Write from the Deep

Thank you, listeners, for over nine years of sharing your writing journey with Write from the Deep! We’ve found such joy in bringing you God’s encouragement and in hearing from you. Join us in this final podcast as we share final truths and insights to help you along your writing journey. And God bless each of you! But first, thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! And in particular, thank you to ALL of our 2024 sponsors of the month: Christy Bass Adams, Wendy L. Macdonald, Tammy Partlow, Priscilla Sharrow, and Kimberley Woodhouse! You’ve been such a blessing to us and to all our listeners! An Important Announcement Erin Taylor Young: Welcome, listeners, to the Deep. We have some important news to share with you. Karen Ball: And here it is: the podcast you’re listening to in this very moment is our final episode from Write from the Deep. You see, Erin asked me a while ago if I thought it was maybe time to step away from the podcast because of health issues and other reasons. At first I was like, no, no, let’s keep going. But as the days went by and I thought and prayed about it, God showed me that I really did need to step back, because of my––and Don’s––increasing health issues. As I came to that decision, I felt such peace wash over me that I knew it was the right thing. Erin Taylor Young: I asked Karen because I’ve been having a few health issues of my own. And also, I’ve been feeling the need to prune, but I didn’t know which things should go. I took a sabbatical from editing over the summer, which was great. But I learned that I needed to keep praying about the pruning that God wanted to do in my life, and I needed to keep seeking Him about the disciplined pursuit of less. We talked about this idea back in episode 223 in “Three Essentials for a Christian Writer’s Life.” So as I sought guidance for pruning and refocusing, God showed me it is time to let go of this podcast. I want you all to know I am not missing the irony there that an episode that I researched and recorded for the show is one of the things that contributed to me understanding that I need to let go of it.  Our Final Gifts for You Karen Ball: Love the way God works to guide us! How we can make this decision with joy because we know it’s what God is guiding us to do. Now, as you listeners know, we often end our interviews with guests by asking them for final words of wisdom or encouragement. So we thought it would be a fitting end to ask ourselves the same question. So what wisdom and encouragement do we most want to leave with you to return some of the joy you’ve brought us? Ground Everything in God’s Word Erin Taylor Young: Well, the first thing that I want to share is from Psalm 1:1-3.  “How blessed is the man who does not walk in the council of the wicked, nor stand in the path of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers. But his delight is in the law of the Lord and in his law. He meditates day and night. He will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in its season and its leaf does not wither. And in whatever he does, he prospers.” You guys, ground everything you do in God’s Word. But more than that, make God’s word your delight. Your greatest joy. It says, our delight should be in the law of the Lord and we’ll yield fruit in its season. Not before its season, by the way. So be patient. Spend your time soaking in God’s word and loving it and meditating on it. This is how we guarantee that our lives will be fruitful. Not Overdue a Single Day! Karen Ball: I’ve mentioned a couple times on the podcast that Habakkuk 2:3 is my life verse:  “Slowly, steadily. surely the time approaches when the vision will be fulfilled. If it seems slow in coming do not despair, for these things will surely come to pass. Just be patient. They will not be overdue a single day.” Not overdue a single day. I love that so much. As you go through your writing journey, remember, it’s all in God’s hands and in his timing. He knows what you need and He will provide, even if it seems like it’s taking forever. Take this verse to heart, so when you start feeling that way, you can remember with a soul-deep joy that God’s plans for you will surely come to pass. They won’t be overdue a single day. Just trust and rest in Him and keep doing what He’s asking you to do. Wait on God Erin Taylor Young: My next verse fits right in with Karen’s. It’s Isaiah 64:4.  “Since ancient times, no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides You who acts on behalf of those who wait for him.”  Remember I said earlier that patience is important? This is why. When we wait for God, He acts. I’m not talking about just any old kind of waiting here. I’m talking about expecting. I’m talking about looking to God to hope in Him and believe in him. Think about how astounding it is that the God of the universe acts on our behalf to accomplish His purposes. This is how God is different from all the other so-called gods of this world. The true God works on our behalf to show Himself great and mighty. He delights in doing this, He purposes to do this. If only we could all walk every minute of our writing journey fully convinced that God is on our side and that He is always working on our behalf for our good and His glory.  This is the Way Karen Ball: I love that. I love Isaiah. It holds so much wisdom. For example, Isaiah 30:21 has this powerful message for all of us:. “Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you saying, this is the way walk in it.” God is so present in your life and in your writing journey, but you’ve got to listen. You’ve got to keep your heart attuned to Him and to His voice. He won’t let you go astray if you do that. But you know what? Even if you do make a misstep, just take it to Him and He will guide you back to the path He has for you.  Strong Support Erin Taylor Young: Amen. My next verse is 2 Chronicles 16:9. Just the first half says: “For the eyes of the Lord move to and fro throughout the earth that He may strongly support those whose heart is completely His.” I’ve had this first section memorized for a long time because it says God will not only guide us, but “strongly support” us. And this verse also reminds me we have a part to play. We need hearts that are completely God’s. Thankfully, though, we don’t accomplish that on our own because one of the things God has done for us when we chose to follow Him is He gave us a new heart, a heart of flesh, and not a heart of stone. A heart that can resonate with His joy because of all He’s done for us.  No Divided Hearts! But even though we know this truth, other desires can come in and divide our hearts. And steal our joy. This world is full of things that just call to us. It may not be our cares and our concerns, but maybe it’s entertainment, money, status, sales, contracts. And let’s not forget stuff like toys and trinkets and all those things.  There is a reason Jesus says in Matthew 5:8, “Blessed are the pure in heart [or the undivided in heart] for they shall see God.” It’s hard to see God with a divided heart. But look at how this verse talks about God looking. For us. He’s searching the world for people who will look to Him who trust Him and hope in him. God’s not up there grudgingly giving out help if we beg hard enough. It brings Him joy to bless us! He has a master plan for the world and every person on this planet, and we get to be a part of it.  We get to bring His truth to this dark world, and we get to be part of God’s kingdom on earth. So go into every day and know God is there waiting to strongly support you. Remember to Rest Karen Ball: Hebrews 4:9-11is a reminder we all need, and it says this: “There is a special rest still waiting for the people of God. For all who have entered into God’s rest, have rested from their labors. Just as God did after creating the world. So let us do our best to enter that rest. But if we disobey God as the people of Israel did, we will fall.” As Ecclesiastes points out, there’s a God-appointed time for everything in our lives, which means there’s a God-appointed time for us to rest. We do need to work hard to push ourselves toward excellence in God’s name, but friends, we also need to take time to rest on our writing journey and in life.  I’m not talking about just resting when you’re discouraged or exhausted, but taking regular time to rest your soul and heart and mind as a part of your process in the day, to prepare yourself to receive God’s joy. You’re not being weak or lazy when you rest. You’re being wise and obedient.  Let God Fill You Erin Taylor Young: Rest is productive. It really is.  Another verse I want to give to you guys is Psalm 81:10: “I am the Lord your God, who brought you up out of Egypt. Open wide your mouth, and I will fill it.” It’s too easy to forget to ask God to supply all our needs. He wants us to depend on Him. Think about God bringing the Israelites, who are a nation of slaves, out of Egypt, which at the time was the most powerful nation. Consider how unprecedented this display of God’s sovereign might was when He made Pharaoh release the Israelites! Then Pharaoh changes his mind and comes back after them with the entire army. That was scary. But God showed His might and His power. And the Israelites went from fear to joy! All of God’s power and provision and miracle working brings to our minds now that He is our protector and provider. He says to us, as He did to the Israelites, “Open wide your mouth ‘cause I’m going to bring all My power and resources to fill it.” Friends, there is nothing you need that God can’t provide. There’s no situation too hopeless, no problem too impossible. God is simply asking you and me to open wide our mouths and receive all He has for us. Let’s purpose to go through all day, every day, with that posture of open mouths, open heart, open hands. Let God fill you. The Honor of Sharing God’s Word Karen Ball: Amen. And then there are the next two verses of Hebrews from what I read before, and that’s verses 12 and 13. “For the word of the Lord is alive and powerful. It is sharper than the sharpest two-edged sword, cutting between soul and spirit, between joint and marrow. It exposes our innermost thoughts and desires. Nothing in all of creation is hidden from God. Everything is naked and exposed before His eyes, and He is the one to whom we are accountable.” You know, words are vital to God. We see that in His Bible, and we see it in the way that He speaks to us and draws us. It’s vital to who He is and to what He wants from us, that He has invited us to use words for His sake and His glory to bring His truth to a weary, lost world. That is such an honor. Don’t ever look down on where you are in the task He’s given you. It doesn’t matter where you are. It only matters that you’re obedient to the task He’s asked you to take on. Whether you write 90 books or one article or one letter, the wonder of your words is infused with Him and it will reach hearts and minds in ways you never imagined. Forget about bestseller lists, about sales numbers, fame, earthly rewards. Instead, keep in mind that you are accountable to Him and only Him for being obedient and doing what He’s given you to do.  If you do that, the rewards you receive will come from Him, and they will spark more joy than you’ve ever known.  Learn from the Turkeys! Erin Taylor Young: The last thing I want to leave you with guys is a story. We’re writers. I gotta leave you with a story! And it’s a true story, by the way. So one day I am looking out my back windows and I see wild turkeys in my yard. I’ve never seen that before!  They’re just walking across the yard, poking around in the grass looking for stuff to eat. Well, once they get across my yard, suddenly they’re completely stymied by my fence. We have this four-foot-high wrought-iron fence. And these turkeys have no idea what to do! So they start trotting back and forth along the fence. There’s no gate to let them through. So then they’re like, “Hey, we wanna get to the green grass on the other side.” We all know the grass is always greener, right?  They’re trying to get to the other side by squeezing through the rails of the fence! Some of these turkeys are too big to fit through the spaces between the rails.  And I’m watching, fascinated, because they’re so stymied by the fence. They could just fly over, but this doesn’t seem to occur to any of them. Finally, the biggest, older ones flap once and do this giant leap and land on the top of the fence, then sort of jump over. The younger, smaller turkeys are like, “No problem. We’ll just squeeze through.” And they do. But there’s the medium-sized ones left in my yard. Now they’re panicking because they see most of the flock has made it to the other yard––and they’re even starting to move on! At this point I’m talking through the window: “ Guys, duh! You can fly. Just fly.” But they continue running up and down the fence, even more panicked. One of them gets stuck trying to squeeze through and I’m wondering if I need to go out and rescue this dumb turkey! But finally, finally, they do all make it through and they’re all in the next yard, meandering across that yard, and they’re happy again. And then this coyote bursts out of the woods behind the yard and goes after ‘em.  Guess what they did? They all fly! Right up into the trees, thanks to pure God-given instinct. Now this coyote is just left standing all alone in the yard. He’s looking around, like, “What do I do now?” You Can Fly! So here’s what I want you guys to take away from this story. You can fly.  Sometimes we forget. We forget that we have God-given talent and creativity and instincts. And sometimes we panic when we see a fence or when we’re confronted by a difficult edit or a book or an article or blog post. It feels too hard to write and we don’t know what to do. We’re stymied. The problem seems insurmountable.  But friends, you. can. fly. God has made you able. Isaiah 40:31 says, “But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles. They will run and not grow weary. They will walk and not be faint.” Don’t forget. You can fly.  You’ve Been A Joy! Karen Ball: Sharing this podcast with all of you has been a wonder and an honor. You’ve brought us such joy and blessings. We’re grateful for you who have listened and delighted that God has used us to share His truth and encouragement with you. That’s really what we wanted to do from the very beginning. Please know that Erin and I will keep you in our prayers, that we’ll always be grateful you chose to spend time with us. And as we close this final podcast from Write from the Deep, please take these words from Philippians 1 to heart: “Every time we think of you, we give thanks to our God. Whenever we pray, we make our requests for all of you with joy. For you have been our partners in spreading the good news about Christ from the time you first heard it until now. “And we are certain that the God who began the good work within you, will continue His work until it’s finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns. So it is right that we should feel as we do about all of you, for you have a special place in our hearts. You share with us the special favor of God in defending and confirming the truth of the good news. “God knows how much we love you and long for you with the tender compassion of Jesus Christ. We pray that your love will overflow more and more, and that you will keep on growing and knowledge and understanding what we want you to understand what really matters, so that you may live pure and blameless lives until the day of Christ’s return. “May you always be filled with the fruit of your salvation: the righteous character produced in your life by Jesus Christ. For this will bring much glory and praise to God.” Erin Taylor Young: Amen. And thank you all.  Karen Ball: Yes. Thanks for joining us today, and may God bless you His powerful peace and unending joy. We at Write from the Deep have found such joy in bringing you God’s encouragement. In this final episode, we share our most important truths and insights for your writing journey. #amwriting #ChristianWriter Share on X WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! What have you learned from the Write from the Deep podcast? We’d love to know! THANK YOU! Thank you to all those who’ve been patrons on Patreon! You’ve helped make this podcast possible! A big shout out to anyone who’s been a Patreon sponsor of the month this year! Thank you to: Christy Bass Adams, Wendy L. Macdonald, Tammy Partlow, Priscilla Sharrow, and Kimberley Woodhouse! Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! The post 226 – You Brought Us Joy! appeared first on Write from the Deep.

It’s so easy, when we are getting hit by one difficult thing after another, to wonder where God is. To cry out to Him, “Why aren’t You stopping it all?” Join us as guest Jean Wilund shares amazing and freeing insights and wisdom, discovered from her study of the book of Habakkuk, for anyone in the midst of these struggles. Get ready to embrace joy! About Jean Wilund Jean Wilund is fully convinced that we’ll never truly know and love the God of the Word apart from the Word of God. This conviction fuels her passion for everything she does, including writing, speaking, and serving her family and the body of Christ—particularly her husband, children, and grandtwins. Jean and Larry live in Lexington, SC and are members of Grace Bible Church. Jean’s Bible study, Embracing Joy: An 8-Week Transformational Bible Study of Habakkuk helps us discover how, during one of the darkest periods in history for God’s people, God moved His prophet Habakkuk from confused to confident and from panic to praise. God will do the same in us if we do what Habakkuk did. Jean’s latest book, Ease into the Bible: How to Wade into the Water of God’s Word with Confidence releases in August to help relive the intimidation factor out of understanding the pieces and parts of the Bible. For more information or to connect with Jean, visit her website, JeanWilund.com and subscribe to her podcast, It’s All About Him! Thanks to our sponsors on Patreon, we’re able to offer an edited transcript of the podcast! Karen: Welcome to the deep, everyone. Today’s podcast is going to be a lot of fun. Our guest, Jean Wilund, is going to dig deep into an amazing book of the Bible, Habakkuk, and share her insights. Erin, tell us all about the amazing Jean Wilund! Erin: Jean and I met several years ago at the Florida Christian Writers Conference, and I got to visit with her again this year. We had a great conversation about the transforming power of God’s Word which is wisdom we need on our writing journey. So welcome, Jean. Jean Wilund: Thank you so much. I’m so thrilled to be here with y’all.  What Does the Deep Mean? Erin: So Jean, what does the deep mean to you?  Jean Wilund: It means the deep things of God, which basically is the Word of God. I need the deep things of God, whether I’m gonna go deep into my circumstances or deep into understanding. My daughter, my youngest daughter, loves to free dive, not scuba dive, but free dive. But the thought of going deep into the water without scuba equipment is unnerving to me. But she said it is so peaceful, and I had a word picture of the deeper we go into God’s Word, the more peace it brings, no matter what we’re going through, no matter what’s going on up on the surface. The deep means to be grounded deep in God, grounded in His Word, and to embrace joy regardless of circumstances. Erin: I love that. So, you did a Bible study on Habakkuk during the Covid pandemic. What got you interested in writing a study about this very short book in very difficult times in our country? Unexpected Detours Jean Wilund: Well, I never anticipated doing a Bible study at all. But when Covid hit and everybody was sheltering in place, I was talking with one of my friends, and she said she’d just read the book of Habakkuk and how perfect it was for those times. So I read Habakkuk with the current situation in mind, and I was blown away. My next-door neighbor and I sat outside, distanced from each other, and talked about this book.  And then our pastor said, “I want the women’s ministry to do a four-week Bible study.” My neighbor and I discussed what, in those crazy times where we couldn’t get together in person as much, would help us the most? And we agreed we needed to know how to study the Bible for ourselves. A Perfect Fit! Jean Wilund: And hey, Habakkuk is only three chapters! So with a four-week Bible study, we’d study three weeks then have a whole extra week to discuss it all. So I did it. I used my transformational Bible study method and taught Habakkuk. I was talking with a friend about it, and she said, “Okay, that’s what we want at our church. A four-week study on just the book of Habakkuk.” So that’s how I wrote it as a study. And my friend’s agent was looking for a Bible study and my friend said, “Well, Jean just taught one on Habakkuk and it was fantastic.” So that’s how the study came about. It was not intentional, but it was so encouraging.   Habakkuk and Writers Erin: So, Jean, as you think about the book of Habakkuk, what truth do you feel applies to our writing lives? Jean Wilund: Well, Judah got into the mess that they were in because they said they’d do everything Moses told them, but before long they just did everything that was right in their own eyes. As Christian writers, we say that everything that we write is going to be for God’s glory, but then we get into it and it’s too easy to veer off track. To do what’s right in our eyes to get the numbers or the platform or whatever. Soon we’ve lost track of the reason that we felt called to write.  Like Judah, we let our eyes get off of God and focus instead on success and living the way we think we want to live.  But if we keep our eyes on the glory of God above all things, we’re going to love our writing journey. And we’ll be successful in God’s eyes and that’s all that matters.  Karen: It’ll also have an incredible impact on everyday life. Don and I have been dealing with one hit after another lately with health issues and unexpected major expenses. It’s tempting, when you’re in those kinds of situations, to focus on those problems and wondering what’s next. But if we keep our focus on God, on the fact that He loves us and none of this is a surprise to Him, then we don’t have to worry. We don’t have to have sleepless nights. We don’t have to be anxious about anything.  Jean Wilund: Right.  Remember God’s Character Erin: I also love, Jean, how your Habakkuk study encourages us to embrace joy. So how do we do that when hard trials come, maybe God is even is bringing hard trials into our lives… What do we do?  Jean Wilund: You know, it’s okay to go to God and ask, “How long, O Lord?” We all wrestle with God’s plans for us at times. The difference is when we wrestle with His character. What we see in Habakkuk is he goes to God because he doesn’t understand why God has allowed Judah to be so evil to their own people. So he is frustrated. It’s clear he’s been praying for a while, but God has been silent. Even so, Habakkuk has continued to pray. Then, when God does speak, the prophet doesn’t get the message he hoped for. God gave him a message that took him from saying, “God, why are you not doing anything?” to “Back up, God, You’ve gone too far now!”  Habakkuk’s Transformational Actions Jean Wilund: But I love what Habakkuk did, and it’s something that has been transformational in my life. In Habakkuk 2:1, he says, “I will take my stand at my watch post and station myself on the tower and look out to see what He will say to me and what I’ll answer concerning my complaint.” Habakkuk is pouring out his heart to God and now he wants to hear from Him. He’s telling God, “I want you to correct me.” So that’s one thing he did that we can do, too.  