There are a lot of hard things in life. Some are downright impossible.
Entrepreneur and media guru Patrick Bet-David says the ten hardest things in life are:
- Getting Married
- Parenting
- Becoming an entrepreneur
- Keeping your health
- Overcoming addiction
- The loss of a loved one
- Leaving people behind
- Handling success
- Trusting others
- Massive failure
Many say the most difficult thing to do in all sports is to hit a baseball with a bat. When the best players ever can only successfully do it 30% of the time, it’s easy to make that case.
“The hardest thing on earth is choosing what matters.” (Sue Monk Kidd, The Secret Life of Bees)
Albert Einstein said, “The hardest thing in the world is to understand the income tax.”
Then there are the impossible things, like licking your elbow, reasoning with a two-year-old, reasoning with a three-year-old, watching the movie Out of Africa all the way through, not yawning at a baseball game, not coughing in church, and remembering to change the furnace filter regularly. (Hmm, those were specific.)
Many feel the toughest part of writing is staring at a blank screen and deciding how to start.
Because it is important to know our limits, there are some impossible things for the Christian writer to fully understand and write about. Sure, there are difficult subjects to address appropriately or challenging hurdles, but knowing what things are impossible to write about in their entirety builds an appropriate amount of humility into the job of a Christian writer.
These are book topics or themes impossible to write in all their various facets, but go ahead and try anyway.
God’s glory in all his majesty
God’s holiness in its perfection
God’s mercy
God’s lovingkindness
God’s grace in all its undeserved blessing
Forgiveness in its completeness
How far the east is from the west
Freedom from the curse of sin
The Trinity in its complexity
Grace and truth combined
The crucifixion in its brutality
Christ’s sacrifice in its sufficiency
The resurrection in its total victory
Christ in you
The wonder of creation
True joy
The faithfulness of God
Adoption into God’s family
God’s sovereign will
What belongs to God and what belongs to Caesar
True repentance
Loving God with all your heart, mind, and strength
Loving your neighbor as yourself
Christ’s return
The new Jerusalem
The new earth
Living in a world without sin
Of course, we will never fully grasp the greatness and complexity of God, and that’s just fine. He wouldn’t be God if he was finite like us and understandable in all his ways.
Still, go ahead and try covering these impossible themes in whatever you write. Spend a lifetime in study and meditation; and if you understand one of them only 30%, you’ll be in the Hall of Fame for Christian writers.
Poetry: I Can’t Sell It, but I Recommend It
It can’t be done, so be aware
that this project has no end;
still, try and write it if you dare,
of how a King can be your friend,
of how you can both kneel and joke
of Earthly life’s absurdity,
share laughter able to evoke
the joy of bright eternity.
And how can you look into those Eyes
above which thorn-bought scars do lay,
and then accept without surprise
His shouted call to joy, “Let’s play!”,
for this is what we all need learn
this friendship we can never earn.
Perfect, Andrew. Have a joyful day!
Linda, thank you!
Blessings on you and yours!
Ummm, Dan . . . Out of Africa is on my list of favorite movies of all time (though I do turn it off before it finishes and give it a different ending in my mind). 😂
Otherwise, a very insightful and thought-provoking post. ☺️
Thank you!
So, even lovers of OOA can’t watch it all the way through?
Point made. 🙂
Just so you can rest assured that commercialism is alive and well in Kenya, the Karen Blixen house is now a nice restaurant. https://www.karenblixencoffeegardens.com/
Hahaha. Touché.
Thanks for the Karen Blixen house info. It’s on my bucket list now. 😃
Dan, my favorite line in this post is: “go ahead and try anyway”. I think that’s been my motto in life and as a writer.
Dan, thank you. You’ve inspired me to return to the joy of writing about the wonder of knowing and sharing life with God, after a succession of those hard things depleted my passion for the work. Your use of “impossible” acknowledges the latter, then calls me back to the former. If that was your target, you scored a bull’s eye in this writer.
If there were a hardest things list just for writers, today I’d have one to add! I had a editing client under contract to write a graduate-school textbook. Then she had a family crisis and asked me to co-author in addition to editing. The publisher decided my academic credentials were adequate and agreed to the change and an extension. I prayed over it for weeks, and signed the contract. Then my dear husband and I got severe long covid, then I lost him to cancer. I didn’t work for months. The final deadline with the publisher, who said they were not inclined to grant another extension, was yesterday. So I have done little else but write for the last three weeks and I finished the text of the book and sent the file at 11:11PM EDT last night–a college textbook without goals, objectives, chapter summaries, self-tests, or study questions. This publisher says submitted drafts are final drafts. Submitting a ms you KNOW isn’t your best work but will be published for the world to read as it is, is now on my list of a writer’s hardest things.
Thanks for posting, Dan! Inspiring, true, and encouraging reminders!
Thank you for reminding us that we are never enough. Today, morning by Spurgeon devotional ended with this:
Let a Christian begin to boast, “I can do all things,” without adding “through Christ which strengtheneth me,” and before long he will have to groan, “I can do nothing,” and bemoan himself in the dust. When we do anything for the Lord, and he is pleased to accept of our doings, let us lay our crown at his feet, and exclaim, “Not I, but the grace of God which was with me!”
Yes–amen and amen. As a mother trying to answer ‘God questions’ from my very trusting yet inclined to question everything sons, your words ring true–and comforting. Elena Corey
Hi Elena,
I hope it’s okay to say here, but I actually have a page on my website entitled “God Questions” where I endeavor to tackle some of the common questions folks ask about God and Christianity. I’d also be interested to know what kinds of questions your sons ask in order to address ones revelant to others. I’m at CynthiaNoble.com – hope it helps. Cindi 🙂
Your blogs are so real and challenging, they NEVER cease to amaze me.
Good “food” for thought and action. Thank you!
Wow, Dan – sounds like an awesome outline for a foundations’ class – or maybe even a list of messages for pastors for the next year! You should do that! 🙂