ICYMI: Articles Around the Web in 2020

Normally at the end of the year I post a list of top blog posts of the year from my own blog (and I might still do that), but if you're a regular reader, you might have noticed that my blog has been quieter this year. In that relative silence, I was busy writing for other websites. I keep a complete list of articles here, but that page doesn't notify subscribers when I update it, so here's a handy list of the 15 articles I published elsewhere in 2020. 

From reflecting on Exodus to COVID, and from teaching and writing to Deuteronomy, these are the things that have been on my mind this year. I've starred a few of my personal favorites.

The Art of Taleh

* “Telling the Old, Old Story (Deut 26:5-10),” April 20, 2020.

The Biblical Mind

* "Freedom Fighters of the Exodus," November 17, 2020.

Canadian Society of Biblical Studies

"Misunderstanding Sinai? Author Interview with Carmen Imes," March 24, 2020.

Cateclesia

“Re-Interpreting the Name Command (Exodus 20:7)” May 6, 2020.

Christianity Today

"Connections that Count," Jesus Creed, Dec 30, 2020. 

* "What God Sees" and "Peace in the Storm," Advent Devotional, Dec 2020.  

* "Church after COVID--Why bother going back?," Jesus Creed, Sept 28, 2020. Reblogged at ChurchLeaders.com, Oct 13, 2020. 

"2020: The Gift Nobody Wanted," Jesus Creed, June 23, 2020. 

"Finding Life in Limbo," Jesus Creed, March 19, 2020.

Political Theology Network

"From Servitude to Service - Exodus 19," June 2020. 

Prairie College

 "How Do You Know if a 'Bible College' is Right For You?" Prairie blog, February 2020.

The Well (InterVarsity's blog for Women in the Academy and Professions)

"Pursuing Tough Conversations with Students," September 3, 2020. 

"A Prayer for Writers," April 15, 2020. 

"Notes from the Pandemic: Social Distancing and the Presence of God," March 23, 2020. 

Celebrating YOU!

It's been a year of all years in so many ways. Although I could list the many losses, disappointments, and kicks to the gut, today I'm in the mood to celebrate.

Today Bearing God's Name is one year old and I'm celebrating YOU, the readers who have made this a year to remember!

In the first six weeks on bookstore shelves, I had a chance to speak a handful of times. After the pandemic hit? Months' worth of speaking engagements evaporated off the calendar. Everyone says this was the hardest year of all to launch a book.

But YOU made it amazing!

So many of you have taken the time not only to buy and read the book, but to talk about it with your friends, to recommend it to your pastors and your small groups, to share about it on social media, and to post reviews. You've preached on it and used it in your classes. You've invited me to speak via Zoom to your students and congregations and ministry staff, and you've written to tell me what it has meant to you. I've been blown away by how generous and thoughtful my readers -- including YOU -- have all been. I've gained so many new friends around the globe. What a joy it's been!

In the midst of a pandemic, with so much uncertainty all around, you have used your voices to get the message out that the Old Testament still matters. You've helped Christians around the world re-discover their identity and vocation as the people who bear God's name. Thank you!!

A year later, Bearing God's Name is still hanging out at at the top of the charts. Incredible!

Thanks to you . . .

• enough copies sold that we're on our 6th printing!
• over 200 of you left ratings on Goodreads!
• over 250 of you left reviews on Amazon!
• Bearing God's Name is repeatedly ranked in the top 10 in Old Testament Bible Study, Christian Ethics, and Bible History and Culture on Amazon. 

Only readers can make these things happen!

I'm also grateful for all the podcasters, bloggers, magazines, and others who have helped get the word out:

• 25 podcast and radio interviews
• featured in Christianity Today, Faith Today, Bible Study Magazine, Library Journal, Bible Today, the Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, Themelios, and Servant Magazine
• Jesus Creed Old Testament Book Award for 2020
• Finalist for the Biblical Foundations Award in Old Testament from Midwestern Baptist
• Finalist for the IVP Academic Reader's Choice award (just 2 months after release!)

Authors can write, but it's readers who determine its success. I am profoundly grateful for all of you. You ROCK!

Blog Tour: Bearing God's Name: Why Sinai Still Matters

Interview for Christianity Today with 
Jen Pollock Michel (Dec 2019)

Bearing God's Name: Why Sinai Still Matters (IVP) releases December 10, 2019, but it's already had a second printing! This is due in large part to those who have have helped me get the word out by interviewing me for their blog or magazine, and for those who have spread the news on social media.