Another example from Habakkuk’s actions is how, earlier on in Habakkuk 1:12, he immediately started going through God’s character. In fact, that’s the first thing he says, “Are you not from Everlasting? Oh Lord, my God, my holy one.” Habakkuk roots himself in who God is before he tries to process what God has just told him. He calls God Yahweh, the God who wants to be in relationship. He calls him Elohim, the God, the sovereign God who created all things and is supreme over all things. And The Holy One. The Holy One Jean Wilund: Now, to be the holy one, God can’t even have the hint of doing anything wrong. So Habakkuk is saying, “God, this feels so wrong. Ah, but You can do no wrong. And so I’m deep breathing my trembling knees.” He says later on that it’s like death has entered his bones. He’s not being like, “Okay, so Babylon’s gonna come and destroy us, but it’s all good.” Habakkuk understands that it’s going to be awful, but God is so good and He would not ordain this if it wasn’t for their ultimate good. And Habakkuk 1:12, “We shall not die.” Because if Judah were to die, what would that do to God’s promise, right? How can a savior come through if not, as God promised, through Judah? A Promise to Sustain Us Jean Wilund: The promise that we have as Christians is the Holy Spirit, who gives us everything for life. The Spirit embodies us. There’s nothing that we lack to accomplish God purposes for us in our writing. And with the Spirit, we can embrace joy no matter what.  But we have to go to him continually and say, “Am I understanding Your call?” Because when we write a proposal and get great feedback on it, and then we send it out and everybody says no, that feels contradictory. Yet, like Habakkuk, we know that God doesn’t do wrong. So have we misheard him? Maybe. This may not be the time, or maybe this isn’t the book. Maybe this isn’t the audience or the publisher. It could be we needed to go through that to understand He’s still doing a work in us and in our writing, or He’s still putting the pieces and parts together.  Remember God’s Presence Erin: We’ve been doing a study at our church where we are studying God’s presence through the entire Bible. From the Garden of Eden to Abraham, His promises that He’s gonna bless all the nations. But when God promises that, they’re in the middle of history. They don’t see the fulfillment. Even today, Jesus came all those years ago, but there still hasn’t been the total restoration of everything. The day of judgment hasn’t actually arrived yet. It’s a long time coming! Sometimes I think as writers we forget that. For centuries and centuries and centuries, God has been working out and unfolding His promise. And here we are, after just days and weeks and months and even years, and we’re moaning, “How long, Lord?” We have remember that God is an eternal God. These are eternal promises. The fruit we think is going to happen tomorrow might be fulfilled centuries from now. We just don’t know. We’ve got to trust, as you pointed out, Jean, in God and His character. Our God is never in a hurry. Sometimes that’s a blessing. Sometimes it is so stinking frustrating. But we can trust it’s always right. In God’s Time Jean Wilund: Yes. Each lesson in the Bible study has a transformational truth, and one of them––one that I have to remind myself of all the time––is that God has appointed all things in their time for their time on time.  Karen: Right. So we can slow down and trust his timing.  Erin: What does it look like to really believe that? How does that transform us? How does God’s Word do that?  Jean Wilund: Well, as we come to know Him, we rest more in Him. As we abide in Him, the fruits of the Spirit are going to come out and we’ll learn to dwell in that beautiful balance of patience and faithfulness. If God has called us to write, then we need to do that with excellence. So how do we do it with excellence? We study the craft. How do we study the craft? We buy the books that people tell us. We listen, we read articles, we go to conferences, and we pray. REmember Prayer! Jean Wilund: Prayer is vital, beginning to end. We pray and we search God’s Word. Because anything that we have to say of value comes from God’s Word. It doesn’t mean that we can only quote God’s Word if we want to be helpful, but as I heard a pastor say one time, if you don’t have a verse, you only have an opinion. We need that balance of studying God’s Word and prayer. Ask the Lord for guidance. As Him, “Do you want me to have a website where I send out blog posts? Do you want me to write for ministry? If so, which one?” Go where God leads you and faithfully do the work. As you do that, you’ll find it more and more natural to embrace the joy He brings you in the process. Even if everything doesn’t go the way you want. Obedience and Prayer are the Keys Karen: Exactly. It’s being obedient to God, and studying His Word and to find His wisdom and his guidance. To help us know what the steps are in the midst of our obedience. When Erin and I first started this podcast, we spent a lot of time praying and thinking and asking God what He wanted it to be and what He wanted us to do with it. And I think the reason that it’s reached as many people as it has is that we followed those steps and the wisdom He gave us.  Erin: I love when you said to cling to God and hold all else lightly. That’s perfect for the writing life because we don’t know what tomorrow is going to bring. We were talking to Deborah Raney last month and she said, “I’m writing as long as God tells me to write, and when He tells me to do something else, I’ll do something else.”  When God Changes Your Focus Jean Wilund: Well, that quote about clinging to God and holding everything else lightly was my journey, is my journey. I got in to writing to write for children. I was working at a day school and I had this passion to take over the chapel. Long ago, one of my dear friends, Julia, said to me, “Jean, we’re gonna write a book. You’re gonna write it and I’m gonna illustrate it, and we’re going to show children how Jesus is in the whole Bible. He doesn’t just show up in the New Testament. He’s not waiting in the wings for His turn. He was there from the beginning.” So that was always our plan, but we were so busy raising our children that we never got around to it. Then she passed away from cancer. Right after that that, I was invited to teach at this day school. I thought, “Okay, this is what I wanna do. I wanna write that book, but I’m gonna teach the children.” I discovered early on that I had no idea how to write for children, but the children kept asking if I’d finished the book yet.  My best friend was the director of the school, and she would sit in the back of the room and giggle and I would be giggling too. Because we figured I’d just go home and work on another way to tell stories to children. So that’s how I got to my first writer’s conference––out of desperation. So that I could teach the children well. A Sweet Confirmation Jean Wilund: I had to step down from teaching when my son and his wife had twins, but I spent so much time working on these lessons for the kids and I really wanted them to be there for them. One of the greatest confirmations that I was following where God was leading is that in that last year, one kid ran up to me and grabbed me, and said, “You’re the best teacher ever.” And I knew that was because the Lord helped me through these wonderful instructors on how to write for children. Here’s the thing. The kids at school were loving my teaching and my stories. They were really, really leaning in. But every time I would pitch to publishers, they said, “We love your book, but you don’t know anybody. You don’t have a platform. So why don’t you focus on the mamas? Teach them what you want to teach their children. Why don’t you write for women?”  I drove home from that conference going, “Lord, I teach children. I don’t know how to teach women.” When I got home, my husband said a woman from a Women to Women Bible study called, and her number was on the counter. I thought she called because I was writing an article about them for a friend of mine. So I called her and she said, “We read an article that you wrote about teaching children the Bible, and we want you to come and teach us.” I was like, “Well, I’m not gonna say no right away because of what I just heard at the conference!” Never Say Never Jean Wilund: So I prayed, and that was when I started teaching women, and how God pivoted me away from the children’s writing. But the one thing I did know was that, even though I taught Bible studies, I would never write a Bible study. Never. Do you know why? Because it’s in black and white. You can’t get those books back. I said, “I’ll write anything but a Bible study.” But all of that happened with Habakkuk and I was like, “Lord, You know, I don’t want to do this. I’m really afraid.” But I had two pastors who helped vet the book. Our Daily Bread publishing is careful about checking the theology. So I just had to go where I was trembling to go, because I felt the order was so clear. God Teaches Us With Love and Patience Karen: I love that and that’s God. God is so good. He’s like we are when we deal with our kids and they want something that’s unreasonable. We say okay, let’s explore that, and then we guide them in a completely different direction. God’s looking at you and saying, okay, okay, writing for children. Now here’s a little detour,  Jean Wilund: Right? He got me in the door I needed to go through using children’s books as a carrot. Karen: I want to share the last portion of Habakkuk three, which is a great way to sum up this time that we’ve had with you. It’s a reminder that we can’t keep our eyes on our circumstances. That we have to have our eyes on God.  This is Habakkuk 3:16-19: “So I wait quietly for the coming day when disaster will strike the people who invade us. Even though the fig trees have no blossoms and there are no grapes on the vines, even though the olive crops fail and the fields lie empty and barren, even though the flocks die in the fields and the cattle barns are empty, yet I will rejoice in the Lord. “I will be joyful in the God of my salvation. The sovereign Lord is my strength. He makes me as surefooted as a dear, able to tread upon the heights.” That’s from the new Living Translation, and Habakkuk reminds us that no matter what’s going on, no matter if you have to fork out $20,000 to put a new roof on your home, or if you are sick, or if you’re having to face surgery or whatever the crises are that come to us, the sovereign Lord is our strength. We will rejoice in the Lord. We will be joyful in the God of our salvation. He is sovereign. He is in His kingdom on His throne, and He has it all in His hands.  Erin: Amen.  Jean Wilund: Amen. When life gets difficult, we can get discouraged. Guest @JeanWilund shares wisdom from Habakkuk to help us embrace joy no matter what! #ChristianWriter #amwriting Share on X WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! What about Habakkuk speaks to you today? Books by JEAN WILUND Ease Into the Bible by Jean Wilund Embracing Joy: An 8-Week Transformational Bible Study of Habakkuk by Jean Wilund THANK YOU! Thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! A big shout out to anyone who’s been a Patreon sponsor of the month this year! Thank you to: Christy Bass Adams, Wendy L. Macdonald, Tammy Partlow, Priscilla Sharrow, and Kimberley Woodhouse! Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. The post 225 – Embrace Joy! With Guest Jean Wilund appeared first on Write from the Deep.

Publishing is getting harder all the time. The author has to do so much that it can become utterly exhausting. And discouraging. Guest Deborah Raney shares what it takes now to have longevity in a publishing career. About Deborah Raney Deborah Raney’s first novel, A Vow to Cherish, inspired the World Wide Pictures film of the same title and launched Deb’s writing career. Thirty years, forty-plus books, and numerous awards later, she’s still creating stories that touch hearts and lives. Her books have garnered multiple industry awards including the RITA® Award, HOLT Medallion, National Readers’ Choice Award, Carol Award, and have three times been Christy Award finalists. Deb served on the executive board of the 2500-member American Christian Fiction Writers for eighteen years and teaches at writers conferences around the country. Deb’s latest release is Playing for Keeps. Find out more about Deborah Raney at her website. Thanks to our sponsors on Patreon, we’re able to offer an edited transcript of the podcast! Erin: Welcome, listeners. We’re so glad you’re here in the deep with us. We’re especially excited because we have a guest with us! It’s Deborah Raney, and Karen gets to introduce her! Karen: I don’t even remember when Deb and I met. It feels as though I’ve known her from my beginning in publishing, low over 40 years ago. We’ve known each other for a long time, and I’ve always been impressed by how everything that Deb does is so steeped in her faith in God. She always has a smile and always a sense of humor, and for somebody who’s been in publishing as long as she has, that either means she’s got a good grounding in faith or she’s nuts! Her first novel, A Vow to Cherish, inspired the Worldwide Pictures film of the same title, and it launched Deb’s writing career. Now thirty years, forty-plus books, and numerous awards later, she’s still creating stories that touch hearts and lives. She, in fact, was given the 2024 ACFW Lifetime Achievement Award just a month or so ago for everything that she has done and has contributed to in publishing. She has been on the executive board of the 2,500 member American Christian Fiction Writers, and she teaches at writers’ conferences all around the country. She’s a Missouri transplant having moved with her husband, Ken, from their native Kansas. They love road trips and they take all kinds of fun trips and share pictures on Facebook. They also have Friday garage sale dates, which I love to watch on Facebook to see the goodies that they picked up. They love to spend time with their family and share breakfast on the screened porch overlooking their wooded backyard. Deb, thank you so much for joining us!  Deb: Thank you, Karen and Erin. It is so fun to be talking with you again. Erin: It is fun! And I kind of wish we were on your screened porch overlooking your wooded backyard.  Karen: I know! That’s what I was just saying! Deb: I wish so, too, except the birds make so much noise I don’t know if we could do a recording out here. But we love listening to them. Karen, I think maybe we met in New Orleans at a writers’ retreat about twenty-five years ago. Karen: Holy cow! Deb: Yeah, it’s been a while.  Karen: Well, I know it’s been a long time. You’ve been a part of my life forever, and I’ve been grateful for that.  Deb: Same here. Erin: Deb, let’s start off with what does the deep mean to you?  Deb: When I think of the deep, I think of God. The deepest place that I go is my faith. I will never live long enough—I’ve been in this business thirty years and I’ve been on this earth sixty-nine years, but I will never live long enough to understand and even imagine everything that God is. All that he has meant to me in my life in my relationships, in my career, he is the deep. Karen: I think that’s wonderful. Deb: It is. There are other things, and again, it all ties back to him. For example, just this past weekend I was with some longtime writer friends. We had a retreat and our conversations went deep. I love that kind of deep, too, where you know each other so well. You love each other so well that you can say what’s on your heart, what’s truly the good things and the hard things, and you know that that won’t change how those people feel about you because your roots with each other go deep.  Erin: Yeah.   Deb:  Lots of different ways to interpret that.  Erin: Wow. Yes. I love that. God has this way of binding us together in a deeper way than we could otherwise be because of his spirit. I think it just reaches out to others and we just, we are a body. That’s the thing, and it just, it shows. So yeah. That’s very cool. One of the things that we wanted to talk about with you was: what do you do as a writer to deal with discouragement? We wanted to discuss that with you because you’ve had a long career. I can’t imagine that you didn’t run into some discouragement along the way. Yet here you still are winning the Lifetime Achievement Award.  Deb: That felt really good, given those thirty tough years. Karen: Right! Erin: Tell us a little bit about your journey. What kind of discouragements have you faced and what did you do about them? Deb: I would have to say that right away in my writing career, I encountered discouragement. First of all, trying to submit that first manuscript and getting, I think, seventeen rejections before I was finally published. Even then, I know that I did not work as hard or write as long as a lot of my writer friends who stuck with it years and years and years before they were published. Comparison is not a good thing usually, but if you’re comparing yourself to the right people, you understand how fortunate you are and you can kind of put things in perspective and realize that while that was hard waiting those five months, or however long it might have been, some people waited twenty years. So be grateful for those things.  Erin: Right.  Deb: But then even after I had a lovely contract for three books with Bethany House, there came a roadblock. I submitted a book to them, and I had not finished the book yet. I’m a seat-of-the-pants writer, and I didn’t know how that book would end. They said, “We don’t see how it could possibly end well. You can submit it again once you’ve finished the book, but we’re going to reject it for now.”  Erin: Ouch. Deb: Yes, that hurt. It hurts to get rejected, especially by a publishing house that had now become my home. You know, this was my first publisher, and I loved everybody there. But God had other plans for that manuscript, and it ended up with another publisher. Another thing that’s happened—and my husband can tease me about it now—he says that I have shut down just about every publisher in the Christian publishing world. That’s not literally true, but I have very often, I don’t know why, but very often in my career I have been on the very tail end of a publisher’s fiction program. Or a certain line. I had the last book in the portrait series for Bethany House. I had the last book in Summerside Press before they shut down. I had the last book in Steeple Hill before they decided not to publish full length Christian fiction anymore. I had a wonderful five book contract with Abingdon Press, and after I had written three of the five books, they decided not to publish fiction any longer. That has just kind of been the story of my life. Of my writing life anyway, I will say. And that’s hard. It’s hard not to think that it’s all because you’re such a terrible writer, that that’s why they decided to close their fiction program. I know in my heart that isn’t really true, but it feels that way sometimes.  Erin: Well, not only that, but I can see why that would be extremely discouraging because when they shut down that line, I mean, are they gonna promote that? Deb: Exactly. Erin: You feel like you’ve birthed this baby and nobody is going to even know about it. That can be career killer, because publishers ask, “Why didn’t that book sell?” Deb: Yes, exactly. And that really is what happened. They did go ahead and publish all five books, but of course, their heart wasn’t in promoting fiction because they were on to other things. And that’s just the way. If I’ve learned anything, it’s just that that is the way that this business works. Things are constantly changing. You get an editor you love and she moves to a different publisher. You get a contract you love and that publisher shuts down. I mean, that’s just the way of things are. But the longer I have written, the more I’m able to see that every time something like that happens, God has something else in waiting in the wings for me. There was always a reason for it. Now, I may not know on this side of heaven what that reason is every single time, but when you walk with the Lord for as long as I have, you learn that whatever he’s doing is for my good and for his glory. That’s what I have always prayed that my writing world and life would be: to bring him glory. There comes a point where I don’t have to know the answers, because I trust him. I know that whatever it is, there’s a reason for it, whether I ever know that or not.  Karen: That’s the biggest thing, Deb, that you know you can trust him and you can rely on him. I’ve seen a lot of conversations online, had some conversations in person lately, with writers who are just so discouraged because things haven’t happened the way that they’d hoped they would. They’ve been around for a long time and they’re just feeling like they’re struggling. I was trying to find a support group of women on Facebook to recommend to some of my friends who’ve been struggling with discouragement, and yet the one group that I found, all of those women are incredibly discouraged and depressed. I don’t think we truly, and tell me if I’m wrong on this, but I don’t think we truly understand who God is, and who we are in him, and what it means to follow Jesus and to walk every step of the way with Jesus. To become discouraged and depressed when we have Almighty God beside us? I mean, it’s hard for me to wrap my brain around that.  Deb: I agree. The other thing is that just because God gifted me as a writer doesn’t mean that God’s going to have me writing for the rest of my life.  Karen: Right.  Deb: I will write as long as God tells me to write. If he puts something else in my life and says that season is over, then it will be over. I might mourn it. I might be sad about it when that happens, but if he tells me, then how can I do anything else? Karen: Amen. Erin: First, I want our listeners to be encouraged because they’ve heard it from Deb: God has a reason. I mean, you have come to that understanding through these years of walking and seeing and having something taken away from you over and over again, only to be handed something different from God. I hope our listeners can see from your experience that God is going to do that. But take us back to your earlier journey. Before you had those years under your belt, were there maybe some practical things you did, or thought, to help you pick yourself up…or not? Or lean on God, or whatever you did to keep moving forward? Deb: Well, first of all, please don’t think that I always handled it perfectly because I didn’t. And it’s okay to cry and weep and mourn and say, “God, why?” He can handle that. It’s okay for us to ask him and plead with him, even, if it’s something we feel strongly about. Sometimes I think that he lets us long for something so that we appreciate it more when it does finally happen. But no, sometimes my attitude in my younger years, well actually even in my older years, sometimes my attitude is not very God honoring. I’m ashamed of those times because every disappointment that I have had in this life is a first-world problem. I’m here to tell you, I am very, very blessed. When I finally, you know, suck it up and say, “Okay, Lord, whatever you have,” I realize how very, very blessed I am. Sometimes the discouragement or the disappointment leads to something better. But sometimes it doesn’t. Sometimes it leads to something a little less than what I thought I deserved and a little less than what I wanted. But even in that, there have been lessons to learn, and there have been reasons for that. As a sixty-nine-year-old writer, one thing that I have seen is a whole new crop of young writers, just like I was when I first started out, coming in to take the place of the writers my age. The old guard that we have kind of become, and that’s fine. That’s okay. