I am weary from well doing, to paraphrase the apostle Paul. Tired. Beat. My eyes are crossing. And, the part of my body that I sit on hurts. It’s all because I said “Yes” to a request that seemed like an appealing idea at the time. You know what they say about good intentions.
I’ve taught various courses in Religion at High Point University since 2018. For the past three years, I have focused on only one course (teaching two sections of it, two days a week, each semester). The course is entitled Biblical Themes. It’s exactly what it sounds like – an overview of some of the great strands of thought that weave their ways throughout Judeo-Christian scripture (things like Theology, Creation, Wisdom Literature, Prophetic Ministry, the Synoptics, Ecclesiology, Theodicy, Death and Ideas About Life Afterward, Patriarchy and Feminism, Sin and Redemption, the Search for Meaning, etc., etc.). A publishing company on the west coast contacted me out of the blue. They only produce textbooks and, therefore, sell exclusively to colleges and universities. (They do post on Amazon and Kindle, but otherwise their books only show up in campus bookstores.) The acquisitions editor explained that they examine academic offerings listed by every college and university in America. They determined in so doing that tons of schools offer undergraduate courses in Intro to Theology, but the books they use are primarily designed for seminary or grad students. “We want something an eighteen or nineteen year old who has never taken a Religion course before can understand,” she said. So, they contacted me. At first, I was complimented … until I began to wonder if she had basically said: “We’ve searched the country for someone who can dumb this subject down enough that anyone can understand it, and we’ve concluded that you’re the man!” By the time I figured out what her invitation to me actually implied, it was too late. I had already signed a contract.
Anyway, back to weariness. I’ve written a number of books across the years and co-authored several more. Some have even sold to people beyond my circle of relatives. Aside from one book about Homiletics that has been used by a few seminaries, most of what I’ve done was either collections of sermons or meditational materials. Those are easy to do. You take sermon manuscripts that you’ve already written, freshen them up a bit so that they will connect with contemporary readers, insert footnotes where needed, and mail it off to the publisher. It’s not child’s play, but neither is it rocket science. Textbooks, I am finding, are completely different animals and require SO MUCH WORK!!
In a textbook for undergrads, you have to present complicated ideas using language that is simple and clear enough to be easily accessible to young people who have no prior knowledge of the subject. However, you also have to make certain it is written with unquestionable academic integrity, or no professor with a Ph.D. is going to use it in her or his classroom. It’s kind of like creating a starter kit for highbrows. Research. Compose. Edit. Do more research. More composition. More editing. Footnote everything. Don’t miss the Ibids and Op. Cits. State objectives at the beginning of each chapter, and then make sure you do not fail to meet them. Don’t repeat the same word or phrase too often. But, make certain to reiterate key concepts by the use of repetition. Are your eyes crossing yet? If not, that means you quit reading all this a couple paragraphs ago. And when it’s all said and done, unless tons of schools pick the book up for their courses, don’t count on earning enough royalties to buy that summer home in the Caribbean.
Why do so many of us work as hard as we do at various things, especially when Wall Street gurus would caution that our returns will never match the investments we made? We do so, I think, because you and I define “returns” differently than do other people whose vision is limited to P-&-L spreadsheets. Some labor diligently at what others would call “menial” jobs because they recognize their jobs are part of the service industry and, therefore, are crucial to the well-being of individuals and communities. Some work third shifts as nurses or med techs because they are convinced of the noble mission of bringing sick people back to health. Some work as teachers or tutors because they believe every child deserves an opportunity to find a meaningful life. Some throw themselves into parenting or grandparenting for no other reason than love, and the return on their investments has nothing to do with money but everything to do with joy. Some receive comparatively modest salaries while employed as caregivers in institutional or private settings or as workers in local foodbanks, knowing that being of help to those who cannot help themselves brings a special kind of richness. And at the end of it all, we believe we will look back and say, “I found every bit as much as I gave away.” We even dare to hope that we will hear a Voice saying, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”
Teddy Roosevelt put it this way: “Nothing worth having comes easy.” Maybe we could rephrase it minimally and say: “Anything worth doing is worth doing well.” Heck! I guess I need to footnote that. Back to the writing board.