Below are links to blog and magazine interviews about the book. I'll keep adding to this post as new opportunities arise, so check back later for more!


Magazine Interview 

Jen Pollock Michel for Christianity Today


Blog Interviews

Carmen Imes and Jennifer Brown Jones
with the recently released Bearing God's Name

Ian Paul for Psephizo

Jennifer Brown Jones for Life Beyond #Blessed

Andrea Bridges for The Well, InterVarsity's blog for Women in the Academy

Kelley Maranto Mathews for Patheos

Sandra Glahn for Aspire2 

Canadian Society of Biblical Studies (about Bearing YHWH's Name at Sinai, my published dissertation on which Bearing God's Name is based)


Guest Blog Posts

Cateclesia Institute

Reviews

Library Journal

Goodreads

Amazon

Robert Mayer for Only Visiting This Planet

Michael Philliber for Deus Misereatur

Kenson Gonzalez for Viviendo Para Su Gloria

Joshua Philpot for The Gospel Coalition

Bible Study Magazine

Faith Today

Bible Today

Themelios 

Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society

Awards

Finalist for the IVP Academic 2019 Reader's Choice Award

Finalist for the Old Testament Book Award sponsored by the Center for Biblical Studies at Midwestern Seminary 

Academic Prayer Series

As a regular contributor for InterVarsity's blog for Women in the Academy and Professions, The Well, I've submitted several prayers tailored for academics. Here's a list for easy reference with a selection from each one, plus a bonus from my own blog:

A College Student's Back-to-School Prayer

Library at Regent College, Vancouver (Photo: C Imes)

Sharpen my mind, so that I can learn to think clearly and critically.

Melt my resistanceto new ideas that are good and right and true.

A Prayer for a New Place

Grant me patience to learn, flexibility to adapt, joy to share with others, and space to grieve the loss of what I’ve left behind.

Grant me energy to make decisions and adjust to new procedures and understand the culture of my new environment. Help me to establish healthy rhythms — spiritually, emotionally, and physically. As I settle in, let me never lose this sense that I desperately need you.

A Professor's Prayer

Grant me wisdom to manage my time well so that I can stand before my classes prepared.Grant me the grace to let go of misplaced guilt for what I cannot be or do.

Grant me discerning eyes, that I may see my students as you see them and that I may love them as you love, that I may anticipate potential mental blocks, that I may discover the key to unlock their desire to learn. Let me not get in the way.

A Scholar's Prayer

Quicken my mind, that I may discern what is right and understand more fully the complexities of the subject that is before me today. 

Grant me diligence to stay on task and ignore distraction. At the end of this day may I be able to stand before you unashamed of the work I have done and left undone.

A Prayer for Academic and Professional Conferences

Help me to choose wisely between the myriads of options available to me — papers, seminars, conversations, exhibits, work, play, rest. May I discern what is best and let go of what is not.

Above all, may I bring you glory today as I bear your name in the academy and among all those whose talents and energies make this conference possible.

A Prayer for Writers 

Help me articulate truth beautifully, precisely, and lovingly. May I not be so enamored with the sound of my words that I neglect sound content. Enable me to present these ideas in a winsome way that does justice to their importance.

In a world full of distractions, help me focus on the tasks to which you have called me.

View from University of British Colombia Campus
(Photo: C Imes)

An End-of-Semester Prayer

Lord, here I stand at the end of another term. I have poured into my students — ideas, questions, caring, comments, time.
Now I entrust them to you.

Take what I have taught them and separate wheat from chaff. Blow away what I said that was empty or worthless. Help them to treasure the truth. May it nourish them in days ahead as they move into new contexts.

I hope these prayers inspire you to embrace your vocation as a Christian professor, if you are one. If not, perhaps they'll inspire you to craft your own prayers for your own vocation.

Calling all World Changers!

I have an unlikely bit of advice for all those hoping to change the world:

Invest in Institutions

Photo: C Imes

Gordon Smith puts it even more strongly. In his latest book, entitled Institutional Intelligence: How To Build an Effective Organization, Smith claims that “institutions are essential to human flourishing” (3). Essential to flourishing? That’s a strong claim.

But without institutions, this world spirals into a free-for-all reminiscent of Lord of the Flies. Driven by whims or personal passions, under the constraints of our own energy levels, our positive intentions don’t last long. And without the checks and balances and combined wisdom of a group of like-minded colleagues, we run the risk of steering in the wrong direction. For lasting change, we need structures in place — structures that harness and manage resources in service of a common mission.