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt sometimes. It doesn’t mean that I don’t feel a little jealous sometimes that those younger writers are coming up, but they are following God’s call just exactly the way I was. When I was a young writer, there was probably an older writer who felt a little jealous of me and the position that I was in. Again, this is just the way life is. When my attitude is right, and I am following God and seeking his will and walking in his truth and staying in his word, and when my perspective is right, and I understand this is the way it is, this is the way life is and it’s good—when I’m doing all that, then life IS good. It’s not the way it was supposed to be in the garden, but we live in a fallen world, and when we walk with Jesus in a fallen world, it’s still a pretty wonderful world. Karen: Yeah. I like those steps. Those are steps to take that can help you endure. Because the longer you walk with the Lord, the closer you become to him and the more you come to understand that, it’s like when you were with your group of friends, you can be honest. You can express every emotion. When I go through one health issue after another, I’m not sitting there and saying, “Oh, this is so great. Jesus, thank you for this new health challenge and all this physical pain!” I’ve been known to actually use obscenities from time to time. I always apologize to God and I apologize to whoever happened to hear me when I was going through that, but God is so gracious. He knows our limitations and he knows what we can endure, and everything that we face is meant to get us a step further in what we can endure, to strengthen us more and to refine us. It’s like tempered steel or tempered glass. It will not shatter the way that untested steel and glass can shatter.  Deb: The other thing that I have come to recognize is that sometimes I think God allows me to walk through a certain type of disappointment so that I can walk along beside someone else in a few years who is going through that same thing. When I was walking through that, there was nothing more comforting than having somebody else who had been through that very type of thing come alongside me and say, “It’ll be okay. I thought it was the end of the world when it happened to me, but God had something else in mind. It’ll be okay.”  Karen: Right. Erin: You’ve touched on this idea of just crying. I think that sometimes as Christians we forget that lament is okay. It’s not just okay, it’s good and it’s healthy. Look at David’s lament when Saul and Jonathan died. Look at the book Lamentations. Lament is important. I love what you’re saying, that somebody is walking with you and you can walk through things with others. I think one of the most powerful things we can say is, “It’s okay to be sad. It’s okay to lament the loss of that contract or the loss of those sales that you thought you were gonna get and instead something awful happened and the whole world did something different” or whatever. Lament is just that we can grieve and we can pour out our sorrow. Jesus cried. It’s okay and good. It’s important, I think, to also remember that lament is not despair. Despair is a different story altogether. But lament is grieving with hope. Grieving at what’s happened, but understanding that we aren’t people who have no hope. In some way, shape, or form, we still have hope for whatever God wants to do. And we know he wants to do things with us because that’s what he does. That’s why we’re here.  Karen: Yeah. The biggest difference is that there are people who fall into lament and that leads them into despair, and then they live there. They live there with that expectation of something terrible happening, or the other shoe dropping, or that God must not love them as much as X, Y, Z, or whatever lie the enemy is going to visit upon their minds and their hearts and spirits, and they stay in that place. That’s why it’s so vital to be able to do as you said: to lament, but do it with hope because we know that we have hope in God no matter what happens to us. We have hope.  Deb: Yes. And sometimes, because God is a loving father and he disciplines the children he loves, sometimes he says to me, “Get over yourself.” I mean, yes, it’s okay to lament and cry and whine and complain and go to the Psalms and all of that, but sometimes it’s time to be done lamenting and get on with the next thing. Erin: Yes! Deb: I always have to learn that the hard way, it seems like.  Erin: I love that idea, too, because that’s humility. As writers, what better thing can we share with the world than humility? Because that’s where we’re learners. That’s where we’re growers. That’s what this world needs is a little bit more humility and a little less human pride.  Karen: I’ll never forget Robin Lee Hatcher, who we’ve had on the show a couple times, and she was talking about when she went through her divorces and she was just struggling and she was saying to the Lord, “Why me, Lord, why me?” God spoke to her and said, “Why not you beloved?” You know, it’s like, “Oh. Yeah. Okay. That’s true.” Erin: It’s that cursed world we live in. It’s filled with futility until the whole restoration of the kingdom. That’s just where we live. But how wonderful and how good of God to allow us joy and peace, and the honor of working in a way that we love, and creativity, and the way that he chooses to use these words. It’s just, there’s nothing better out there, you guys.  Deb: Yes. You know, even if no one ever read the books that I have written, that wouldn’t change God’s goodness. That wouldn’t change the fact that he gave me a gift. Now sure, I’m happier when a whole bunch of people read them. The more that do, the happier I am. But some of my books, I think I wrote for me. They were written for me to pour out something that was going on in my life, or to teach me a lesson, or that type of thing. That’s okay, too.   Erin: I love that.  Deb: Another—I’ll call it a gift in quotes—that God has given me is that I play the piano by ear. Nobody else needs to hear that. That is a gift that he has given me purely for my own enjoyment, and maybe to play with my grandchildren sitting on the piano bench beside me and just having fun. I am not going to be playing in any concert hall or even in any church anytime soon. So not always are the gifts that we are given meant to be used to do great and mighty things out in the world. Karen: Right.  Erin: I love that you said that because so many writers struggle with, “Am I called to write, or is it okay for me to write, or should I be writing?” My answer is always yes. You’re a creative person. You don’t need some kind of a gift card from God that says you need to write. But they think it’s a waste and they only want to write if it’s going to be read by hundreds of people because otherwise, why? That’s the wrong way to look at it. It’s the wrong question.   Deb: Right. If God wills, then the story will get out there. Every time I get a wonderful reader letter from somebody who I didn’t even know was reading my book, which usually you don’t, that’s a wonderful blessing. I can remind myself that for every person who does write and tell me what my story meant, there’s probably another hundred people who didn’t write. That’s okay. I don’t need to know what happened to my story once it got out in the world. That’s between God and that person. But that doesn’t mean I’m not still thrilled when I do get to hear, every so often, and get that little bit of encouragement. Erin: We’re coming to the end of our time already. Do you have any last words of wisdom you would want to leave our listeners with?  Deb: I guess if I could say anything to my younger self, I would say don’t worry about the little things. God will take care of them. Learn to trust him and to know that if something that is out of your control happens, just roll with the punches and wait. God, he may show you. He may make it very clear to you later on what the reason was for that happening. But if he doesn’t, that doesn’t mean he’s not working in your life. He’s still working in your life. Trust him. Two words. Just learn to trust him. I think that’s kind of what this life on this earth is all about—just learning that our father loves us and he wants to give us good things. He also sometimes needs to discipline us because we’re naughty children sometimes. You know, we need a spanking. I know I do sometimes. But let him have his way with you and work in your life.  Erin: I love that. Karen: What I really like is recognizing that in light of eternity and in light of God’s purpose, it’s all small stuff. Even the things that feel like they’re going to end our careers, or ruin our lives, or whatever. In light of God, it’s all small stuff, so don’t worry about it, don’t fret about it. Feel your emotions and share those with God and with believers who’ll speak truth to you. But in the long run, God’s got this. He’s got you. You’ve proven that, Deb, with what you’ve talked about today. You’ve reminded us of the fact that we don’t need to worry. We don’t need to be afraid. We don’t need to be discouraged. We can just rely on God and trust him. Like you said, those two words: Trust him.  Erin: Yes!   Deb: I think one of the best things about getting older is that the longer you live, the more you see, you can look back and trace, God’s work in your life. I love that part of being old.  Erin: Amen. Karen: Amen. Guest @AuthorDebRaney shares two powerful words to help you have longevity in a publishing career. #amwriting #ChristianWriter Share on X We want to hear from you! What helps you trust God? Latest Release by Deborah Raney THANK YOU! Thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! A big thank you to our October sponsor of the month, Kimberley Woodhouse! She’s an award-winning and bestselling author whose books have received the Carol Award, Holt Medallion, Reader’s Choice Award, Selah Award, Spur Award, Christian Market Book Award, Golden Scroll Award among others. A popular speaker/teacher, she’s shared with over 1,000,000 people at more than twenty-five hundred venues across the country. Her fortieth book, 70 North, releases this month. You can also connect with Kim at kimberleywoodhouse.com Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. The post 224 – Do You Have What it Takes to Last? with Guest Deborah Raney appeared first on Write from the Deep.

Writing is not an easy profession. Being a Christian writer can be even more difficult. These three essentials for a Christian writer’s life will ground you in your faith, enabling you to write and build a career with peace and confidence. But first, thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! Recently I listened to a couple of books that got me thinking about today’s topic. What is essential for a Christian writer’s life? We live in a busy world with a thousand things demanding our time and attention every day. I don’t think that’s overstating it. We’ve only got one life. How are we going to choose what to do with the time God gives us? What is our priority? Even if we were to weed out obvious things to say no to, like sin or clear distractions, that still leaves a multitude of demands, ideas, activities, and so on, to consider. Many of which you can make a good case for. The choices we make matter, because what you give your time and attention to is what shapes your life. That’s where those books inspired me. The first one is titled Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown.  The subtitle was a revelation: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less. It seems like today’s world is all about the urgent, unending pursuit of more—doing it all and having it all. This book is about deliberately, ruthlessly choosing to do less so you can focus on what matters most to you.   Today we want to step back from the myriad details of our lives. We want to step back from complicated plans and programs, endless to-do lists, and a plethora of shoulda woulda couldas. Instead, we’ll pare down to 3 essentials, or guiding principles, to help shape and guide your life as a Christian and a writer. God gave us our creative gifts for good purposes, so we want to ensure that we’re willing vessels, available anytime, anywhere, for the tasks God gives us.  We’ve used the term essentials, or guiding principles, but you can also call them core precepts, or a “rule of life.” By rule, we don’t mean legal regulations but rather a way of organizing your life toward a purpose.  Essential 1 – Abide in Christ   John 15:4-5 (ESV) says, “Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.” Abiding in Christ means we WILL bear fruit. Not abiding in Christ means we won’t bear fruit. Apart from Christ we can do nothing. This is so simple, yet too often we fail to realize and carry out the dire necessity of this. Maybe in part because it’s hard to quantify what abiding in Christ looks like, or what it means in a practical sense. Abiding in Christ (or some translations use the word “remaining” in Christ) is more than just believing in Christ. As an article on Crossway.org puts it, it’s “staying vitally connected” to Christ. An article on DesiringGod.org describes abiding in Christ  as being “…attached to the vine in such a way that it is receiving all that the branch has to give…” The article goes on to say, “…abiding is believing, trusting, savoring, resting, receiving.” What does that look like in a practical, daily sense? The Crossway.org article says, “It is the lifelong extension of encountering Jesus.” That’s still probably going to look different for everyone, but I think one universal principle is to make encountering Jesus your daily mindset. Make Encountering Jesus Your Daily Mindset This is the essential. The rule of the day is to live in such a way as to believe and trust his promises, to savor and rest in his presence, to be constantly and expectantly open-handed to receive everything we need from him moment by moment. It’s to keep in the forefront of our mind that we’re working and living and resting in communion and in union with him. When we’re writing, when we’re plotting, when we’re doing a day job that might not be writing; when we get up in the morning, when we go to bed at night; when we brush our teeth, mow the lawn, run errands, fix dinner—all of this is done with a constant awareness of, and reliance on, our connection with the Vine. But mindfulness of this—or anything else for that matter—is a very real struggle in our culture today. Our brains are being assaulted with distractions, and being rewired to need them. That’s why this essential is also a practice. It’s something we have to choose to continually do, and it isn’t easy. Thankfully we don’t have to do this in our own power.  The Crossway.org article has this to say, “…Jesus does not leave us to ourselves. Even though he commands us to abide in him—and we are responsible to abide there, and guilty if we don’t abide—nevertheless he himself keeps us there. And we would not abide there without his crucial keeping.” So, don’t forget to ask for God’s help and know you’ll receive it. Do Frequent Checks We should also be frequently checking ourselves to make sure we aren’t neglecting or straying from the true Vine. Y’all know that we’re prone to do this. The Crossway.org article puts it like this: “…we are often tempted to find our life-giving sap from another plant.” We’re prone to disobedience, apathy, forgetfulness, or just plain drifting. The good gifts and desires God has given us—like creativity and writing—have a tendency to become distorted. That’s the very last thing we want if we’re going to have something of value to share with the world. Making abiding in Christ an essential, a life rule, rather than just a good idea or a random desire will help us fight those tendencies and truly bear fruit both in our lives and in our writing. This essential also does the most important thing of all: it helps us love God with all our heart, soul, and mind. Jesus tells us in Matthew 22:37-38 that this is the first and greatest commandment. Essential 2 – Build & Nurture Relationships Our next essential is to build and nurture relationships. This is in keeping with our design. We were created for relationship by a relational God. We can’t flourish if we’re not living according to our design. That said, we want to stress that how this plays out in each person’s life will be very different. Some of us thrive in the midst of a large community of friendships and networks. Some of us do better with fewer relationships. Too many people becomes overwhelming. No matter what this looks like for you, the point is that you make relationships an essential in your life. We get strength from our community of friends.  We carry each others’ burdens (Galatians 6:28). We learn in 1 thes 5:11 that We encourage each other and build each other up (1 Thessalonians 5:11). We teach each other (Colossians 3:16). We help each other and have each other’s backs (Ecclesiastes 4:9-12). We sharpen each other (Proverbs 27:17). We pray for each other (James 5:16) We comfort each other (2 Corinthians 1:3-4) We simply can’t live a “Lone Ranger” life and expect to thrive. We need all the things relationships offer, and other people need those same things from us in return. In our busy lives today, relationships suffer. They take time and energy, two very precious commodities, so we must make relationships an essential if they’re to flourish. As writers, we need to be writing out of our deep love for people, our connection with them, and our understanding of them. That comes from our journey of doing life with people. Of being vulnerable and walking with others in their vulnerabilities. Hanging in there through the glory, and mess, and triumphs, and failures. We earn the right to speak to others when we’re in the trenches with them. That’s also where we learn to shift our writing from being writer focused—as in “I just want to tell my story”—to being reader focused—as in, “How can I best serve readers?”  Loving God with all our hearts is the greatest commandment, but Matthew 22:39 tells us that loving others is the second. We simply can’t do that if we have no relationship with them. However, please don’t hear us saying you have to spend every minute of your life with people. Many writers are introverts who need down time and alone-time. What we’re saying is that building and nurturing relationships should be a guiding principle in how you’re spending your life and what you’re doing with your time. Ask yourself: Is what I’m doing right now ultimately going to help or hinder my relationships with others? Will I be investing or isolating? That hour you take for solitude may be exactly what you need in order to recharge and be ready to engage others with the best version of you. Essential 3 – Eliminate Hurry Our last essential is to eliminate hurry from your life. This might seem like a strange thing for us to pick as an essential, but a book called The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry by John Mark Comer makes a profound case for this idea. I highly recommend all Christians read it. It’s paradigm-shifting. It’s near impossible to effectively carry out the first two essentials we mentioned if we’re always in a hurry. How can we abide when we’re in a rush? How can we build and nurture relationships when we’re always on the go? We’ve probably all been on the receiving end of an appointment or conversation with someone who’s in too much of a hurry to listen. Whether it’s a doctor or a good friend, the result is the same. We don’t feel heard or seen, which leaves us feeling uncared for. Think of this third principle—to eliminate hurry—as a practical way to carry out the first two. It’s a way to make space in our lives for what matters most. Also, think of it as a way to love yourself. We want to love God, and we want to love our neighbors, but Matthew 22:39 says that we’re to love others as we love ourselves. That means we don’t neglect self-care! A hurried life is a stressful life not a peaceful life. Hurry creates angst and a feeling that we’re never good enough, fast enough, strong enough, smart enough, safe enough. Hurry is the enemy of abiding, the enemy of knowing deeply and being known, and the enemy of time and attention. We can’t listen to ourselves, let alone others, when we’re in a hurry. What about our writing life? Writing that’s hurried suffers from inauthenticity and superficiality. It lacks insight and resonance. We’ve all read superficial writing. It’s out there, and at the end of the day, it’s ineffective. Don’t add to it. What does the elimination of hurry look like in our lives? Again that’s probably different for everyone, but two key ideas to put this into practice are to create margin and to slow down. Create Margin in Your Life This means not just that you don’t over book, but it means that you do “under book.” Allow more time than you think you need for each appointment or activity. Put white space in between appointments—and book deadlines!—so you can reset, refocus, and rest. Don’t schedule anything back to back. Work to pare down your schedule, to pursue less, as the book Essentialism suggests. Do few things and do them well. Fair warning: Creating margin will require you to be disciplined and ruthless in your choices!  Slow Down The second way we eliminate hurry is to slow down By this we mean actively work to set a slower pace. This will be hard. Our culture is zooming along at a frantic pace, and we’ve been caught up and swept along. We have to dig our heels in if we’re going to stop the madness.  The goal of this essential is to experience your life. To savor it rather than be exhausted by it. Stop and think about how that sounds. What could that feel like to be free from rushing? I think that’s why so many people love Amish and historical fiction. It’s the lure of a slower life that feels impossible today. How would your stress level change if you regularly drove the speed limit because you weren’t in a hurry to get where you were going? Or if you could saunter through the grocery store, and play lazy games of Candyland with your kids? If you had time to savor a cup of coffee with a friend or an impromptu conversation with a neighbor. You can do this if you create margin and actively work to set a slower pace.  Eliminating hurry fosters creativity, patience, peace, mindfulness, rest, delight, and love. It makes your life and writing fertile ground for bearing fruit.  God’s Design Abide in Christ, build and nurture relationships, and eliminate hurry from your life. Following these principles will help you live out God’s design for your writing and life as you love God, love your neighbor, and love yourself. 3 essentials for a Christian writer’s life to ground you in your faith so you can write and build a career with peace and confidence. #christianwriter #amwriting Share on X Books mentioned in the podcast Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry by John Mark Comer WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! What do you count as essential in your life? CHECK OUT THE FLORIDA CHRISTIAN WRITERS CONFERENCE! Erin will be at theFlorida Christian Writers Conference, in Leesburg, FL, October 16-20, 2024. Hope to see you there! THANK YOU! Thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! A big thank you to our October sponsor of the month, Kimberley Woodhouse! She’s an award-winning and bestselling author whose books have received the Carol Award, Holt Medallion, Reader’s Choice Award, Selah Award, Spur Award, Christian Market Book Award, Golden Scroll Award among others. A popular speaker/teacher, she’s shared with over 1,000,000 people at more than twenty-five hundred venues across the country. Her fortieth book, 70 North, releases this month. You can also connect with Kim at kimberleywoodhouse.com Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. The post 223 – 3 Essentials for a Christian Writer’s Life appeared first on Write from the Deep.

