. Use interesting word choices, lively pacing, and all of the other features that make fiction interesting, and apply those to your nonfiction.
5. Give it a great ending. Remember that you’re intending to leave your readers feeling inspired, so don’t let the ending thud.
6. Don’t be abstract, academic, or overly theological. A really good approach (but not the only acceptable approach) would be to take an incident either from your life or from someone else’s life that inspired you, and to relate that incident, along with how or why it’s inspiring. But don’t make it sound like a report (“I find the life of Gertrude Schuckelgruber to be inspiring because…”) Keep in mind that we’re looking for excellence in writing skill above all else.
If you’d like to read some more online examples of inspirational writing, there’s a blog called Jewels of Encouragement that was started by some FaithWriters and still has a few FaithWriters as regular contributors. Every post is to be encouraging in nature, and I highly recommend that you read a few posts to get an idea of this genre, if you’re still unclear.
And that’s about it—this is a far shorter lesson than usual because this genre is really self-explanatory. Will your writing inspire your readers? Then it’s inspirational writing.
HOMEWORK:
As usual, feel free to ask a question or to leave a comment about anything in this lesson. OR
If you’ve written an inspirational entry, link to it. If you do this, will you also tell us something about the writing of that particular piece, please?
Although inspirational writing has a lot in common with devotionals and Bible studies, there are some significant differences. Inspirational writing is not as academic as Bible studies are; although you may put a Bible verse in an inspirational piece, it’s not necessary, and you definitely don’t want more than one—maybe two. But the focus is not on analyzing the meanings of scripture verses. Rather, the focus is on the encouraging or motivating or inspiring lesson that can be gained from the narrative.
Similarly, while a devotional (or a Bible study) may make a theological point, an inspirational article is more down-to-earth, and more accessible by people at any point in their life of faith—certainly not just those who have been Christians for many years.
In fact, inspirational writing isn't necessarily Christian at all. The Chicken Soup books are in the inspirational genre, and the stories there are not overtly Christian, but they are inspirational in that they leave the reader uplifted. In fact, although it’s taken me five paragraphs to get to it, that might be a good working definition for inspirational writing: it’s nonfiction writing that leaves the reader feeling better for having read it.
With that in mind, I’m going to go ahead and pull some of the best tips from the “devotionals” lesson because those apply here, too.
1. Avoid “Christianese”—those words and phrases that come so easily to the minds of those of us who’ve been in churches for decades. If you’ve heard it or read it before, write it differently.
2. Start with a great hook.
3. Feel free to include characters and dialogue.
4. Nonfiction does not have to be dry. Use interesting word choices, lively pacing, and all of the other features that make fiction interesting, and apply those to your nonfiction.
5. Give it a great ending. Remember that you’re intending to leave your readers feeling inspired, so don’t let the ending thud.
6. Don’t be abstract, academic, or overly theological. A really good approach (but not the only acceptable approach) would be to take an incident either from your life or from someone else’s life that inspired you, and to relate that incident, along with how or why it’s inspiring. But don’t make it sound like a report (“I find the life of Gertrude Schuckelgruber to be inspiring because…”) Keep in mind that we’re looking for excellence in writing skill above all else.
If you’d like to read some more online examples of inspirational writing, there’s a blog called Jewels of Encouragement that was started by some FaithWriters and still has a few FaithWriters as regular contributors. Every post is to be encouraging in nature, and I highly recommend that you read a few posts to get an idea of this genre, if you’re still unclear.
And that’s about it—this is a far shorter lesson than usual because this genre is really self-explanatory. Will your writing inspire your readers? Then it’s inspirational writing.
HOMEWORK:
As usual, feel free to ask a question or to leave a comment about anything in this lesson. OR
If you’ve written an inspirational entry, link to it. If you do this, will you also tell us something about the writing of that particular piece, please?