The Billy Graham Center at Wheaton College,
an institution with a long history of training Christian leaders.
(Photo: C Imes)

I've been gradually realizing this as I invest in our 96-year old college. It may sound dull, but we need institutions the way we need a roof over our heads. We can last without shelter for a few days, maybe, but for long-term flourishing, we need a sturdy place to live. So do our ideas, our energies, and our talents.

You can increase your IIQ (Institutional Intelligence Quotient -- I just made that up) by reading the rest of my article over at The Well. By reading Smith's book, you can become even more institution-savvy.

What are you waiting for? The world needs what you have to offer.

Making Summer Work

This week I published a short piece over at The Well, InterVarsity Christian Fellowship's blog for Women in the Academy and Profession. A very simple trick is working wonders for my summer schedule. You can read about it there.

The basic idea is that I write until noon and do other stuff after that.

There are exceptions, of course, like last week's dentist appointment, faculty interview, and farewell party that ate into my mornings. But by refusing to let my to-do list eclipse my writing time and scheduling everything possible in the afternoons, I'm enjoying great momentum. As the halfway point of the summer quickly approaches, I'm happy to say that the first draft of my next major writing project is also about halfway done.

I'm thankful for the good advice of other writers that helped me craft my own plan.

• Write 500 words first thing every day. Save editing for later in the day. (My daily goal is 750).
• Write in the "gaps." Don't wait for long stretches of time. Seize the moment. Thanks to Scrivener, I'm discovering that I can easily write in 10-minute segments.
• Set personal goals to keep you motivated. I have a chart listing all of my current projects (including blog posts here and elsewhere, journal articles, conference papers, and books), and I've mapped out where I'd like to be on each project by the end of each week of the summer. When I have a free hour, I can dive into the next project. 

What simple step can you take to ensure that your most important tasks get done this summer?

A Professor's Prayer

Have I mentioned that I have the #bestjobintheworld?

Last week the campus lay dormant, mounds of snow lining empty sidewalks. Quiet buildings stood ready, expectant. So did my heart. This week all is abuzz as students return from break and embrace in happy reunions. Classes begin with characteristic rigor. Last semester I was new here and my head swirled with names and syllabi and schedules and handbooks. This semester I welcome familiar faces with a settled heart. The inner calm permits more deliberate reflection on my role as professor and my investment in this community. Perhaps my prayer for this new term may become your prayer as well.

You can read my prayer over at InterVarsity's Blog, The Well.

Leaning In: One Year Later

Just over one year ago, I decided to read Sheryl Sandberg's Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead. Now I'm looking back and taking stock of what I've learned. I reworked last year's blog post into an updated article for The Well, published today on InterVarsity's blog for Women in the Academy and Professions. 

. . . By the time I got my dissertation back, dripping with red ink, I was already a month into teaching. I had less than two weeks to cut dozens of pages and tighten my arguments. During those two weeks I didn’t use impressive PowerPoints in class, didn’t grade anything, and didn’t meet with students outside of class or attend any special events on campus. But then my defense draft was submitted, and my teaching rhythm returned to normal.
And I learned that Sheryl Sandberg was right. I had almost said no because it didn’t seem convenient or practical, because I might end up too busy. But saying yes worked out fine. My students survived, even though they weren’t the center of my universe for a couple of weeks in February. Most importantly, I finished my degree and finished out the spring semester, gaining a wealth of practical experience in the process.

You can find the whole article here.  I hope my journey inspires you to lean in, too!

a scholar's prayer

My Desk (Photo: C Imes)

For those whose desks, like mine, have been swallowed by dissertation research . . .
For those in the throes of writing a book or an essay . . .
For those laboring over a new language or a new discipline . . .
For students just starting out in academia . . .

I invite you to pray this prayer with me. You can find it in full at InterVarsity's blog for Women in the Academy and Professions, but it applies just as well to men.

May He be glorified by the works of our minds!

Lord, 

as a new day dawns,

I offer thanks for the privilege of learning —

For the time, the mental acuity, and the resources at my disposal. 

Thank you for the delight of discovery. 

These are precious gifts... 

Let me love the truth 

more than I love what I have thought or said or written. 

Grant me the courage to confront falsehood, even in myself, 

to defend an unpopular position, 

or to surrender a cherished opinion found wanting...

For the rest, click here.