Attending a writers’ conference can be intimidating, even overwhelming. If you want to make the most of your time at a writers’ conference, guest Grace Fox has some specific strategies to help you do exactly that. And some of them are even about your writing. But first, thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! Grace Fox Grace Fox is a popular speaker at women’s events internationally. She inspires hope, courage, and transformation through God’s Word. She has served as a career missionary for more than 30 years. Grace has written fourteen books and published hundreds of articles in magazines. She’s a member of the First 5 Bible Study writing team for P31 Ministries and is a co-host for a podcast called Your Daily Bible Verse. Her book, Finding Hope in Crisis: Devotions for Calm in Chaos, won the Golden Scroll Devotional Book of the Year Award in 2021. Keeping Hope Alive: Devotions for Strength in the Storm won the same award in 2022. Her newest devotional is titled Names of God: Living Unafraid. You can learn all about her at GraceFox.com.  Thanks to our sponsors on Patreon, we’re able to offer an edited transcript of the podcast Erin Taylor Young: Welcome listeners into the Deep. Today is part two of our interview on writers’ conferences with Grace Fox, and we are discussing specific strategies for making conferences work for you.  Karen Ball: So when writers attend conferences, what is helpful and what isn’t?  Well, many writers wonder why they should spend the money to attend a writers’ conference if they don’t get a contract from it. How do they justify the expense to a spouse? Or maybe you think, “I’m ready to be published. I’ve got this,” but what if the professionals at the conference don’t agree?  Haven’t they just wasted all that money for nothing? Grace Fox: Absolutely not, because attending conferences is about growing relationships with those very professionals. It’s about laying a strong foundation for your career. You go to conferences to learn as much as you possibly can about the craft of writing. Which means you have to go in with a teachable spirit. To say, “I’m here to learn,” and take in as much as you can. That’s the first strategy.  But conferences––all those workshops––can feel like information overload at times, so the next strategy is to tell yourself it’s okay to skip out on a workshop if you need to decompress. It’s so helpful to take time to get your notes in order and to get your thoughts put together again, or to just go to your room and have a quiet time and pray.  With that in mind, it’s always a good idea to have friends praying for you as attend the conference. Because you don’t know what God’s purpose is for having you go there.  Karen Ball: Exactly! Sometimes He calls you to go to a writer’s conference and it has nothing to do with your writing career. It has to do with you meeting people who get you on the right track as far as your perspective, understanding that God may be calling you to write something for one person, and if you write something and only one person reads it and it changes that person’s life, it’s worth it. The expense is worth it. The investment is worth it. It’s all worth it because you’re doing what God has asked you to do. Grace Fox: That’s beautiful. It really is about obedience. And in my career with writing, I’ve met so many people who think that end all is writing a book—gotta write a book. Gotta write a book. But one thing I learned at a conference is that that there is a huge audience out there with magazines. Think about it. Your book may only sell 2000 copies in its lifetime. But one magazine article can reach a quarter of a million people. You don’t know those things unless you start going to conferences and learning from those people that are in the know. Karen Ball: That’s why it’s so important to get your expectations straight, to go in with an open mind and an open-hearted spirit and say, “What is it you want from me, Lord?” Not, “What are You going to give me, Lord?,” but “What do You want from me?” Grace Fox: Because His plan may be to put you on the bridge to something entirely different. Erin Taylor Young: You know, I love, Grace, how supportive your husband was. He justified the expense because God told you to go. And I love what you said about it being an education. I mean, people go back to school all the time and nobody questions that expense to pay for a class or whatever. This is the same thing. You’re paying for a lot of classes. And believe me,  it’s cheaper than college tuition! Grace Fox: Amen. And again, the relationships that you make at conferences can last for years. I am still friends with some of the women that I met in 1999. We still communicate and [00:08:00] support each other in our writing. Erin Taylor Young: Well, I met Karen at a writing conference.  Karen Ball: Exactly. And so much came out of that, even beyond publishing Erin’s book, Surviving Henry. It’s amazing what God can accomplish if we’re open to letting Him do his will and bring about His plans instead of ours. And Grace, I loved what you said in part one of this interview about not stopping until God tells you to.  Grace Fox: That was a quote from Matt Anderson.  Karen Ball: We all need to remember that, especially when we experience what you did, Grace. Where you told us in the first part of this podcast that you were so sure when you went to that first conference that you had everything down, that you were ready to be published, and you weren’t. Or when we’re’re told that we need to learn how to do this or this or this better… That that can be just devastating.  But from the editor’s side of the desk at writer’s conferences, I can say met a lot of wonderful writers, but not very many who were ready, at that moment, to be published. Writers have to spend time studying, writing, and  learning the craft. And so if you go to a writer’s conference and they’re telling you that you need to do this and this and this, don’t look at that as something depressing. And don’t let it make you want to give up! Look at that as your orders, your marching orders. Don’t stop writing until God tells you to do so. Grace Fox: That’s right because we want to do what God’s called us to do with excellence. Erin Taylor Young: So, Grace, you were digging in and learning everything you could, and when you learned about articles, you explored that as a way to hone your craft. And to learn how to write to deadline. And you were building a reputation amongst editors.  Karen Ball: One caution though, again from the editor’s side of the desk. We’re talking about making professional connections, and that’s great. But it was obvious to me when someone came to talk to me or sit at my table during a meal, and it was just to make a connection with an editor. It wasn’t because they cared anything about me as a person, or they were looking at me as an individual, or that God had asked them to sit next to me. It was that they thought talking to me was a strategic connection.  It’s not about “connections” so much as relationship. The people that I met at these conferences, who shared passions for the things that I had passions for, who came to me with a teachable spirit like you’re talking about… Those are the people who are still in my life because they know me so well and they know God so well and we can speak truth to each other and encourage and challenge each other. So focus more on building relationships. Just ask God who He wants you to meet. He’s got His reasons for directing you where He does. Erin Taylor Young: Yeah, I love that. Especially because there are some conferences editors can’t always control who their appointments might be with. But it’s lovely to just have someone come along and just chat with you, to just to talk about what’s happening in the writing world or even just to visit.  Grace Fox: So another wise strategy is to watch your attitude when you approach the editors. Always remember, they are people as well who may be dealing with hard things, who may have  just had a tragedy in their family, but here they are back at work. We just don’t know. So be careful, if an editor looks disinterested, that it may have nothing to do with you or your writing. Maybe they’re a little preoccupied because they’ve got something personal going on.  There are all kinds of dynamics that happen at a conference, so purpose to be sensitive to those dynamics, whether with editors or the other attendees. Some are discouraged. Oh my goodness! I’ve been at conferences where a writer gets a rejections and that person is in tears. So go in as someone who’s willing to minister as well as be ministered to. Erin Taylor Young: Just know that God might send you to a writing conference for something that you can offer to someone else––some thought, some prayer, some who knows what, and word of encouragement––and you might be there for that. And that’s still being obedient and still being used by God and still contributing. To the overall words of truth going forth in, in this world. We can contribute even if we don’t write a word. What if we encouraged somebody who then wrote something that that just took off? Changed people’s lives? God is so much bigger than we realize. Karen Ball: So let me recap some strategies or going to writer’s conferences that we’ve hit on here. First of all, make sure you go to conferences because God is calling you to do so. If you need to justify the expense, you can honestly say that God is calling you to this, that this is an investment in what He’s asking you to do. The next strategy is to check your expectations at the door. We talked about false expectations, why not go with no expectations beyond asking God what He wants to show you?  Erin Taylor Young: Right. Go in with an open heart and mind and spirit. Grace Fox: And ask him for those divine appointments. Erin Taylor Young: Those are so much fun when they happen! Karen Ball: Next, check your ego at the door. Be teachable. Don’t feel as though people are rejecting you when they say you’re not ready. What they’re really saying is you can do better. That actually is a form of belief in you, and so take it as such and let it nurture you and nourish you and move forward in what you’ve been shown and taught.  Erin Taylor Young: That brings up an important point. It’s difficult sometimes for a new writer to get that meeting she wanted, or have a critique done, and see red pen all over. But the deal is this: published writers, career writers, still get red pen all over their work! As an editor, Karen has put red pen all over manuscripts. I have too. There are multi-published authors who’ve had a 30-page revision letter from me! That doesn’t mean you don’t know what you’re doing and it doesn’t mean that you’re a bad writer and it doesn’t mean that you should be discouraged. It’s just a normal part of the process. Karen Ball: We writers all need editors. When I’m functioning as a writer, I love getting those letters from my editor. I don’t always agree with everything that they suggest, but I know that what they are saying is, this is good, but you can do better. And it’s because of their belief in who I am as a writer. So when editors at these conferences say this isn’t quite what we need, but have you considered, and then they give you guidance, that’s because they believe in you. Grace Fox: When I went to that first writer’s conference. I should have checked my ego at the door. I wrote three sample devotions to be critiqued by an editor of a beautiful women’s devotional magazine. I sat at her table one meal and she recognized my name. She said, “Oh, I read some of your stuff.” And I’m thinking, oh yeah, here we go. And then she said, “They were okay, but they’re just too long for our publication.” My devotionals were 800 words, and she was looking for something more like 350 to 400. But she said, “I know you can cut them down and get them down to 350 or 400 words.”  I had the gall to say, “I don’t think so.” She said again that I could, and I just said no. That I couldn’t do that and maintain the integrity of the piece.  Needless to say, I’ve never written for her. And why would she want me to? Talk about ego! But I ended up at the airport with a different editor whose flight was at the same time as mine. I told her about that meeting, and she said, “Show me what you submitted.” So I pulled out that first devotion and slid it across the table to her. She butchered it with red ink. She took the second one and did it again. And when she got to the third one and started in with her red pen, I was just dying by that point. But I went home with those devotions all marked up in red pen, and I did what she said. She showed me how to cut things down from 800 words to 350. And the integrity of the piece was still there! Now? I have a hard time going bigger because I know how to write tight. Erin Taylor Young: That’s grace right there. That is a God-gift that this editor, after you wouldn’t listen, did that for you. One of the neat things about all this? We have all made mistakes, mistakes, mistakes, mistakes, and guess what? Our careers did not die. One mistake is not going to ruin your career. So be okay with direction. With correction. We’re gonna learn, we’re gonna make mistakes, and we’re gonna be humble about it and, and then follow advice.  Karen Ball: Grace, do you have any final words of wisdom for our listeners about writer’s conferences? Grace Fox: Absolutely, GO. Have a teachable heart. Know that what you think you’re going for may not be at all what God has in mind. It might be about ministering to somebody in the airport on your way or the person in the plane beside you. God’s purposes are so much bigger than ours, so go with a wide open heart. Karen Ball: Yes, amen. Thanks for joining us today. You can find previous episodes and more resources at right from the deep.com, and I bet you know someone who needs this podcast will please share it with them. So until next time, embrace the deep, your writing and your life will never be the same. Don't stop until God tells you to. Share on X WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! Which of these strategies do you think will work best for you next time you attend a writers’ conference? CHECK OUT THE FLORIDA CHRISTIAN WRITERS CONFERENCE! Erin will be at theFlorida Christian Writers Conference, in Leesburg, FL, October 16-20, 2024. Hope to see you there! THANK YOU! Thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! A big thank you to our August sponsor of the month,Tammy Partlow! She’s a speaker at women’s retreats, and her debut novel Blood Beneath the Pines, a suspense set in the deep South, is now available. She’s hard at work on the next book in the series!  Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. Book mentioned in the podcast Names of God: Living Unafraid by Grace Fox The post 222 – Strategies for Writers’ Conferences with Guest Grace Fox appeared first on Write from the Deep.

Writers’ conferences cost time and money, so are they really worth it? Absolutely! But not necessarily for the reasons you think. Guest Grace Fox shares how God moved her to attend a writers’ conference, how many mistakes she made there, and how God miraculously provided for her and used it all to bless her far more than she ever imagined. About Grace Fox Grace Fox is a popular speaker at women’s events internationally. She inspires hope, courage, and transformation through God’s Word. She has served as a career missionary for more than 30 years. Grace has written fourteen books and published hundreds of articles in magazines. She’s a member of the First 5 Bible Study writing team for P31 Ministries and is a co-host for a podcast called Your Daily Bible Verse. Her book, Finding Hope in Crisis: Devotions for Calm in Chaos, won the Golden Scroll Devotional Book of the Year Award in 2021. Keeping Hope Alive: Devotions for Strength in the Storm won the same award in 2022. Her newest devotional is titled Names of God: Living Unafraid. You can learn all about her at GraceFox.com.  Thanks to our sponsors on Patreon, we’re able to offer an edited transcript of the podcast! Erin: Welcome, listeners. We’re so excited that you’re here for another day, another show! We have a guest, which is also exciting.   Karen: Our guest is someone that you all know. She’s been here before, and we’re so excited that she’s here with us again now. Her name is Grace Fox. She’s the writer who lives on a boat. She speaks at women’s events internationally and inspires hope, courage, and transformation through God’s word. She’s written fourteen books and published hundreds of articles in magazines. She’s a member of the First 5 Bible study writing team for P31 Ministries and a co-host for the podcast Your Daily Bible Verse. She is just so smart you guys, and she’s here to share with us about conferences and other things. Welcome, Grace.  Grace: Thank you so much for having me back.  Erin: Yes, we’re excited about it. So let’s start with our same lovely question that we just love digging into. Grace, what does the deep mean to you?  Grace: Well, that word reminds me of my childhood, standing on the diving board at the swimming pool. At the end of swimming classes, the teacher would say, “Okay, everybody, you get to jump off the diving board.” I would just die inside because the thought scared me half to death. Getting up those stairs and standing on the diving board with a lineup of people waiting patiently behind me while I worked up the courage to jump into the deep end, that’s what I think of. In my faith journey, it’s scary sometimes when God calls me to a place where he says, “Okay, Grace, I want you to jump.” The good thing to know is that he’s always there to catch me. Like the lifeguard, in the goodness of his heart, he’d be down there with his arms straight up going, “It’s okay, Grace, you can jump. I’ll catch you.”  Karen: That’s great.  Erin: Conference season is kind of rolling along here in the fall. I would love to hear, Grace, about your very first conference because we were talking a little bit earlier and I know you’ve got some good stories about your first conference.  Grace: Yeah, so I started my writing career thinking I was going to develop a line of greeting cards. I found a woman who could draw, because I can’t draw to save my life. I came up with the concepts and we put together ten sample cards.  Then we thought, “Now what do we do with them?” She really wasn’t interested in doing any more than drawing. She had a little hobby farm she was busy with, and so I said, “Okay, I’ll figure out the marketing. I haven’t got a clue, but I’ll figure it out.” I remember sitting down at my computer and Googling, like for the first time, Christian greeting card publisher. Up came the Florida Christian Writers Conference. I didn’t even know that such a thing existed. I thought, “Wow, that looks interesting.” I scrolled through it and looked to see what faculty members were going to be there. Lo and behold, Dayspring was going to be there! Karen: Wow.  Grace: My first thought was, “That looks so good. I should go. Oh, but that’s way beyond my reach. That’s so far. I can’t do this, I can’t afford it.” You know. I came up with all the reasons why not. That was in August.  Erin: Where were you living at the time that it was far?  Grace: I was living on a little island off the coast of British Columbia, working at a Christian camp, and we were living on paid support, so the thought of coming up with the money to do this was just beyond me. Then the thought of getting there was another issue. Erin: Wait a minute. That really was far. I mean, let’s just point that out for our listeners. You were far, okay, and you were financially challenged. Those were both true.  Grace: Yep. As far as distance goes, it would take me two ferries just to get to the mainland, and then I would have to fly from either Vancouver or Seattle. If I were to go to Seattle to fly, it would be about a twelve hour trip, ten or twelve hours with two ferries. Erin: Wow.  Grace: So it was a big deal. It was a very big deal. I remember thinking, and arguing about that, and then just kind of shutting it down and thinking, “That’s impossible.” But the thought never really left the back of my mind. In October I went back and looked at the site again, and it was like somebody just gripped me and said, “You need to be there.” I shared that with my husband and he just said, “If God is wanting you to go, then I will support you with that. We will make it work.”  Karen: Yeah.  Grace: God actually did make it work in an amazing way, because a couple weeks later I went to a teeny tiny missions conference at a teeny tiny church. Literally walked across the cow pastor to get there.  It was on a Friday evening. The pastor opened the service by saying, “Everybody stand up, turn around and say hi to somebody around you.” I did that, and lo and behold, the woman behind me was there because her husband was one of the speakers for that weekend. But I’d graduated from Bible college with her more than twenty years before, and I hadn’t seen her since. I’d had no contact with her.  I went, “Lynn, so great to see you! What have you been doing with yourself?” She told me that she was a travel agent working out of her own home. I remember saying, “Hey, give me your information because I’ll keep you in mind if I ever need to go somewhere.” When it just seemed like God was saying, “You are going to Florida,” I phoned her up and I said, “Lynn, here’s the deal. I need to get to Florida on this day, and I need to get back on this day and you know, I need you to get me there as inexpensively as possible out of Vancouver or out of Seattle. “ She said, “Let me see what I can do.” She called me back and said, “Grace, I have never seen anything like this before, ever, so give me your credit card right now.” I did and she booked me a flight on the days that I needed it. It was about $150 round trip.  Erin: No!  Grace: That was a miracle. And let me tell you, I didn’t know the whole story until I met her at a women’s retreat years later. She goes, “Grace, by the way, did I ever tell you what happened after I booked your ticket? A disclaimer came up on the screen that said that price was a mistake. They’d honor every ticket purchased on that price, but that was a mistake.” Erin: That’s God.  Grace: And that’s how I got to my first writer’s conference.  Erin: That is amazing. Look at how God provided. You stepped forward in faith each time and God gave you that encouragement along the way and that prompting, and then he made it work. Miraculously.  Grace: He did more even because we had a house that had been on the market for two years in Washington state. When we moved to Canada, we’d put our house on the market. It sold just before Christmas that year. But I was still several hundred dollars shy of what I needed to go to the conference.  About a week before the conference, I remember sitting at the kitchen table, literally crying because I felt like this was way bigger than me. I was thinking, “I’m on a white water rafting trip, and I’m hanging on for dear life, and this is way bigger than me.”  Into our mailbox came a letter from escrow that said they’d made a mistake in figuring out how much they owed us after the house sold. The amount of money they said they owed us was, almost to the penny, what was left that I needed to get to Florida. Karen: Don’t you love how God does that? I mean, that’s amazing. I guess it’s pretty clear God wanted you there.  Grace: I think that’s another reason why I cried. I thought, “He’s in charge of this and this is bigger than me. Let’s just hang on for dear life and see where this goes.” I went to the conference because I knew I was supposed to go. Erin: Yes, it’s very clear.  Karen: How did that conference go for you?  Grace: My greeting cards were nicely rejected by the Dayspring editor, and they’ve never gone anywhere to this day. That would’ve been like 1999, and they’ve never gone anywhere. But it was, like I say, the carrot before a little donkey’s nose. I just followed that carrot and it led me to the Florida Christian Writers Conference. While I was there, I went to every workshop I could possibly go to because I wanted to get my money’s worth out of the thing! Erin: Yeah.  