Pen of a Ready Scribe

In ancient times, it was the pen, a stylus for writing that was the instrument for writing for over a millennium. Then new ways or instruments are invented with pen and paper, type writers, and the like in the 20th century and in the past 25 years, it is the computer or the laptop that is the most popular form of tech for writing. Putting pen on paper is now typing on a keyboard on a desktop or a notebook.

Personal computers and laptops are so advance nowadays that it can practically do many things, unimaginable just 40 or 50 years ago. For me as a writer, it has made my life much easier compared to the days of a type writer when it was still commonly used during my law studies (1982-1987) and my first degree in theology (1993-1994). 

Computers were certainly available by the mid 1990s, but by the time I pursued my postgraduate study in 1999, almost everyone owned a laptop of various sizes. I bought my first laptop (second hand) as a student at an auction for just under NZD1,000.00 and it lasted me exactly two years before I chose a desktop computer (Windows 2000 and XP) and completed my thesis without a proper laptop until I became a pastor in Kota Kinabalu in 2003. 

Since 2014, my final year at TTC in Singapore, I switched over to using a Mac, and today I have decided to invest in a proper laptop, one that has more than 8GB RAM. For way too long and I regretted that I cheapened out three years ago when I bought a MacBook Air for my lectures but I went with 8GB RAM once again. Nowadays since late 2024, even the base MacBook Air has 16GB RAM which is the minimum even for writing large projects or books or 100 or more pages. Saving one's file over 200 pages and opening it again and again with just 8GB RAM is possible if one is patient but the laptop becomes slow with the spinning beach ball. 

I also invested in a couple of external SSD as my laptop has run out of storage for more than 1 year now and I have to remove or delete files and videos unless I save them on an external SSD. Prices have shot up in the last several weeks due to AI data centres taking up all the DRAM and SSD. I am glad to have purchased a 2TB Kingston external SSD before the price doubled a few days ago! 

All these I am doing as I am transitioning from active pastoral ministry to writing full-time. I very much look forward to it, and by the end of the 2nd month of the year, I hope to be on the way into commenting on passages from John 16 and then proceeding to John 17 until the end of the Gospel. Lord, quicken and make me as a pen of a ready scribe and let my writing be a fragrant sacrifice to You as You, O Lord pour out Your wisdom into the pen (laptop) of Your servant.