Redesign Preview, part 3

We wanted our first cover with the redesign to reflect a lot of energy. This image of a skateboarder, who is part of Student Venture, Campus Crusades’ outreach to high school students, works.

Our title at the top reflects the new fonts. And we’ve changed the box that points readers to other stories so it retains visibility while not interfering with your enjoyment of the photo.

Our covers will continue to take you into the midst of our ministries or transport you around the world. (India will be featured on the cover of our next issue.)

– Mark –

I’m tired. That’s good.

Florence King wrote, “Easy writing makes hard reading, but hard writing makes easy reading.”

The writers and I are all tired. Here’s to easy reading.

–Erik

Redesign Preview, part 2

Our Outlook section  will show the greatest change in our redesign.

Outlook opens with a large photo accompanied by a small story that describes something about Campus Crusade’s work in the country or city shown. Previously the photo filled the page and the text would run over the photo. In the new look, the photo is smaller so the text runs beside it. The words are easier to read and you have a clearer look at the image.

We’ve also added a small spot map. While you likely know where Los Angeles is, are you as sure about Mongolia, Rio de Janeiro or Uganda?

The rest of the pages in the Outlook section feature more room for photos, more color, and easier-to-find notes about where you can go for more information about each ministry profiled.

– Mark –

Redesign Preview, part 1

Over the next week our September/October issue, which will be the first with our redesign, will be finished, printed and mailed. In light of that, I want to show you a bit of what that will look like.

I’ll start with the table of contents. We moved it to the first page inside the issue, and simplified it—it now fits on one page. This will allow you to quickly see what is in the issue at a glance, and find the parts that are most useful.

Of course, we hope you’ll go back and read the whole issue, but this will allow you to set priorities.

On that page you’ll see our new fonts—Mercury and Prelo—chosen to make the issue easier to read and more interesting. You’ll also see an icon to help you quickly find the main cover story. In this issue it starts on page 38.

– Mark –

The Worth of Words

Sometimes I wonder about whether all the work on a story is worth the effort. How can I know God is really using the words I write?

My most frequent prayer request is that God will glorify Himself and show Himself to others through my writing.  However, I realize I don’t have a habit of praying fervently for this myself.

But at a C.S. Lewis conference this past weekend, God reminded me He values words, and He uses words to point people to Himself.

Jill Briscoe spoke at the conference, and she said, “Words are weapons for good or ill.” She noted that the writer of Ecclesiastes “searched to find just the right words, and he wrote what was upright and true.”

I don’t want my words to be careless. I don’t want them to portray any worldly wisdom but only what is true.

Another thing Jill said—and I asked her to write in the cover of my Bible—was that “words that work are words that worship.” The words we write that cut to the heart and lead people to the truth are words that glorify God and reveal what is true about Him.

I want my words to worship.  That is the only way they will ever matter.

-Hayley

You Know You Belong When…

After 15 years of marriage, my wife understands my love for books, and how a day among the shelves of Barnes & Noble is better than Disney anyday.

Yes, she understands, but she doesn’t get it. Frankly, neither do most of my friends.

Then the writers team met this week to discuss a great book about writing. We are committed to excellence and always striving to improve our work.

One chapter is called, “Literary Theft: Taking Techniques from the Classics.”

As an application, I challenged all of us to read a classic and look for ways to apply it to our writing. Then, in a moment of sheer delight, I listened as Amber suggested we all go to a bookstore one morning. Someone else suggested the downtown public library–that way we all leave with a book.

But here’s where my breath was nearly taken away: this idea sounded exciting–yes, exciting!–to everyone else.

They get me.

-Erik

The Delightful Dozen

I just got home from the Florida Magazine Association awards banquet. It was a treat to go and represent our team’s work for the year from May 2008 through April 2009.

We won awards for writing, photography, design and an award for the magazine as a whole—12 awards in all.

FMA received more than 600 entries.

For most of the categories we competed against other association magazines—those that represent organizations similar to Campus Crusade for Christ.

PHOTOGRAPHY:

• (Charlie/First Place): best overall use of photography among association magazines.
• (Charlie/First Place): best single color photo for “Togo herder” by Ted Wilcox (May/June 2008) among association magazines. (Photo below)
• (Silver/Second Place): best single color photo for “Girl in Togo at night” by Ted Wilcox (May/June 2008) among association magazines. (Photo below)
• (Silver/Second Place): best cover among association magazines for our Togo cover by Ted Wilcox (May/June 2008). (Photo below)
• (Bronze/Third Place): best photo essay for “The Forgotten Ones” by Ted Wilcox (May/June 2008), among all FMA magazines.

 

DESIGN:

• (Charlie/First Place): best overall design among association magazines.
• (Charlie/First Place): best feature design among association magazines for “People of the Land” (July/August 2008).
• (Bronze/Third Place): best feature design among association magazines for “The Forgotten Ones” (May/June 2008).

WRITING:

• (Charlie/First Place): best written association magazine.
• (Silver/Second Place): best feature among association magazines for “People of the Land” by Chris Lawrence (July/August 2008).
• (Bronze/Third Place): best feature headlines among association magazines.

OVERALL MAGAZINE:

• (Charlie/First Place): best overall magazine among association magazines.

I’m most happy with the gold awards for overall writing, photography, design and for the best overall magazine. Our team is working together to glorify God through the stories of what He is doing around the world.

If you’d like to know about the Journey Group team, who handles design, production and printing for us, and plays a crucial role in our award wins, go to www.journeygroup.com. And if you’d like to see more about he FMA and the awards they offer, go to www.floridamagazine.org.

– Mark –

Just Too Much

We’re traveling back to Orlando after our Campus Crusade for Christ staff conference in Colorado.

Usually I drive for the family, but with a 16-year-old son in the car, I’m getting some non-driving time to reflect on the wide variety of stories I heard about how God is at work through our organization.

It brings to mind something Garrison Keller once said. He was talking of life in small-town Minnesota in late summer. Everyone who had a garden was trying to give away extra produce—tomatoes and cucumbers and squash. He concluded that it was a problem of “just too much.”

And, he went on, wondering if that would be what heaven will be like—just too much.

I don’t know how heaven will compare to a garden, but I do know that when I look at the six issues we get to put out each year, I come back from the staff conference not worried about the need for stories, but concerned that we will choose wisely among all the stories we hear from around the world.

– Mark Winz –