Grace: I went to the sessions especially about writing for magazines. That was where I ultimately broke into writing. I was just doing what the editors said. I played by the rules, and I got the Christian Writers Market Guide, and I studied it like a Bible. I did all the right things, and I was able to break in, but that doesn’t mean that I did it all correctly.  Erin: First, though, let’s go back to the fact that you got rejected by Dayspring. Like what happened to you when that happened? Obviously you said, “Well, too bad, I’m still gonna learn everything I can.” But did you also go, “God, uh, did you make a mistake?” What did you think when that happened?  Grace: I got rejected there, but I thought, “I’m not gonna give up that easy.” I think I went back home and I sent the samples to… I must have sent them in to Dayspring again. At that point, there was an artist named Matt Anderson, and he had a line of greeting cards called Heaven’s Unofficial Greetings, like there were little characters like Ziggy, the little cartoon character. They were one of my favorite lines of cards. So I sent some samples in, and I got a letter back. It was kind of a form rejection, you know, “Your cards do not meet what we’re looking for at this time. Thanks, but no thanks.” I saw the name on the letter when I got it, and I thought, “That’s not Matt Anderson. That’s not who I wanted to look at the cards” So I got on the phone. There was a phone number on that thing. I phoned and I asked for that person. It was a name that could be either a male or a female, so I really didn’t even know who I was calling, but I called up, and it turned out to be a man. I said, “I wanna know why these cards were rejected.” He said, “Well, to tell you the truth, I didn’t even see them. I was not the one who looked at them. Matt Anderson did. Why don’t I have him call you? He’s a really nice guy and he will do that.” I thought, “Yeah, yeah, yeah. Don’t call us, we’ll call you.” But I thanked him and hung up.  Thirty minutes later my phone rang and it was Matt Anderson himself! Erin: Wow.  Grace: He went through each card and what he thought about them gave me his opinion. Then he said this, ” Grace, if God is in this, then don’t stop until he says so.” Karen: Very good.  Grace: I thought that was the best piece of advice, and I’ve passed that on to a lot of newer writers too, because it really kept me going. I didn’t realize you probably shouldn’t get on the phone and call and say, “Tell me, explain to me…”  But these people were gracious with me and gave me the answers I was looking for, and that’s what I needed. As for Matt Anderson, later I was able to interview him for a Power for Living Sunday School paper article. Then we met years later at a Mount Herman Christian Writers Conference. It was great fun.  Erin: Wow. What I love is these connections that you were building, you know? Let’s go back to the conference. You get rejected by Dayspring, but you’re still, you know, moving along. Did you get rejected at the conference with Dayspring, or did that happen later?  Grace: No, that happened right at the conference.  Erin: Okay. Yeah.  Grace: I had sent them in earlier to be looked at, and so when I got the envelope back there was the nice rejection letter. Erin: How did you feel?  Grace: I was disappointed because that’s why I went. I went thinking, “Oh, these are so cute and for sure somebody’s gonna want them.” I had actually done a little bit of a test drive with some Christian bookstores on Vancouver Island, I had taken them in, and also had taken them to a friend of mine who owned a Christian bookstore in Tacoma, Washington. All of them were favorable reviews, so I went to that conference thinking, “I’ve got this thing in the bag.” But it didn’t turn out that way at all! Erin: You wouldn’t be the first person to think, “I’ve got this thing in the bag,” at a conference.  Karen: Not by a long shot.  Erin: What else happened at the conference? You learned a lot, it sounds like.  Grace: I learned a ton. Really that was the best thing I ever could have done, to invest in a conference. I know it’s costly, but it’s an investment. People invest in their education if they’re going to become a teacher or a dentist or any other career. So you know, we need to, as writers, invest as well and know that that money is well spent. Erin: Right! Grace: I went wanting to learn. Especially when I got my rejection, I knew that I had to pivot. That’s the big word, right? To pivot and to be flexible. I thought, “Okay, well if the cards aren’t gonna fly, I’m not gonna waste this opportunity. What else can I learn?” And, yeah, I learned. I remember catching an editor on the sidewalk and pitching an idea on the way to the dining room and that type of thing. He actually said to me, “Yeah, go ahead. Why don’t you write up the story?” And I did. And I got published. So that was a win for me.  Erin: You know what I love about all this is that you’re very tenacious. You were willing to not roll over and die at the first sign of trouble. You just kept moving forward. Now, I know you and I were talking at one point about your interaction with Andy Sheer. Was that a result of this conference?  Grace: Yes.  Andy had said yes to an idea that I pitched to him as well. I went home, wrote up the article, typed it up, and I sent it in. That was in the days where they weren’t doing so much by email. It was hard copy. I sent it in and a little while later I got a rejection letter back. I was appalled to see that when I sent this thing in, I’d sent it on recycled paper, so there was something typed on the back! It wasn’t even clean paper that I sent the article in on. I was so appalled. I just wanted to go crawl into a hole and never come back out. I did get their form rejection letter back. Although I think it did say something like, “Try again.” It wasn’t a, “Don’t ever do this again!” I did get a comment like that from another editor. I can tell you about that one. But this one, I don’t think I ever submitted again to that magazine because I was so embarrassed. So embarrassed.  Erin: Let that be a lesson to everyone out there. Try to use clean paper. Or in these days, hey, everything’s electronic, so that helps. But don’t send it “to whom it may concern…”  Grace: That’s right. Play by the rules. Get that Christian Writer’s Market Guide and play by the rules.  Erin: There you go. Obviously, though, you’ve had a very prolific career. Did you go to other conferences or did you just make the most of this one so much that afterwords you were mostly developing connections by submitting and getting rejections and submitting again?  Grace: I probably went to one or two conferences a year for the first seven or eight years. Erin: Wow.  Grace: Yeah. Oh, I did the whole thing. I prepared meals for my family, and I marked on the freezer container, you know, 350 degrees for forty-five minutes. I did all of that. Just prepared, prepared, prepared so that my family wouldn’t feel like I was stepping out on them because I’d be gone for a week at a time. I still had three kids at home at the time. They weren’t little anymore. They were junior high and high school, but still.  I did that and then I think I took a bit of a break, if I remember correctly, because I felt like things were really starting to move along and it was okay to take a break for a couple years, three years.  Then my husband and I moved from the island down to Abbottsford, British Columbia, which is about an hour from Vancouver. But the ministry that we began leading at that time meant that I had to be overseas for about five or six weeks every summer and also in the spring.  I had loved going to the Mount Herman Christian Writers Conference partly because it wasn’t as far as the Florida Christian Writers Conference. It wasn’t clear across the continent for me. It was also in the same time zone, so I didn’t have to deal with jet lag. That was quite handy. Just less expensive all around for me. But they always did it in the springtime, right around Palm Sunday, and that’s when our missions staff conference was held overseas. So I missed it for many years. But yeah, my writing career was really taking off at that point, so it didn’t hurt it so much since I had a lot of established connections.  Erin: Right.  Grace: But for those who are thinking about it, or just fairly new kids on the block with this, it is good to get your foot in the door and keep that door open by growing those relationships at conferences.  Erin: Right. I think that’s a misconception that a lot of new writers have. I know I did when I was a new writer. I was like, “Well I have to go to a writer’s conference.” But then you go and there’s so much pressure on that one because it’s expensive and you’re like, “I’ve gotta make my money back. I’ve gotta do this now, and this might be my only chance.” But it doesn’t work that way very often. The best thing is exactly what you did, Grace: to go to as many conferences as you can year after year to meet the same people, to develop relationships. Ultimately that’s what I ended up doing as well. That’s how I got to know people. That’s how I grew in my writing craft. That’s what happens. Then after you’ve been going to conferences for 5, 6, 7 years, you know so many more people and those connections and relationships are far more developed, and then when the time is right, God takes you, if he has publication in the path for you, and he opens those doors and makes it happen and all of a sudden you’re like an overnight success after seven years.  Karen: After a lot more than that. There are people who’ve been overnight successes after twenty years.  Erin: Yeah. Karen: Well, I don’t know about you guys, but I really enjoyed this whole conversation and we’ve got even better information and ideas for you about attending writers conferences in the next podcast. So be sure to listen. Are writers’ conferences worth it? Guest Grace Fox says YES! #ChristianWriter #amwriting Share on X The Latest Release by Grace Fox Names of God: Living Unafraid by Grace Fox Upcoming Conference Erin will be at the Florida Christian Writers Conference, in Leesburg, FL, October 16-20, 2024. WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! Have you been to a writers’ conference? What did you you think about your experience? THANK YOU! Thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! A big thank you to our September sponsor of the month, Christy Bass Adams. She’s the author of a devotional titled Learning As I Go: Big Lessons from Little People, and a middle grades novel, The Adventures of Cricket and Kyle: Imagination Checkers. She’s also a speaker and leads women’s conferences and Bible studies, and she’s a monthly contributor to Inspire-a-fire and a newspaper columnist for Greene Publishing. Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. The post 221 – Are Writers’ Conferences Worth It? with Guest Grace Fox appeared first on Write from the Deep.

There is no escaping our humanity. But we can address those elements in our hearts, minds, and spirits that make us, as people and writers, vulnerable to attacks from the enemy of our souls. Attacks that seem, nowadays, to happen more and more often. Come explore the solutions to those vulnerabilities so you are ready But first, thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! The Bad News: We’re ALL Vulnerable No one likes to be vulnerable. Heck, we don’t even like to admit we’re vulnerable, especially to the enemy of our souls. But as fallible humans––yes, even someone as wise as we are––our strong emotions that can lead us astray, giving the enemy a foothold to launch attacks against us and tear apart our faith and trust in God. The Good News: You’re Normal All of the emotions we’ll talk about today are a normal part of life. They aren’t wrong or dangerous in and of themselves. But when we don’t take them to God, seeking His guidance and peace, His resolution, things can go very bad very fast. So let’s dive in. Vulnerability #1: Anger Scripture makes it clear God gets angry, but His anger is always righteous. Since we’re created in His image, we, too, have the potential for anger. Unfortunately, our anger often isn’t righteous, but self-focused. We perceive some slight, some insult, some betrayal––and they all may be real––and we get angry. A reader writes us a letter taking us to task for something we’ve written. Our book receives a one-star review for reasons that have nothing to do with the book itself. Publishers decide to cancel or not renew contracts. Anger is often understandable. But when we nurse that anger, when we let it coax us into bitterness and a desire for retribution, when we continue to visit it and feed it, we have opened a door to the enemy’s attacks. Satan loves our anger And satan loves it when we nurse our anger, when we recount it to others and do everything but surrender it to the Father. The longer anger dwells in your heart, the more likely satan is to fuel it. To increase your frustration, to compound the negative feelings and thoughts with any issue that arises, whether it’s connected to the source of your anger or not. And before you know it, you are under attack, and more focused on serving your anger than serving your Lord. Solutions for the vulnerability of Anger Remember Ephesians 4:26-27: “Don’t sin by letting anger control you…for anger gives a foothold to the devil.” If you’re angry, be sure you are controlling that emotion and not the other way around. Seek resolution. Address the problem rather than the person who attacks you. Stick to the facts of the situation, where you felt wronged. Seek to communicate in a calm, reasoned tone. Don’t fall into the trap of yelling or letting your emotions take control. Instead, let God lead you as you try to talk the issue out.  Know when to let it go. Some situations cannot be resolved. If your anger is taking up too much of your time and energy, if it’s leading you into resentfulness or bitterness, you need to surrender it to God. Holding on to anger hurts you far more than anyone else. Vulnerability #2: Pain Physical pain, emotional pain, spiritual pain. It all strikes at the heart of what we believe, at the heart of our trust in our loving Father. Too often, our response to such pain is to pull back, to separate ourselves from others. Or to think God has forgotten us or is ignoring our suffering. That He doesn’t care. Or, even worse, that we must not have heard Him right when He tasked us to write for Him, otherwise He wouldn’t let us go through this pain. But those reactions only make things worse. Pain married with isolation and doubt is dangerous and becomes an open door to satan’s attacks. Instead, lean into the pain and try the following: Solutions for the vulnerability of Pain Know what Scripture says about pain. For example: 1 Peter 5:10 “After you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you” See how it says AFTER you’ve suffered, and not IF? 2 Cor 4:16-18 “Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” Isaiah 43:2 “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned, nor shall the flame scorch you.” Revelation 21:4 “And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away.” Let God in to your pain.  Justin Jahanshir, on Jamesriver.church, shares this wisdom: Bring your pain to God, don’t run from him… Fill your life with God’s Word and God’s people… Don’t be filled with worry, overflow with worship… Believe that God will turn your sorrow into great joy… Vulnerability #2: Injustice Injustice is so hard to deal with. Whether it’s false accusations (“She stole my story!”), or untrue attacks on our reputation (“If he was a real Christian he’d never write something like that!”), or flat-out lies told about us (“Did you hear? She’s turned her back on God!”), everything inside of us wants to defend ourselves. But God calls on us to leave these attacks to Him. NEVER?? Oh, I can hear you now: “Never? Never defend ourselves in the face of injustice?” It’s a hard admonition, isn’t it? I struggle with it too. When someone treats me or those I love unjustly, everything in my flesh wants to rear up and defend against those false accusers. It’s a normal, human reaction. But our behavior isn’t based on normal human reactions, is it? It’s based on following our Lord. And His instructions are clear. God’s Instructions for handling injustice If you’re not sure about that, read Romans 12 in its entirety, giving special attention to the following verses: 14: “Bless those who persecute you. Don’t curse them; pray that God will bless them.” 17-21: “Never pay back evil with more evil. Do things in such a way that everyone can see you are honorable. Do all that you can to live in peace with everyone. “Dear friends, never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God. For the Scriptures say, ‘I will take revenge; I will pay them back,’ says the LORD. Instead, if your enemies are hungry, feed them. If they are thirsty, give them something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals of shame on their heads. “Don’t let evil conquer you, but conquer evil by doing good.” And God gives us even more instructions in 1 Peter 2: 19-25: “ God is pleased when, conscious of his will, you patiently endure unjust treatment. Of course, you get no credit for being patient if you are beaten for doing wrong. But if you suffer for doing good and endure it patiently, God is pleased with you. For God called you to do good, even if it means suffering, just as Christ suffered for you. He is your example, and you must follow in his steps. “He never sinned, nor ever deceived anyone.” No retaliation! 1 Peter goes on: “He did not retaliate when he was insulted, nor threaten revenge when he suffered. He left his case in the hands of God, who always judges fairly. “He personally carried our sins in his body on the cross so that we can be dead to sin and live for what is right. By his wounds you are healed. Once you were like sheep who wandered away. But now you have turned to your Shepherd, the Guardian of your souls.” Let God Defend! So when injustice hits, don’t open yourself up to even more attacks by trying to defend yourself. Let Almighty God defend us and grant us justice. Easy to say, but How do we do that? Solutions for the vulnerability of Injustice Remember, we live in a fallen world. Again, the enemy isn’t those who treat us unjustly, but satan. He moves those without God to do terrible things, especially against God’s children. He moves them to lie and deceive, to attack and spread injustice. Social media is a veritable playground for the enemy’s lies and evil. We’ve all faced attacks there. But make no mistake, it is satan’s lies and evil. He is the enemy, not the people attacking us. So speak God’s Scriptures right to satan. Trust me on this, he will flee. Prepare your heart and spirit ahead of time. Knowing that we live in a fallen world with fallen people, and knowing that it’s only a matter of time until someone––by the enemy’s prodding or from their own brokenness––treats us unjustly, fortify your heart and spirit with God’s word. Let Scripture protect you Let Scripture such as the following verses sink deep into your heart and spirit to protect you and keep your focus on God: “Take a new grip with your tired hands and strengthen your weak knees.  Mark out a straight path for your feet so that those who are weak and lame will not fall but become strong. “Work at living in peace with everyone, and work at living a holy life, for those who are not holy will not see the Lord…Watch out that no poisonous root of bitterness grows up to trouble you.” (Heb 12:12-14) “For the LORD loves the just and will not forsake his faithful ones. Wrongdoers will be completely destroyed ; the offspring of the wicked will perish. The righteous will inherit the land and dwell in it forever.” (Psalms 37:28-29) “And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?” (Luke 18:7-8) The last vulnerability we’ll look at is a doozy. In fact, it’s the sin that births many other sins: Vulnerability #3: Self-Focused Pride C.S. Lewis called pride in ourselves “the utmost evil….the complete anti-God state of mind.” Scripture is equally harsh in regard to this kind of pride: Proverbs 8:13 “To fear the LORD is to hate evil; I hate pride and arrogance, evil behavior and perverse speech.” Proverbs 11:2 “When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom.” Proverbs 16:5 “The LORD detests all the proud of heart. Be sure of this: They will not go unpunished.” In Mark 7: 21-23, Jesus says: “It is what comes from inside that defiles you. For from within, out of a person’s heart, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, wickedness, deceit, lustful desires, envy, slander, pride, and foolishness. All these vile things come from within; they are what defile you.” Listen up! When Jesus says something is vile, that it defiles you, you need to listen up. So… when pride rears it’s ugly head, and tells you that you’re better than someone else; when it encourages you in your own righteousness to judge another for saying or doing things you don’t think they should; when it tells you that you deserve more or better or something other than God has given you; when it keeps you from humbling yourself and apologizing when you’ve wronged someone… Let’s face it, ANY TIME pride comes to play in your heart and spirit, you need to deal with it as God commands. Because it’s not just an open door to the enemy’s attacks, it’s a flat-out invitation. Solutions for the vulnerability of Self-Focused Pride Romans 3:22-31 gives us God’s steps to deal with pride: First, remember who you are in God’s eyes. Who we all are: “This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe… for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God…” Who we are, without Christ, is unrighteous sinners. Period. Deserving of punishment and death. Second, remember why we have any righteousness at all: “…and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith. He did this to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished—he did it to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.” God and His Son Jesus justify us, and they alone deserve adoration and worship. None of us is worthy in and of ourselves. We are made acceptable to God by Christ’s sacrifice. Period. Third, realize where pride belongs in a life of faith: “Where, then, is boasting? It is excluded. Because of what law? The law that requires works? No, because of the law that requires faith.” If it’s not clear to you by now, then let me make it clear. Where does pride belong in a life of faith in Jesus Christ? It doesn’t. At all. Don’t Get Discouraged It’s easy to look at all that we’ve talked about and grow discouraged. Especially when we realize that these vulnerabilities aren’t the only ones we have! We humans are full of sin and foibles and failure. God is greater! But the truth is God is greater than all of those things. His love, through Jesus’s sacrifice and resurrection, has brought us back to Him. And He is there every time we fall, every time we give in to vulnerabilities and end up facing the enemy’s attacks. We can’t change or deal with these things on our own, but we don’t have to! Jesus is there, ready to shelter us under His wing, to cover us in His righteousness, and to restore us over and over. Because His Holy Father LOVES you, and me, and all of us. Be Ready, but not afraid Yes, we need to be ready for the attacks coming out way. But friends, we don’t need to be afraid of the enemy or his attacks. We have already won the victory through Christ, and He will uphold and sustain us. All we need to do is, as the child’s chorus says, “Trust and obey, for there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus than to trust and obey.” Amen There is no better weapon against satan than Scripture, prayer, and submitting the situation to God. Share on X WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! Do you struggle with any of these vulnerabilities? What one thing can you do today to address one of them? THANK YOU! Thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! A big thank you to our August sponsor of the month,Tammy Partlow! She’s a speaker at women’s retreats, and her debut novel Blood Beneath the Pines, a suspense set in the deep South, is now available. She’s hard at work on the next book in the series!  Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. The post 220 – Are You Ready for Attacks? Part 3 appeared first on Write from the Deep.

