What is an acrostic?

A - Artful words hidden in plain sight,
C - Cleverly crafted phrases with insight.
R - Reading down, a secret appears,
O - Opening minds through lines so clear.
S - Subtle messages tucked inside,
T - Tool to aid learning and memorization.
I - Inspired by patterns, letters align,
C - Creating puzzles both bold and divine.

More than 100 acrostics on this site

  1. Abraham, friend of God
  2. Acrostic -- What is it?
  3. Animism
  4. Anthropology: What is it?
  5. Attendance -- Why it Matters
  6. Bless -- How to pray for missionaries
  7. Baptism: What does it mean?
  8. Bible Study -- How to do it well
  9. Blessed
  10. Boniface -- Missionary to Germanic Tribes
  11. Bowing
  12. Buddhism
  13. Canaan
  14. Carey -- pioneer missionary to India
  15. Case studies -- a learning tool
  16. Christ -- Reflecting Him
  17. Christmas
  18. Church
  19. Compassion
  20. Conflict -- Resolving It
  21. Conversion: What does it entail?
  22. Coping with culture shock
  23. Courage
  24. Creed -- What is it?
  25. Culture -- a definition
  26. Cussing -- The Negative Affects
  27. Daniel -- What He Can Teach Us
  28. Death
  29. Deceit
  30. Decision-Making
  31. Dependency
  32. Devil
  33. Discipleship
  34. Discussion posts" -- How to write good ones
  35. Diwali -- a Hindu festival
  36. Easter
  37. Empower
  38. End Times
  39. Ethnocentrism
  40. Everybody
  41. Everyone -- Every Soul Matters
  42. Everywhere -- Where We Must Go
  43. Exekiel
  44. Exodus
  45. Failure -- Root causes in cross-cultural ministry
  46. Faith
  47. Fatalism
  48. Foreigners -- Loving Them
  49. Forerunner
  50. Francis of Assisi
  51. Fundraising for Mission Trips
  52. Genesis -- What It Can Teach Us
  53. Gentile -- What First Century Jews Thought of Gentiles
  54. Globalization
  55. Habakkuk: Fountain of Joy
  56. Harvest (as in bringing people to faith in Christ)
  57. Hebrews
  58. Holiness
  59. Holistic
  60. Humility
  61. Indigenization
  62. Interview -- How to do a good one
  63. Isaiah: What to remember about him
  64. Jonah, the reluctant Old Testament missionary
  65. Linguistics
  66. Listen -- How to do it
  67. Lost People
  68. Lost Sheep -- Jesus' parable
  69. Mammon -- god of wealth
  70. Membership -- What does it mean to belong to a church?
  71. Merciful
  72. Minister
  73. Missio Dei
  74. Missiology: What is it?
  75. Mission Trip
  76. Missional
  77. Missions -- A world evangelism acrostic
  78. Moses
  79. Mother
  80. Mustard Seed
  81. Names -- their importance in the Bible
  82. Nations
  83. Nazarene (a label for Jesus of Nazareth)
  84. Old Testament
  85. Online: Being a successful e-learner
  86. Parables -- How They Can Help Us
  87. Paternalism
  88. Pastor
  89. Persecuted
  90. Prayer -- How should we pray?
  91. Proactive
  92. Proclaim -- What does Isaiah 41:12 mean?
  93. Psalms: Chapters in the Bible book of Psalms that were composed as acrostics in the original language (Hebrew)
  94. Purpose
  95. Racism
  96. Reapers -- We Need More of Them
  97. Reentry -- What to expect
  98. Religion
  99. Revelation
  100. Salvation
  101. Satan
  102. Senders
  103. Sending -- John 20:21
  104. Servanthood -- How missionaries must act
  105. Shepherd
  106. Shinto
  107. Sinai
  108. Slessor, missionary to Africa
  109. Sustainability
  110. Syllabus -- What is it?
  111. Ten Commandments
  112. Thessalonians
  113. Townsend, founder of Wycliffe Bible Translators
  114. Transformation
  115. Unevangelized
  116. Unreached People Groups (using the word "thumb")
  117. Vision
  118. Wisdom -- What we can learn from Job, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and Song of Songs
  119. Women
  120. Word Puzzles as Learning Tools
  121. Zacchaeus
  122. Zephaniah

Suggestions Welcomed

If you have suggestions for improving the wording of any of the acrostics, please email me at hculbert@snu.edu Help me make them even better than they are!

What good is an acrostic?

Acrostics can be valuable in several ways. Here are four of them:

  1. Acrostics help with memorization by using the first letters of words to form an easily recalled list of words or phrases. A familiar example is "Every Good Boy Does Fine" (for musical notes E-G-B-D-F on the treble clef).
  2. Acrostics are used in poetry, literature, and personal writing to add depth and meaning. Example: Writing a poem where the first letters of each line spell out a name or a word.
  3. Teachers use acrostics to help students remember complex information in a structured way. Example: "HOMES" (to remember the Great Lakes: Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, Superior).
  4. Personalized acrostics can be used in motivational or sentimental messages. Example: H.O.P.E. – Hold On, Pain Ends.

The earliest known examples of acrostics are found in the Old Testament book of Psalms, where the lines of some psalms begin with successive letters of the Hebrew alphabet, thus forming an abecedarian acrostic (an acrostic that spells out the entire alphabet).

-- Howard Culbertson, hculbert@snu.edu

Afterword: Acrostic or Acronym?

An acrostic is a type of composition — often a poem or a series of lines — where the first letters of each line spell out an existing word, message, or phrase when read vertically. It's commonly used as a mnemonic device or a creative writing technique. A classic example is Edgar Allan Poe’s poem "Elizabeth" in which the first letters of each line of the pem spell out the name ELIZABETH vertically.

An acronym, on the other hand, is a new word formed from the initial letters of a phrase or series of words, such as "NASA" (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) or "RADAR" (Radio Detection and Ranging). While both wordplays involve the use of initial letters, acrostics are typically written in lines and are meant to be read vertically, whereas acronyms are condensed into a single, pronounceable term used for brevity.

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