Essays and Editorials
Recently, I was approached by an educator in the Middle East to write a forward to some newly published books of Dr Frank Boreham. I guess I was approached because of my rather disciplined habits in writing for a secular world. Every week I receive letters of appreciation from those who enjoy reading my editorials because they express the views my readers hold dear.
Very few people today write general editorials – many write on their favourite subject – politicians, the environment, personal relationships, Islam, climate change, and whatever they feel angry about. But few write on general topics that touch us all. Occasionally, years later, I receive letters about something written long ago. This week one came from a man who was helped in his teenage years through a series I published. Now he wants a copy to help his son going through the same age!
People quite often refer to a title such as Aldirage; Granddaughters, A Cup of tea, The Blessings of Rain, Characteristics of Tall Poppies; Spring’s the Crown of All the Year, Bi-Lo Aisle 14, Practising What I Preach, Our Magnificent Defeat and so on. You can check these and scores more on www.gordonmoyes.com/category/articles/editorials/ But it was a surprise to be asked to write a foreword and a dust jacket comment about Dr Boreham. I wrote:
“I first read one of Dr Boreham’s books in 1954. As a teenager I bought all I could find in second hand bookshops, and read a chapter a day. Those books changed my habits for more than fifty years. I learnt from him to communicate the Christian gospel mainly through secular media. Since then I have written a brief Christian radio talk every single day for fifty years. I have over 8,000 filed. I have written in full two sermons and one editorial for publication in newspapers and magazines every week for fifty years.
I write a regular newspaper column and a monthly magazine article, and two essays every week for our Email readers. I have written thousands of weekly radio and television talks given in Australia and overseas and 46 film scripts screened internationally. There are several thousand sermons that are screened by people doing Google searches. Like Dr Boreham, I have published a book every year for more than fifty years.
Boreham taught me how to be a busy pastor of a church and at the same time write and communicate to a nation and our largest city. It was only after his death that he became my most effective mentor. Fifty years ago, I learnt to repeat a famous introduction of him: “His name is on all our lips. His books are on all our shelves and his illustrations are in all our sermons”. Now is the time for new generations to discover one of the greatest communicators and influential mentors in Christian history.” For those who love his books of editorials, published largely in the Saturday newspaper, “The Age” in Melbourne, look out for the new series.
The first lesson in writing is to be disciplined about it. As Sir Winston Churchill once replied, “The art of writing is the art of applying the seat of the trousers to the seat of the chair!”
Rev The Hon. Dr Gordon Moyes, A.C., M.L.C.