Beloved Friends,

I would just like to offer a bit of Help & Encouragement to those of you who might be struggling a li’l with my long sentences ☺️.

When I was a little girl I remember a grammar lesson all about parentheses.

Parentheses look like this:

• – abc –

• , abc ,

• ( abc )

They are a little tool used to put a sentence within a sentence without starting a new sentence; famously used by the Apostle Paul, CS Lewis & Yours Truly 😋.

The most important tip to spot these guys is to see if the original sentence would still make sense if you take out the bit inside the parentheses.

For example:

We love the LORD.

• We – are equipped by grace to – love the LORD.

• We, because we are found in Christ, love the LORD.

• We (as children of God) love the LORD.

We love the LORD.

Please note Dear Ones, that in this example – as in most cases – for example, it is more important for you to remember that “We love the LORD” than it is for you to understand everything that I write 😊.

Exercise 1:

See if you can spot the two sets of parentheses in the above sentence 😃.

Exercise 2:

See why taking out the parentheses & everything inside it can sometimes be a good thing 😄.