For your concern number 3, the creator of spacemacs has created a package to help you author lisps in normal mode (https://github.com/syl20bnr/evil-lisp-state h

For your concern number 3, the creator of spacemacs has created a package to help you author lisps in normal mode (https://github.com/syl20bnr/evil-lisp-state https://github.com/syl20bnr/evil-lisp-state). It is included by default in spacemacs (all the bindings begining with `SPC k`). It offers you all the cool features of paredit (barf, slurp, splice, transpose, convolute etc...), but it is easier to use in evil-mode. Check it out!