Recentering your writer’s heart is not just a privilege, but a necessity! In our busy lives, it’s easy to get off kilter. We each need to take a moment and examine our focus, to ensure it’s on the only one deserving of our trust: Almighty God. And Psalm 40 is here to help you do exactly that! But first, thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! Can you all believe that it’s already the second half of 2024? I don’t know about you guys, but it feels to me like this year is rushing by. If you’re considering a midyear or third quarter review, or you’re taking stock of the things you’ve accomplished, or haven’t yet accomplished, or you’re feeling stuck, or frustrated, or you just want to make sure you’re on the right path, have we got some encouragement for you! It’s a chance to recenter our hearts and thoughts, and a chance to check our behavior. It’s all conveniently found in Psalm 40. I encourage writers to consider memorizing this psalm—at the least beginning of it—in order to help you dwell on it. Then you can meditate on it even if you don’t have your Bible open or with you. It’s full of life lessons for writers. WAIT PATIENTLY “I waited patiently for the Lord…” Psalm 40:1a (CSB) I love how this Psalm opens. If you remember nothing else, or read no farther in Psalm 40, this alone is still so powerful in the application to our lives as Christians and writers. “I waited patiently.” If only we could look back on our writing career and on our life and say we did that—we waited patiently.  But we didn’t wait for just anything, we waited for the Lord. God is the one who is in charge of the universe, in charge of our lives, and in charge of our careers. He opens doors, he closes doors, and he leads us in his timing. God will act on our behalf. No matter what our situation is right now, we’re not forgotten, we’re not an afterthought. We just need to wait patiently, because here’s what the rest of verse 1 says: “…and he turned to me and heard my cry for help.” God sees and God hears. He’s looking at you even now. Turned to you. Some translations say “inclined” to you. Your cries for help don’t go unheeded. Whatever you’re facing right now, it’s not unknown to God. But we do have to trust in God’s timing and his sovereign plan. Our job is to ask for help and then wait patiently. Resist the temptation to FRET Now, we all know this isn’t as easy as it sounds. While we’re trying to wait patiently and trust that God sees, hears, and has a plan, we’re going to be tempted, of course, to fret. To wonder and worry and think about all the things that could go wrong, or all the ways we think God is failing. And that’s exactly what we have to resist.  Think of this midyear recentering as giving you something positive to do: wait patiently for the Lord, and something negative to resist: fretting and worrying. When we did our series on being ready for attacks, we talked about knowing our vulnerabilities. This is the same idea. If we’re supposed to wait patiently, we know we’re probably going to be vulnerable to attacks of fret and fear. God ACTS TO HELP US Let’s face it, sometimes our patience is needed through some very difficult situations. Here’s how the next verse in Psalm 40 begins: “He brought me up from a desolate pit, out of the muddy clay…” Psalm 40:2a (CSB) A desolate pit? Other translations say things like horrible pit, slimy pit, pit of destruction. Now, we know the Christian publishing industry can be difficult, but a pit of death? It can feel that way. For example, what if you feel your career is dying?  Have you ever felt like the situation you’re facing is hopeless? It might be illness, or a huge publishing nightmare, or a problem you can’t see your way out of. I have great news: God specializes in impossible things. We might feel like we’re drowning in trials, and it’s okay to acknowledge that life is hard. But don’t forget to catch the first four words of the verse: “He brought me up.” Up from where? From the pit. He always does. You know why? The pit is no match for God’s almighty power.  But God doesn’t just lift us up, he does more. Listen to the whole verse now: “He brought me up from a desolate pit, out of the muddy clay and set my feet on a rock, making my steps secure.” Psalm 40:2 (CSB) God acts to help us by lifting us up, and then he sets us in a place of safety and security. We have a God who IS a rock, a fortress. When we walk on the sure foundation of God’s truth, we are secure.  Resist the temptation to FORce YOUR OWN WAY OUT Even while we know that God is the one who lifts us up and puts us on a secure path, we face the temptation to short circuit waiting by scrambling to find our own way out, to stubbornly force our way onto some path we think will get us out of whatever pit we’re in, whether it’s the path God has for us or not.  Of course we’re not saying we should never try to help ourselves, only that we should never move ahead of God’s leading in doing so. God has the plan. We need to follow it and resist the temptation to claw our own way out, because our own plan is not placing our feet on the Rock.  God CHANGES OUR PERSPECTIVE Have you ever wondered why life seems to work this way? Why we face trials and struggles and have to wait on God to help us? We could maybe blame it on Adam and Eve, who thought they’d forge their own path to wisdom and ate the fruit God had forbidden them. That certainly highlights our problem with perspective: We tend to think we know best, and that the one who created us doesn’t. But when we wait patiently for the Lord, and he brings us up from the pit, and he sets us on a secure path, guess what happens next? He changes our perspective to one that reflects the truth of all reality. Here’s how the next verse in Psalm 40 begins: “He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God.” Psalm 40:3a (CSB) First notice that it’s God who puts the song in our mouths, a song of praise to him. He gives us the right perspective on not just our trials, our writing, and our life, but also on humanity’s place in creation. Big news: We are not God. He is. And he is to be praised. He alone deserves praise for who he is and what he does. In God’s plan, God gets the glory, not us. Second, when we’re praising God, we’re focusing on him. Our focus has moved off of our pain and difficulty. We have something wonderful to sing about—he’s lifted us up from the pit. And we’re left with gratitude and love for the God who saves us. Resist the temptation to fall back into your old way of thinking Ah, if only that would last! But as humans, we easily slip back into our old ways of thinking. Like the hymn writer of Come Thou Fount says, “Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it…” We need to resist the temptation to hang on to, or drift back into our old patterns of self-sufficiency. That’s hard because it’s ingrained in our culture, this notion that humanity is the savior of itself. That’s a lie. We’re not our savior, God is. We cannot praise God when we’re busy praising ourselves.  OUR SITUATION RESULTS IN A WITNESS TO OTHERS There is an exciting thing about us waiting patiently, and God hearing, acting, and changing our perspective, resulting in us praising him. It’s told in the rest of verse 3: “Many will see and fear, and they will trust in the Lord.” Psalm 40:3b (CSB)  Our whole experience becomes a witness that can lead others to know and trust in God.  Our trials are never wasted. First, they change us, but also they are a light shining in the darkness for others to see. That’s astounding. We get to participate in a show of God’s glory, in bringing hope to this weary world. resist the temptation to hide But as we’ve acknowledged, sometimes the struggles we face are so awful, or it produces such shame that we’d rather no one knew. But this is the very thing we need to resist. We must resist the temptation to hide the reality of our lives. TRUSTING GOD RESULTS IN HAPPINESS We need to be transparent so God can show others how he is acting in our lives. Whatever pit we fell into, or whatever ordeal we’ve gone through, that’s all part of who we’ve become and who we’re continuing to become. It’s part of the tapestry that God is weaving of our lives. We need to trust him with that.  Conveniently, Psalm 40 goes on to tell us what the benefit of trusting God is. Here’s verse 4: “How happy is anyone who has put his trust in the Lord…” Psalm 40:4a (CSB) Some translations use the word happy, some use the word blessed. But the idea is this: putting our trust in God means we’re putting ourselves in the care of our almighty, sovereign God, the God who hears us, turns to us, lifts us up from the pit, and changes our perspective. Under God’s protection we can rest and find peace. That’s where we find our state of blessedness, of happiness, even in the midst of difficulties.  Resist the temptation to turn to self or humanity as a source of salvation Yes, there is still a caution for us, a temptation to resist. Putting our trust in the Lord means we don’t turn to human wisdom, or self sufficiency for rescue. That’s exactly what the rest of verse 4 says: “How happy is anyone who has put his trust in the Lord and has not turned to the proud or to those who run after lies!” Psalm 40:4 This can be difficult when our culture is screaming at us to do it all our way, to be “free” of any outside constraint, and trust in ourselves. Or to trust in the current person trying to sell us happiness. We need to resist that if we’re truly going to trust in the Lord. REMEMBER THE WORKS OF THE LORD  Is God deserving of that trust? Why? Check out verse 5 of Psalm 40: “Many, Lord my God, are the wonders you have done, the things you planned for us. None can compare with you; were I to speak and tell of your deeds, they would be too many to declare.” Psalm 40:5 (NIV) The God who deserves our trust is the God who’s done wonder upon wonder not just throughout the course of history, but also in a deeply personal way in our own lives. We are not walking through life facing random events. God is sovereign, and he makes good plans for his people. He’s been doing this since before time began. Our job is to remember this. Remember the works of the Lord recorded in the Bible, but also to remember the works of the Lord in our own lives. To record them, to meditate on them. To sing about them, tell about them, and write stories about them. Acknowledge that God’s works are indeed too many to declare.  Think about how much God has done for us just today. Our hearts are beating by God’s grace, we’re breathing, oxygen is going to our brains and everywhere else in our bodies. We’re wearing clothes that God provided. Eating food that he gave us. In a shelter he provided. We can hear, see, feel, and think.  Take a few seconds to consider how you got where you’ve gotten to so far on your writing journey. Consider the hurdles you’ve faced, the knowledge you’ve gained, the experiences you’ve had, both good and bad. How about your journey just to discover your desire to write in the first place, or to hear God telling you to write? What about all the things he planned that led you to that point? If you’re like me, you might’ve had a twenty some-odd year journey to that discovery. Resist the temptation to discount God’s works or his sovereign control Many are the wonders God has done. But sometimes we forget. Sometimes our memory is just too short. Or perhaps worse, we discount the things God has done. We’re tempted to think that all those marvels are in the past, and we don’t trust that God has anything else planned. But we have to resist that temptation, because of course he has more plans. He’s God. He has a sovereign plan for everything. You’re not a forgotten secondary character in some other person’s story. God has an arc just for you, and he IS leading you through your own story.  No one can come in and take it over. No one can sabotage or revise God’s plans. He doesn’t make mistakes. He doesn’t need an editor. Remember that the verse says, “None can compare with God.” That means he’s the best planner, and the best story-maker.  So as we head into the remainder of this year, stop and take some time to do a heart check. To recenter your thoughts and hopes on God’s sovereign plans for you and your writing journey. Speak, write, remember, and praise God for the deeds he has already done in your life, and wait expectantly for the amazing deeds he has planned for your future. Trust us on this. Not just for the rest of this year, but for the rest of your life, you can trust God with every single thing that you face. In your life, and in your career, he’s got you in his hands. Writers, let Psalm 40 help you recenter your heart on Almighty God. #amwriting #ChristianWriter Share on X Upcoming Conference Erin will be at the Florida Christian Writers Conference, in Leesburg, FL, October 16-20, 2024. WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! What do you do to recenter your writer’s heart? THANK YOU! Thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! A big thank you to our August sponsor of the month, Tammy Partlow! She’s a speaker at women’s retreats, and her debut novel Blood Beneath the Pines, a suspense set in the deep South, is now available. She’s hard at work on the next book in the series!  Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. The post 219 – Recentering Your Writer’s Heart appeared first on Write from the Deep.

  Do you want to know God more intimately and live unafraid? Come join our guest, Grace Fox, as she delves into the many names of God, all with their own meaning and promise. You will find yourself more drawn to Him than ever! But first, thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! We’re told in Scripture that God doesn’t give us a spirit of fear, and yet so many of us struggle with that very emotion in our lives. Sometimes even debilitating fear. Guest Grace Fox is here to share what God has taught her about living unafraid.  About Grace Fox Grace Fox is a popular speaker at women’s events internationally. She inspires hope, courage, and transformation through God’s word. She has served as a career missionary for more than 30 years. Grace has written 14 books and published hundreds of articles in magazines. She’s a member of the First Five Bible Study writing team for P 31 Ministries and is a co-host for a podcast called Your Daily Bible Verse. Her book, Finding Hope in Crisis: Devotions for Calm in Chaos, won the Golden Scroll Devotional Book of the Year Award in 2021. Keeping Hope Alive: Devotions for Strength in the Storm won the same award in 2022. Her newest devotional is titled Names of God: Living Unafraid. You can learn all about her at GraceFox.com.  Thanks to our sponsors on Patreon, we’re able to offer an edited transcript of the podcast!  Living Unafraid Erin: Welcome listeners. We are delighted that you’re here with us today. And you might even hear my smile. We have a guest, Grace Fox, and she’s on a boat somewhere in Canada!  Karen Ball: In fact, Grace and her husband have been living on their boat for six years, and they have discovered all kinds of people to share God’s love with. Welcome, Grace.      Grace Fox: Thank you so much for having me. I am excited to be here with you all.  Erin: Of course, we’re going to start by asking you what ‘the deep’ means to you?  Grace Fox: It means going into a hard place, and yet it’s a rich place. It’s a place I might not necessarily choose for myself because it might hurt and I don’t like pain, but it’s often in the hard places, the painful places of life, that we grow the most.  Karen: It’s true. We don’t want to go there. But so often God forces us there, kicking and screaming.  Whenever Erin and I meet together, we read from a devotional called Streams in the Desert.   What I most appreciate about that devotional is it addresses the fact that, by following Christ, we are members of the fellowship of suffering. Living the Christian life is not easy, but we have an almighty God and Savior who help us to get through it.   Know God Better Grace Fox: And maybe the deep shouldn’t be a place we dread or think of it as a frightening place to be. Maybe we should start thinking of it more as a place of invitation, where God says, “Come with me. You wanna know Me better? Let’s go to the deep.”  Erin: Both are true. It’s hard and it’s great.  So, Grace, we mentioned in our intro that you have a new devotional release about living unafraid. What compelled you to focus on the names of God as a means to overcome fear? Grace Fox: Back during Covid days, I thought about women being in isolation just like I was. And it occurred to me that maybe they were hungry to fellowship with other women, like I was. Many years prior I wrote a book called Moving From Fear to Freedom, A Woman’s Guide to Peace in every Situation. And then I had done a Bible study to go with that.  So pulled that out and put it out there, asking women if they’d like to do the study with me on Zoom. Eighty women said yes! I didn’t know what to do! I didn’t know how to do small groups on Zoom. But a woman who had signed up contacted me and she said, “Grace, do you need help with the technological part of this?” And I said, “Absolutely!” So off we went with a seven- or eight-week study. And as it came to an end, the ladies were asking what we were going to do next? And I went, “I don’t know. What are we gonna do next?” What’s Next? I hadn’t thought that far ahead. But in my own quiet time reading, the names of God just kept coming up. Not any particular names of God, but the words “name of God” or “God’s name.” Such as “in God’s holy name,” or “We will praise God’s name.” And I kept thinking, what’s the deal? It just kept coming around. Finally I realized God was trying to get my attention. And so I offered that––to study God’s names together. I wrote the curriculum as we went, week by week. It was a massive undertaking, but I learned so much and saw how there is tons of material to explore.  When I met my managing editor around that time, she asked me for other book ideas. I pulled up my laptop and went through a list of what I’d been studying. She listened and when I said, “What about a book on the names of God?” She said, “Yes, Let’s do that.” So that’s how this was born.  A Devotional Study It’s actually a devotional study. It’s seven chapters, written in a devotional style, with stories and biblical teaching and a prayer and questions at the end of each chapter. It’s a Bible study for groups or individuals. I envision somebody sitting across the table having coffee with a friend and doing this, maybe one-on-one as a discipleship tool. And then there’s a QR code at the end of each chapter where you just point your camera and up will come a fifteen-minute video teaching. Karen: How fun! Why Study the Names of God? Grace Fox: I’ve learned so much about the names of God and how understanding each one can change our lives. Because understanding God’s character frees us to live unafraid. Erin: I really like the notion of studying God’s names, because God’s name is who He is, but it’s also what He does. And if we connect those things better we can apply who He is to our situation, and understand how who He is affects who we are and what we need. So I love how it’s all woven together. Grace Fox: Years and years ago, my husband and I were missionaries back in Nepal. Our son was born there, and then on our second child was born, but she had hydrocephalus––too much water on the brain. The doctors told us we had to take her back to North America on the first flight available for a surgery to save her life. Well, back then there weren’t a lot of international flights. Maybe one every three days or so. Then, when the airline found out I had had a C-section to deliver this baby, they refused to take me because I was a medical high risk. They didn’t want me, or my less-than-two-week-old baby on their plane. But my husband and the doctors said our little girl would die if she didn’t get back. So my husband wrapped our daughter in a big blanket, and took one bottle of breast milk and a diaper bag. That’s all he had. He left, but I had to stay behind for another eight days. “What do You want me to Learn?” Sitting on that bed, after saying good-bye to my newborn daughter, not knowing if I would see her alive again or not, I cried out to God, asking what He wanted me to learn. Well, one week prior, we’d interviewed with a career mission agency to stay in Nepal for the rest of our lives. And now…that was not gonna happen. And it was that fast that everything changed.  In that very, very dark moment, the lyrics of “Great Is Thy Faithfulness” came to mind. And I got to where I could kind of sing along. Not with my whole heart and mind, but I was hanging on for dear life to God’s faithfulness  I wondered what was going to happen to our family. We were going back to North America with no job, no car, no house. We didn’t even have a health insurance for a North American hospital, and we were gonna have a baby in the NICU ward!  The AHA! Moment That was the life-changing aha! moment for me, a young woman in my mid-twenties. I either had to believe those lyrics, that God is faithful, or not. And if they weren’t true, then we were in serious trouble.  But if they were true, then everything would be okay. It didn’t mean our daughter would live. It didn’t promise me that she would have a good quality of life. But God would be faithful to see us through, no matter what. And I hung onto that. Since then, I’ve believed with all my heart that our understanding of who God is, well, that’s the most important understanding we can have. Which means we have to ensure that understanding is based not on our feelings, not on our circumstances, not on what somebody else says, but on truth. And that’s what gets us through those hard and deep places. Erin: Exactly. What do we have if not that truth? We have nothing.  So, let’s talk about the process of writing and studying all of these things.  What kind of affect did that have on your own spiritual journey as a writer? Yahweh Rohi: The Lord is my shepherd Grace Fox: This book has seven of God’s names, but there are so many more. When I thought about Yahweh Rohi, The Lord is my Shepherd, I realized that every time I write a book, I go into it with a great deal of fear.  I think it’s fear of failure, like, Oh no, I landed a contract! What if I fail? That’s when I remember Yahweh Rohi, The Lord is my Shepherd. I have all I need. My Shepherd will give me what I need to do this job.  I will trust Him to lead me to the right research and the right resources. I might have somebody who I think will be a good interview for a particular chapter, but inevitably Yahweh Rohi flips it upside down and brings in somebody else whose story is a better fit.  What’s more, I have to be open to that––to follow His guidance as my Shepherd, to follow His lead and to know that He’s not gonna lead me down some path with a dead end.          He’s going to lead me down the right path to this pasture that is green and it’s gonna feed not only my soul as I write it, but it’s also gonna feed the souls of the readers. What If I Fail? Karen: There’s the perfect answer to that question, “What if I fail?” Yahweh Rohi. The Lord is my Shepherd. I can’t fail. He has called me and guided me to write this. I don’t need to worry about failing. I just need to pay attention and to listen.  Grace Fox: Exactly. I mean, think about the cast sheep. That’s the sheep that just flips over on its back and it can’t get up. So it’s in a very vulnerable position.  Sometimes a sheep like that will lie there and kick and flounder and cry out, bleating for the shepherd’s help. Unless the shepherd comes to help, the cast sheep will die.  As a writer, I’ve been that sheep in that cast position. Several years ago I had such high hopes for one book that I’d written. I thought it was going to come out of the gate and be a bestseller and I’d be set for life and all that, yada yada. But it didn’t happen. Not at all. Two years into it, my agent had to release some clients because of her life and needs at that point. And I was one of those she said good-bye to. Well, that broke my heart. Then I heard that this book that I had all the high hopes for was going to be remaindered. And I thought, Oh, all that work for nothing! “Is This The End of My Career?” I went into a pit. I was the sheep on my back, lying there with its legs floundering and crying, “Oh God, I don’t get it. I had better hopes for this.” One day, I even thought, Maybe I’m done writing, maybe this is it. This is the end.  I cried out again to my Shepherd. “God, you gotta help me here. Would You show me if I’m done? Because if I’m done writing, I’m okay with that. If I’m not, then You need to tell me, because I’m okay with persevering too, but I just wanna know so I’m not wasting my energy anymore.”  