Orthodoxy of Me

Orthodoxy of Me

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Orthodoxy of Me
Orthodoxy of Me
This is the one piece of advice every writer, creator, and dreamer needs to know...

This is the one piece of advice every writer, creator, and dreamer needs to know...

Matthew Paul Turner's avatar
Matthew Paul Turner
Jan 18, 2023
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Orthodoxy of Me
Orthodoxy of Me
This is the one piece of advice every writer, creator, and dreamer needs to know...
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I tripped into writing.

Twenty-five years ago, I was a terrible writer. My grammar was atrocious. My word choices lacked diversity and inspiration. And please, whatever you do, don't ask about my skills for spelling and punctuation.

I still struggle with spelling and punctuation.

In high school, I was a B-/C+ student. In college, my grades only slightly improved. And that's because during my first semester in college-I attended Chesapeake College (a community college located 40 minutes from where I lived), I was required to complete 2 refresher courses before I was allowed to enroll in English 101. I kid you not. I was that awful.

But like I said, I tripped into writing.

In 1999, I was invited to write a 1000-word essay about my experience "being a Christian, being single, and dating". I wrote those words for a free faith-based Washington DC newspaper. Dear God, I shiver to even think about what I might have written in that little newspaper. And if you happen to have one of the 500,000 copies hidden away somewhere in a box, please keep it there.

But somebody at Crosswalk.com (a Christian website that had millions of daily readers in the early 2000s) read that article and thought I might be a good fit to become their site's Music and Entertainment Editor. I still laugh thinking about that. But that's what happened: one week I was booking talent and brewing coffee at a Christian coffeehouse in Northern Virginia and the next week I was setting up interviews with folks like Thd Newsboys, Phil Keaggy, Sonicflood, and Third Day. During my time at Crosswalk, I interviewed MC Hammer, Kristen Chenoweth, Patricia Heaton, Kathy Troccoli, and so many others.

Exactly 9 months later--I kid you not--9 months later, I received a phone call from the Executive Editor at Salem Communications asking me if I'd consider flying to Nashville to interview for the soon-to-be vacant position of Editor of CCM Magazine. That's what I did. I flew to Nashville and I not only interviewed that position, I got the job.

While I was thrilled to become the editor of CCM, I was in way over my head. I mean, way over my head. Rather than engaging phone interviews with Christian celebrities, I was now doing in person interviews with Christian celebrities. At the time, I thought I'd died and gone to heaven. I had coffee with Jennifer Knapp. After picking her up from the airport, I went out dancing with Jaci Velasquez. I sat at Amy Grant's kitchen table and ate her very own homemade corn chowder soup. It was amazing.

Yes, I was in heaven.

Three years later…

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