Keep Writing! Five hours later––five hours––my phone rang and it was a woman I didn’t even know. She said, “Grace, for some reason I feel compelled to call you. I’ve never called an author before, but today I can’t get this out of my head. I need to tell you that your book, Moving from Fear to Freedom, changed my life. “I also feel compelled to tell you this, for whatever this is about, so just take it or leave it. I feel compelled to say, please keep writing.” I burst into tears. I told her why I was crying, what I had prayed five hours before. And then she started crying and said, “I heard the spirit.” “You not only heard him, but you did something about it.” She was afraid what I would think of her if she just called me. But she did it anyway. Wow. And I needed the words she spoke.  It was my most amazing God moment ever as a writer. That was 10 or 12 years ago, and I’ve never looked back. I’ve grown weary, but I’ll never again think it’s over. Not until God makes it that clear that it’s done.  Are You Done? Karen: Over the years, I’ve had authors come to me and ask if I think they’re finished writing. My first response is to ask who gave him or her the task to write in the first place? If their answer is God, then I ask if He’s set them free from that task. The answer is usually no, or the reasons they think they’re done. But I ask again if God has set them free. More often than not, the answer is no. “Then you’re not done.”  I understand the frustration and weariness, but God doesn’t call us to be bestselling authors. He calls us to write His words and truth for whomever will read it and be blessed by it.  Grace Fox: Yep. So there might be a writer out there listening to this who feels like that little cast sheep and to that dear writer, I would say just call out to the Shepherd and He will come. He will come and put you back on your feet. Part of a shepherd’s job is to massage the sheep to get that circulation going until that sheep is able to run again. Jesus, our Shepherd, our Yahweh Rohi, knows what we writers need to get back on our feet so that we can run again.  Understand the Shepherd Aspect of God Erin: Amen. How kind and gentle and loving He is to give us what we need in those moments. Like the shepherd rubbing and massaging the sheep, when Jesus was here, walking on Earth, He was going places, meeting people, touching the leper… We would have less fear if we understood that Shepherd aspect of Jesus more deeply, that he is going to take care of us. My favorite thing about the shepherd is the place of rest. My Shepherd leads me beside quiet waters and makes me lie down in green pastures. It’s such a picture of calm.  Publishing is difficult and can be stressful and fraught with problems, but if we’re doing it with God, it’s also a place of rest. And if we would hang on to that, it would make such a difference. And that’s just one of the names you cover!  Yahweh: I Am Who I Am Karen: Another name that you explore is just Yahweh, and the meaning you give is I Am Who I Am. Who else can say that but God? I Am Who I Am. You know, we spend so much time trying to “find” ourselves. God never has to do that. He knows who He is.  So when I pray, if I’m feeling uncertain, I can go to the I Am, Who is the biggest and the best and the most powerful of anyone who has ever existed. And I can rest in Him and in the promise that nothing is going to change Him. He is God. Yahweh Tzevaot: the Lord of Hosts Erin: Yeah, that’s very cool. Another name that I really liked was Yahweh Tzevaot. I might not pronounce it right, but it means the Lord of Hosts. Can you talk about that one just a little bit?  Grace Fox: You did well pronouncing that name. That is the name that comes to mind when we think about David fighting Goliath, when David says, “You come to me with with your javelin and with all your armor, but I come to you in the name of the Lord, my God.” The Israelite army turned around and ran from Goliath’s taunts. The entire army. Twice a day for 40 days, whenever Goliath came out and taunted them.  When David, this little teenage shepherd boy showed up, he says, “What’s the problem here?” What’s the problem? Goliath is defying the army of the living God, and that’s a problem! So David picks up his five little smooth stones and takes Goliath out with a slingshot! Fight In Yahweh Tzevaot’s Name! David really got it. He fought that battle in the name of the Lord of hosts, the Lord of heaven’s armies. If you’re looking at all the challenges with marketing or writing a book, or maybe you’re a newer writer trying to break into publishing, and it feels like a Goliath before you. But if God has called us to do this, then do it in the name of the Lord of hosts!  He goes before us. He’s the one who gives us courage. He’s the one who fights on our behalf. We don’t do this alone.  Karen: When we come to challenges, we need to see through the eyes of eternity, not the eyes of this temporal world. If you look at where the world is today, it’s easy to be discouraged and to feel as though everything’s out of control. There’s so much hatred and so much violence, and yet if we turn our gaze to God and we see Him in all of these names and that He does, we don’t need to be afraid. We don’t need to despair. We know that God is all knowing. We know that God is ever present. We know that in all of his names and in all of the things that He does, He is working for our best. He is working to make us into clearer reflections of His son.  So, Grace, as we draw our time to a close,  do you have any final words of wisdom for our listeners?  El Elon: God is a Creator Grace Fox: I would just sign off using the name El Elyon. And that one is God is a Creator, Almighty God. Because he is a creator, he owns it all. So it’s his right to do with it what he wants, right?  And that’s true about our writing career, our endeavors. That’s true about our lives. When we belong to Him, He owns us. He bought us with the blood of Jesus Christ. We need to surrender to that, to be good with that and learn to rest in that.  Also that name denotes the fact that He is the boss, therefore He always has the final say. When we as writers look at what’s before us, look at our dreams, look at our endeavors or whatever, always remember He decides the outcome. So we can strive and strive and strive, but He gets the final say. And don’t compare with other people’s journey, but rest in contentment knowing that He’s got us. He’s our Shepherd. He holds us close to His heart and He will have the final say.   Karen: Amen!  Erin: Amen to that. Book mentioned in the podcast Names of God: Living Unafraid by Grace Fox I cried out to God, asking what He wanted me to learn. #amwriting #Christianwriter Share on X WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! How can you start today to live unafraid? THANK YOU! Thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! If you want to add your support, visit patreon.com/writefromthedeep.  We’d sure appreciate it! Thanks so much to our July sponsor of the month, Wendy L. Macdonald. She’s a writer, poet, podcaster, photographer, a maker of journals (find her on Etsy to see them!) and nature lover. I know you’d enjoy getting to know her! Check out the treasury of her website at wendyLmacdonald.com. Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. The post 218 – How to Live Unafraid with guest Grace Fox appeared first on Write from the Deep.

Fasting. We’ve all heard of it, and yet we rarely do it. But this ancient practice is frequently mentioned in the Bible, with Jesus himself leading the way. He did it, he taught about it, and he presumed we’d follow in his footsteps. Join us for a deeper look at this vital aspect of discipleship and why it matters for writers. We’ll even discuss alternatives to try if your medical condition prevents you from practicing typical methods of fasting. But first, thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! We’ve been talking about various practices for deepening our relationship with God. Here are links to our past episodes about Rest-211, Prayer 208, Silence-205, Solitude 199, and Fellowship 214 if you missed them. Today we want to cover a practice that isn’t the first choice for most of us. It’s certainly not comfortable, and often put off or not done at all. What is it? Fasting.  Now, hang in there with us, because while fasting typically involves abstaining from food for a period of time, we’re well aware that some folks, Karen included, have medical issues that make it unsafe, even life threatening, to skip meals. So in this episode, we’ll also cover alternatives to traditional fasting. First, let’s talk about why fasting matters. I mean, who thought of this? And why? I’ll sum up my research findings in one sentence: I couldn’t find any source that claimed to know exactly when the practice of fasting started. New World Encyclopedia just says, “Fasting for religious and spiritual reasons has been a part of human custom since pre-history.”  But it is also found in various ancient written records—including the Old and New Testaments.  How often is fasting mentioned in the Bible? An article on cslewisinstitute.org lists many occasions: In Deuteronomy chapter 9, Moses recounts how he did not one but two 40-day fasts when he was meeting with God on Mt. Sinai after leading the Israelites out of Egypt. In Daniel 10:3, in response to an overwhelming, terrifying vision, Daniel talks about his partial fast for 21 days and says, “I ate no delicacies, no meat or wine entered my mouth, nor did I anoint myself at all, for the full three weeks.” After this he received the meaning of the vision. Here’s what it says in Ezra 8:21-23 when Ezra is leading a group of exiles from Babylon back to Jerusalem: “Then I proclaimed a fast there, at the river Ahava, that we might humble ourselves before our God, to seek from him a safe journey for ourselves, our children, and all our goods. For I was ashamed to ask the king for a band of soldiers and horsemen to protect us against the enemy on our way, since we had told the king, ‘The hand of our God is for good on all who seek him, and the power of his wrath is against all who forsake him.’ So we fasted and implored our God for this, and he listened to our entreaty.” ESV In the book of Esther, when Haman succeeded in getting a law published to kill all the Jews, Esther was going to go to the king to plead for mercy, but appearing before him without being summoned was punishable by death unless the king held out his scepter to her. So here’s what she tells her uncle, Mordecai: “Go, gather all the Jews to be found in Susa, and hold a fast on my behalf, and do not eat or drink for three days, night or day. I and my young women will also fast as you do. Then I will go to the king, though it is against the law, and if I perish, I perish.” Esther 4:16 ESV Another fast during a national emergency happens in the time of King Jehoshaphat. A giant army made up of different people groups has come against them, and this is the king’s response in 2 Chronicles 20:3-4: “Then Jehoshaphat was afraid and set his face to seek the Lord, and proclaimed a fast throughout all Judah. And Judah assembled to seek help from the Lord; from all the cities of Judah they came to seek the Lord.” ESV The result of this fast? God delivered them—they didn’t even need to fight the battle because the opposing armies killed each other off. Fasting is found in the New Testament, too. Mark chapter 1 tells us Jesus himself fasted in the wilderness for 40 days. And Jesus’ teaching on fasting in Matthew chapters 6 and 9 make it clear that he expects this to be a normal practice for his followers after his crucifixion. In Acts chapter 9, Saul, later to be called the apostle Paul, fasts for three days after being blinded after his vision of Jesus on the road to Damascus. In Acts 13, God’s instructions to launch the first missionary journey come during the course of prayer and fasting, and Paul and Barnabus are then sent off with another round of prayer and fasting. And it’s clear that fasting was a regular part of their journey. Acts 14:23 says, “And when [Paul and Barnabus] had appointed elders for them in every church, with prayer and fasting they committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed.” We won’t take the time to give detailed examples of prominent fasting Christians in the centuries after the Bible was written, but we will point out that John Calvin, Martin Luther, Jonathan Edwards, John Wesley, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and C.S. Lewis were all enthusiastic supporters and practicers of fasting. One more thing we should make clear. The article on cslewisinstitute.org states that the Bible specifically defines fasting as going without food. Here’s how they put it: “In the Old Testament, the main Hebrew word used is tsom, which means ‘to abstain from food.’ In the New Testament, the Greek word we translate as ‘fast’ is nesteuo, which means ‘to abstain from eating.’ In both testaments, fasting is simply going without food in order to seek God for some special reason.” The reason they stress this definition is because this is what the actual practice was and is: going without food. This is what the Israelites did, this is what Jesus did, and it’s what he’s teaching about. So, if your health allows, this is the normal way to practice fasting. But again, we know not everyone can physically do this, so we’ll also discuss alternatives. First, let’s circle back to the purpose of this practice. The article on cslewisinstitute.org says it’s “to seek God for some special reason.” So, why would fasting help us do that? How Does Fasting Help Us Seek God? 1. Fasting helps us divorce ourselves from the ordinary pleasures and occupations of this world.  Dallas Willard, in his book The Spirit of the Disciplines, which we’ve mentioned in previous episodes, writes this: “[Fasting] teaches us a lot about ourselves very quickly…it reveals to us how much our peace depends upon the pleasures of eating.”  Justin Whitmel Earley, in his book The Common Rule, adds, “Fasting is a way to resist the original sin of trying to eat our way to happiness…” Earley goes on to describe how he feels during a day of fasting: “It’s midmorning when I become irritable. Not only am I trying to concentrate over a hungry stomach, but I also can’t do what I otherwise do every day: look forward to lunch or snacks as a way to medicate the pain of toilsome work.” He continues describing the discomfort of his day, then he sums it up with this: “When I fast I see that deep down I’m not actually a very patient person after all. I’m not actually a very content person after all…I’m a weak, impatient, angry person who medicates with food and drink. This is painful to confront. Yet to live without fasting is to live without knowing who I truly am.” Knowing our weaknesses is humbling, but that’s right where we need to be in order to effectively seek God. Which leads to the second reason fasting helps us seek God. 2. Fasting reminds us that we are humbly dependent on God. We’re dependent on God for everything. Acts 17:25 (NIV) tells us, “[God] is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else.” God supplies our daily bread, our clothes, our homes, our jobs, our stories, our words, our talents and abilities, our book sales, our readers. Dallas Willard writes, “Persons well used to fasting as a systematic practice will have a clear and constant sense of their resources in God.” That’s exactly what we need as Christians, a better connection to the reality of God as our constant provider.  But there’s more. Willard goes on to say that this connection and constant sense developed through the systematic practice of fasting will help us “…endure deprivations of all kinds, even to the point of coping with them easily and cheerfully.” Imagine what coping cheerfully and easily with deprivations could look like if, say, you find you have to type your next book with one hand because you’ve developed carpal tunnel syndrome in the other? Or if the time you thought you had to write gets cut in half because of an unforeseen family emergency? Or if you lose your publishing contract? Or your day job? Or you have to tighten your belt due to the crazy inflation these days? Or whatever else.  3. Fasting helps us feast on God. But God is more than just the giver of stuff we need. Dallas Willard writes, “Fasting confirms our utter dependence on God by finding in him a source of sustenance beyond food…In fasting we learn how to suffer happily as we feast on God.” So, fasting helps us see God as more than a provider of resources, but actually as sustenance itself.  Look at Deuteronomy 8:3 where Moses speaks to the Israelites before they head into the Promised Land: “[God] humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your ancestors had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.” Now fast forward to the New Testament and look at what Jesus says about this bread of God in John 6, verses 33 and 51 (ESV): “For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world…I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.” So, fasting helps us seek God by seeking to feast on him. On who he is, on what he’s done, and on what he will keep doing throughout eternity. Look at what Psalm 36:7-9 says: “…The children of mankind take refuge in the shadow of your wings. They feast on the abundance of your house, and you give them drink from the river of your delights. For with you is the fountain of life; in your light do we see light.” ESV Not only can we feast on God, we can also feast on doing God’s will. In John chapter 4, Jesus is talking to the woman at the well in Samaria, while his disciples have gone to the village to buy food. When they come back, they urge him to eat. Here’s what he says, “…I have food to eat that you do not know about” (John 4:32 ESV). So the disciples are trying to figure out if someone brought him food while they were gone. But then: “Jesus said to them, ‘My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work.’” (John 4:34 ESV)  I love how Dallas Willard sums this up. When we fast, he writes, “We learn that we too have meat to eat that the world does not know about. Fasting unto our Lord is therefore feasting—feasting on him and on doing his will.” 4. Fasting helps remind us to pray and serve. None of what we’ve said so far means we won’t actually experience the discomfort of hunger. We typically do. But one way those hunger pangs can help us seek God is by being a consistent reminder to pray. As we go about the busyness of life, the habit of praying can be something that becomes superficially brief, or put off until we have more time, or forgotten altogether. But prayer is key in communicating with God, so the reminder to pray that hunger brings can help us foster more constant interaction with God. And hey, if we don’t have to spend time making dinner and eating it, well, we’ve just freed up more time to spend with God. Another benefit of the discomfort of fasting is that it can help us tune in to the needs of others. Here’s what Justin Whitmel Earley writes of his own experience returning home from a day at work when he’s been fasting, “I come home [at dinner time] not expecting to eat. I’m simply expecting to serve other people as they eat. The most remarkable part is that I’m actually happier that way, because all along I’ve been thinking that food makes me happy. But now I see that only love does that. When that switch happens, ironically one of my favorite things to do is cook for other people when I’m fasting.” 5. Fasting helps us empathize with the suffering of others. You all will likely find other benefits of fasting that we didn’t have time to cover, but one last benefit we want to mention is that fasting gives us empathy with those who are suffering. That, in turn, expands our capacity and tenacity in our prayers for the needs of those around us. Justin Whitmel Earley writes, “When we fast, we become more attuned to the stubborn reality of the world’s suffering…while there is a part of fasting that reveals our own needs, there is a part that reveals the world’s need, too…fasting is a way to lean past our own emptiness and into someone else’s. It’s a practice of empathy, of willingly walking into pain for someone else. It’s an imitation of Christ…”  What if fasting isn’t medically advisable for you? Now, for those of you who can’t fast—either for physical or mental health reasons—remember the goal as you’re looking for a suitable alternative. As Justin Whitmel Earley puts it, you want to “lean into the lack.”  Simple Meals One idea, instead of not eating, might be to eat very simple meals. You can follow what Daniel did, and rather than abstain from all foods, you can choose certain foods to abstain from. Maybe especially those we consume for pleasure rather than healthy sustenance. We need protein everyday, but does it need to come from whatever your favorite source is? What about things like soda? Refined sugar? Chocolate? Potato Chips? These are things we like the taste of, we eat them for pleasure rather than nutritional value. In The Spirit of the Disciplines, Willard writes, “The desert fathers such as St. Antony often subsided for long periods of time on bread and water…” but he also cautions that “their ‘bread’ was much more substantial than we have today.” So you might not want to eat just store bought white bread! But what is the simplest meal that can supply the basic nutrients you need? The goal is to experience discomfort, to be humbled, to focus on God as our fullness. Abstain from Snacking Another alternative, and something that can also be done in conjunction with simple meals, is to not eat between meals—if your medical condition makes that possible. I know I have the habit of grazing. My watch tells me it’s time to stand because I’ve been sitting too long, so I get up and walk to my kitchen where I eat a nice little snack. Which, when you analyze that, is probably counterproductive. For the most part, I don’t need those snacks. I just like them. Abstain from Entertainment Kelly Minter, in her Bible study Encountering God: Cultivating Habits of Faith Through the Spiritual Disciplines writes this: “When we fast, we’re practicing the needed discipline of saying no to ourselves and yes to God.” For alternatives to fasting from food, what other things can we say no to? Well, we can say no to entertainment. No TV, no phone games, no social media scrolling for birds and puppies and other fun videos, no Spotify, Pandora, or Podcasts, no reading for pleasure, going to the movies, sporting events, or whatever you do for fun. Take a whole day off, and rather than seeking distraction, seek only God, his presence, his words, his direction. Learn to delight in God, and only God.  Abstain from Something Else  What are the things in your life that take up time? Things you look forward to and would miss?  For example, suppose you’re an extroverted person who hates to be alone and spends lots of time getting together with friends. Maybe you can choose to stay home one night a week instead—stay home and have a date with God. Or, maybe you like to go out and shop. You don’t even necessarily buy things, although maybe sometimes you do. But instead of hitting the mall to look around and see what’s new, you abstain for 40 days. Instead, you use that time to stay home and seek God. There are probably lots of other alternatives out there we can think of if we give it more personalized time and thought. Ask God to show you. The point is to practice fasting—in whatever way your health allows—and incorporate it into your spiritual life. As Dallas Willard writes, “…[F]asting is one of the more important ways of practicing that self-denial required of everyone who would follow Christ (Matthew 16:24).” Why do we fast? Kelly Minter sums up her reasoning for fasting this way in her Bible Study Encountering God: “I believe we can and should fast for guidance, healing, direction, intercession, in pursuit of spiritual breakthroughs, and more. But I believe one of the greatest reasons we can fast is simply in pursuit of a deeper experience with Christ.” Fasting. We’ve all heard of it, and yet we rarely do it. Take a deeper look at this vital aspect of discipleship and why it matters for writers. #amwriting #Christianwriter Share on X WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! Do you practice fasting? What do you find to be the best thing about it? THANK YOU! Thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! Thanks so much to our July sponsor of the month, Wendy L. Macdonald. She’s a writer, poet, podcaster, photographer, a maker of journals (find her on Etsy to see them!) and nature lover. I know you’d enjoy getting to know her! Check out the treasury of her website at wendyLmacdonald.com. Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. The post 217 – Why Fasting Matters for Writers appeared first on Write from the Deep.

As we discussed last week, there are things happening in our country and around the world that many of us never believed could happen. Riots, protests, increasing terrorist activity, science being ignored and twisted, vitriol becoming the norm toward any who disagree with society’s agendas… all of which we’ll tackle. Along with how to prepare for the enemy’s attacks! But first, thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! It seems insane, but in reality, it’s not. It’s warfare. Spiritual warfare. And the “enemy” is not people who have bought into the insanity. It’s not even the people spewing hatred and violence against those with whom they disagree. The enemy, plain and simple, is the creature known as satan. That “father of lies” who seeks to devour and destroy any who believe in God and stand for His truth.  You may have already experienced attacks against your heart and soul, attacks designed to undermine your faith and immobilize you as one who writes or speaks truth. If you haven’t, know that the time may well come when you will. When you’ll be asked to surrender God’s truth, exchanging it for lies and deception. Such things are already happening to Christian writers. So the question is, are you ready?  How Do We Prepare? So, how do you prepare for whatever the enemy throws your way? First, you must know where you’re vulnerable. Here are some common vulnerabilities along with possible solutions to help you overcome them.  Vulnerability #1:  Attacks when we Feel Weak Whether you’re feeling weak physically, emotionally, or spiritually, these are moments that leave us open to attacks. And we’ve all been there…those times we’ve done everything we know to do in our work as writers, and nothing seems to be working out.  When we are dealing with illness or injury, and feel as though we’ll never be strong again. When we’re worn down from trials or battles or just life, so tired of the struggle, so weak, that’s when doubts come knocking at our heart’s door. So let’s consider solutions for those three types of weakness: Physical, emotional, and spiritual.  Solutions for Physical Weakness It’s so tempting, when we’re weak physically, to believe we just…can’t. Can’t work, can’t write, can’t deal with people or relationships, can’t do anything we want to do. Which is why it’s so important to take even small steps to refresh and restore yourself. To steal yourself against attacks when you’re weak. Some things you can do:  Get Moving. It may seem counter-intuitive, but exercise can help when you’re feeling weak physically. I know how much I just want to sleep when I’m in this place, but then I remember what my dad always told me: “Talk a walk before you take a nap. You’ll be surprised how much better you feel.” And you know what, he was right.   Rest. Sometimes, though, you really do need to just rest. I (Erin) suffer from bouts of chronic fatigue. When they hit, I can’t do anything BUT rest. I don’t necessarily mean sleeping,  although that can be helpful, but by finding a restorative place or activity to rest and relax. Sometimes I just sit on my deck or on  my couch and watch the birds. Sometimes I just lie on the floor in my bedroom—cuz it has cozy carpet—and I shut out everything in my mind and look out the window at the sky and trees and think about one Bible verse and let God’s presence and his Word give me rest. God is the source of our ultimate rest and protection against the enemy’s attacks. I know we’re talking about physical weakness, but for me, my mind is very much a part of that physicality. For me (Karen), that’s often my back porch, where I can watch the birds, listen to the wind rustling the trees, and see my flowers growing.   Hydration. Believe it or not, sometimes that weakness is simply dehydration. According to FamilyDoctor.org, “Your body depends on water to survive. Every cell, tissue, and organ in your body needs water to work properly. “For example, your body uses water to maintain its temperature, remove waste, and lubricate your joints. Good hydration is important for overall good health.” See Your Doctor. If this weakness goes on for too long, it’s always a good idea to see your doctor. You might have something going on that needs medical intervention. Solutions for Emotional Weakness Emotional weakness or exhaustion comes when the stresses in our lives wear us down. If you’re at a place where you think you can’t handle one more bad or hard thing, where you’re at the “end of your rope,” you may be facing emotional exhaustion.  The devastating consequences of this particular weakness is that we often get the sense that we have little to no power over our own lives. That we just have to take the hits, no matter how long they keep on coming. And we all know how it seems impossible to be creative and write in the face of emotional exhaustion!  Find Power in Prayer. Regardless of your feelings, you do have power. Because you have prayer. When you take your emotional exhaustion to the Father, when you lay it at His feet and ask for mercy, He will answer you. No, that doesn’t necessarily mean things will suddenly be better. But it does mean He will uplift and strengthen you. He promises you that in Isaiah 40:29-31:    “He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.”  Let Friends Help. I know, I know, it’s hard to ask for help. Expecially when you’re emotionally weak. But just make one phone call. Send one email. Reach out to one person who you know will respond. Ask for company, prayer, Scriptures…whatever you need. You don’t have to go through this alone. Nor should you. Hanging out with people who truly love you, who are as comfortable with your silence as with your talking, who are willing to just be with you can be powerfully restorative.  Journal. Hey, we’re writers, yes? So write what you’re feeling and why. Write out prayers to God. Write down helpful Scripture or quotes. It can help you in so many ways, from getting it out of your head and onto paper to helping you better understand what you’re going through.   Take a break. Get away from everyone and everything. Find a safe place to be with God and seek His restoration and healing.  Solutions for Spiritual Weakness Ah, spiritual weakness. This, above all others, is the most attractive weakness to satan . He is delighted when we fall into this vulnerability, and believe you me, he will attack this weakness with vigor.  As much as we hate to admit it, we are all susceptible to this vulnerability. But why? Well, often because we don’t truly understand the nature of God.   Two of my favorite moments in C.S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia are when: (1)   Lucy asks Mr. Beaver if Aslan is safe. His response? “Safe?” said Mr. Beaver. “Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the King, I tell you.” (2)   When Mr. Tumnus adds, “He’s wild, you know. Not a tame lion.”  As much as we talk about understanding that God’s ways are not our ways, that His thoughts are not our thoughts, we still often hold expectations that God will be…safe. Tame. That He’ll do what makes sense to us. And when that doesn’t happen, in whatever way it may happen, we’re shocked. Disappointed. And doubts start to creep in.  If God’s all good, then why did He let this happen?  If God loves me, why didn’t He protect me? Where was God when this happened? If God can allow innocents to be slaughtered, He must not be good.  And on and on we go, measuring God by our standards, our expectations, and our human thought processes. Which often leads us straight into spiritual weakness.  Some of the signs that you’re feeling spiritually weak. You:       struggle with anger and hopelessness      have no desire to be with God’s people      stop reading the Bible or spending time with God      feel abandoned by God      can’t seem to accept the coexistence of God and pain       start to doubt what you know to be true about God  If you’re in this kind of place, here are some possible solutions: Seek sound counsel. Go to those who you know will listen to your struggles and questions without condemning you. Be honest with them about your feelings and the reasons for them. Then let them give you biblical counsel and guidance.   Read Hebrews. Why Hebrews, especially? Jon Bloom on desiringGod.org explains: “I love Hebrews for many reasons. I love how it radiates with the transcendent glory of God the Son. I love its magisterial grasp of how the old covenant is fulfilled and surpassed by the new covenant. And I love the beautiful, compelling portrait of the cloud of witnesses, who by their remarkable examples call us to live by faith in the unfailing promises of our faithful God.”  He goes on to say, “I also love Hebrews because it is a letter to weary Christians, some of whom are standing right on the cliff’s edge, tempted to ‘throw away [their] confidence, which has a great reward’ (Hebrews 10:35).” Be honest with God. Pray and let God know what you’re feeling, why you’re struggling. God can handle all our doubts and frustrations, our anger and despair. In The Message, Matthew 11:28-30 tells us: “Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.”  Give Yourself Time. Dealing with these soul-deep questions and struggles takes time. Don’t get down on yourself if it takes longer than you want to find peace in the situation. Remember that God is with you, He loves you without reserve, and He will guide you home.  Other Vulnerabilities So what are other vulnerabilities we need to watch for? Here’s an interesting one: Attacks When we feel close to God or other believers I know, at first that doesn’t seem to make sense.  But have you ever gone to a Christian writers’ conference or retreat? There’s such a high when we’re surrounded by people who share our beliefs and trust in God. Who share our passion for writing about Him and His truth. It’s exhilarating! And the worship together is profound. God is RIGHT THERE!   But what happens next? You get home, and boom! There are bills to pay, kids to parent, spouses to listen to, chores to be done. All normal life, but you miss that unity of purpose, that gathering with people who really get you. And the contrast is so profound that you start to feel alone. Even when surrounded by those who love you.   These emotional letdowns are perfectly normal, but if we aren’t careful, they can open a door to the prowling lion.  Solutions for these attacks Realize you’re dealing with emotions, which are true to how we feel, but aren’t always reliable in terms of what the Bible says is true. Speak God’s truth into those emotions. Thank God for the time you shared with those of like minds and passions. Savor the time you had together, the lessons you learned. But recognize that ultimately your relationship with God is between just you and Him. Get to know Him as well as you know your friends and family. Spend as much time alone with Him as you do with others that you love. And remember that while your family and friends may not “get you” like other writers, they love you.  Spend time with other believers. It may not have the same impact as a conference or retreat, but being with other believers in a Bible study or fellowship group may help. Sometimes just being with a Christian friend, even for a short amount of time, can help as well. Go for a walk together, go out to dinner, even just sit and talk.  Remember you’re never really alone. The God who knit you together with other believers is always right there beside you. He is always ready to talk, to listen, and to show you His love. He’s waiting for you. Listen to what the Psalmist says in Psalm 27:8, and I love how the New Living Translation puts it: “My heart has heard you say, ‘Come and talk with me.’ And my heart responds, ‘Lord, I am coming.’”  Lord, I Am Coming We’ve got more vulnerabilities to explore, but that’s for a future podcast. For now, friends, let Psalm 27:8 be your response to your loving Father. “Lord, I am coming.” In every vulnerability, in every attack the enemy throws at you, “Lord, I am coming.” Take it all to Him, lay it in His all-powerful hands, and walk away covered in His promises and grace. He will NEVER abandon you. No matter what circumstances seem to say, the Lord has spoken His truth and promises over you. And nothing the enemy does can erase or stop them.  Amen WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! What is one vulnerability you strengthen against attacks? THANK YOU! Thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! Special thanks to our June sponsor of the month, June sponsor of the month Kimberley Woodhouse! She’s an award-winning and bestselling author of more than forty books.  Her books have been awarded the Carol Award, Holt Medallion, Reader’s Choice Award, Selah Award, Spur Award, Christian Market Book Award, Golden Scroll Award among others. A popular speaker/teacher, she’s shared with over 1,000,000 people at more than twenty-five hundred venues across the country. Check out her latest book: Set in Stone available now and we’ll link to it in the show notes! Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. The post 216 – Are You Ready for Attacks? Part 2 appeared first on Write from the Deep.

So much of what’s happening in the world today is mind- and spirit-boggling. Things we never expected to see or experience in “The Land of the Free” are happening left, right, and center. Attacks on freedoms and faith are on the rise. As writers, we need to understand what is causing all this. As Believers, we need to know how to prepare ourselves to respond. But first, thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! America the Beautiful? I love watching old movies about America being a bastion for free speech, supporting the downtrodden, and protecting those who’ve been beat down. I miss those days. Sure, America is still is all of that to a certain degree, but much has changed. 180 degrees. Not in My Lifetime! Recently we’ve seen something I never thought to see in my lifetime: people in the world of academia––students and professors––screaming hate-filled antisemitism, calling for the death of Jewish people. Such hate speech would not have been tolerated even a few years ago.. But even hate speech is covered by the first amendment. Unless it includes: Hateful Hate Speech Imminent lawless action, or telling people to immediately commit a crime, and True threats: knowingly causing someone to fear for their safety, and Fighting words: words intended to provoke a violent reaction. It’s Happening Now! All of which have taken place in the recent anti-Israel protests on college campus. For example, a Cornell University student was arrested for posting threats to shoot and stab Jewish people on campus, and to “shoot up” the Kosher dining room. (He was kicked out of the college after being arrested.) Over the past ten years or so, we’ve also seen traditional and Christian beliefs attacked with increasing vehemence. Those who find such beliefs offensive spew vitriol and organize to criminalize those whose beliefs offend them. Are you ready for such attacks? Students’ Troubling Attitudes In 2023, Newsweek reported on a new poll from the Buckley Institute, which surveyed students at four-year colleges. The results of this poll? “Young Americans are turning their backs on basic American principles of free speech, tolerance, and due process, in a way that’s so drastic it genuinely endangers the future of our political order. And this disintegration is only accelerating. “The Buckley Institute has conducted this poll for nine years, yet this year, for the first time ever, more students support shouting down speakers they disagree with than oppose this kind of mob censorship…” Censorship, Anyone? The article goes on to say, “What’s more, 46 percent of students now believe that ‘offensive’ opinions should get other students reported to the university administration…and more than 50 percent of students literally believe certain topics should be banned from being debated on campus. “There’s also an alarming violent twist to the censoriousness rising among Gen Z college students. A whopping 45 percent of students told pollsters it is justified to use physical violence to prevent people from expressing hate speech or making racially charged comments. “This radical, un-American idea is only becoming more popular: Back in 2017, for example, only 30 percent of students supported this same proposition.” Justice for All? Something else I never thought I’d see in American is citizens being jailed, but rather than being given their rights to defend themselves, they are incarcerated for an indeterminant amount of time with no way to defend themselves or pursue justice. Or people who demand we “follow the science” on one issue completely ignoring it when it comes to what gender people are. Try to argue, and you get attacked. Especially on social media. These changes in America toward elitism and intolerance don’t stop with politics. Christians Under Attack Are you ready for an attack in your church? Hostility and violence against churches in America is at an all-time high, according to a recent Family Research Council report. They documented more than 430 incidents in 2023—more than double the number in 2022. That’s an 800% increase in incidents since 2018 and an average of 39 attacks every month! Christian Business Are Targets Christian-owned businesses have been sued for not accepting jobs that go against their beliefs. Chick-fil-A has been picketed and harassed for designating some of its charitable giving to churches and church-related organizations that hold to the biblical view of marriage. In fact, San Antonio blacklisted the company from doing business in their city for not supporting LGBTQ charities. Christian writers have lost contracts because they won’t revise history to fit today’s agenda. It’s Getting Worse in America So many of us have considered America immune to attacks on faith. However, according to a 2024 study titled “The Intensifying Intolerance Toward Christians in the West”, which was conducted by the Family Research Council, most religious liberty violations in the Western world in the last few years took place in America. Predators Where We Least Expect Them Are you ready for an attack in places where you feel safe? Just a few years ago the Christian publishing world was shocked when women attending Christian writers conferences reported years of sexual misconduct and harassment by male faculty members. I knew such things were happening in churches, but I’d been teaching at these conferences for more than 20 years! And the men on faculty whom I knew––and know––well were above reproach. However, I became more attentive––and reported the few instances I saw. Twisted Ideals and Truth More and more, both in the world and in Christian communities, we see the ideals and truths on which America was founded being twisted and ignored. The same for biblical truth. And anyone who resists the twisting can count on an attack. Wrong is called right, truth is called lies, faith is called racism or worse. So what does all this mean for you and me today, in this very moment? Several things. What All This Means We who follow the risen Christ should not be surprised or afraid. We’re seeing the fulfillment of Scripture. The adversary is hard at work. And we need to know how to identify his attacks, and how to equip ourselves to face them. We could, at any time, come under fire for our beliefs, so we need to be ready to take a stand for Christ. Bellievers cannot look to the world for our justice or to defend us. Christians who are writers MUST be grounded in God’s truth, willing to write what God tells us even if it’s not popular or puts us in the crosshairs for an attack. Fufillment of Scripture Jesus told us many times that, in this world, we would see trouble (John 16:33) and that the world will hate us (John 15:18-19). In 1 Timothy 3:12, Paul wrote, “Yes, and everyone who wants to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution.”= 2 Timothy 3:1-5 tells us: “You should know … that in the last days there will be very difficult times. For people will love only themselves and their money. They will be boastful and proud, scoffing at God, disobedient to their parents, and ungrateful. They will consider nothing sacred. They will be unloving and unforgiving; they will slander others and have no self-control. “They will be cruel and hate what is good. They will betray their friends, be reckless, be puffed up with pride, and love pleasure rather than God. They will act religious, but they will reject the power that could make them godly. Stay away from people like that!” Shameless Spin David Mathis, of DesiringGod.org, says, “[As] New as the recent trend of shameless spin, and outright lies, may seem to some, Christians with Bibles in hand do not number ourselves among the surprised. Long has the devil trafficked in half-truths, subtle deception, and ‘disinformation’ — from the beginning, in fact. “This has been his strategy, and main trick, as ‘father of lies,’ from the garden. Even if the social manifestations now appear plainer and, at times, more jarring, those informed by the truth of Christian Scripture take it in stride. “Two millennia ago, one of our apostles informed us that unbelievers ‘suppress the truth’ and ‘exchanged the truth’ for lies (Romans 1:18, 25).” Sound familiar? Too much so, in fact. So it’s no surprise, in light of Scripture, that such craziness is happening today. The Adversary is Hard at Work Scripture also gives us a clear picture of the enemy of our souls. In 1 Peter 5:8 we’re told, “Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.” This comparison to a lion is especially appropriate. An article by Marshall Segal on desiringGod.org shares the following: “Mountain lions detect vulnerabilities in their prey and attack the weakest — the young, the sick, the injured. Studies have confirmed this instinctive cruelty. It’s how the mountain lion lives, following the scent of suffering and feasting on whatever he finds. “The enemy of your hope and happiness hunts with that same instinct, with a cold-hearted and ruthless hunger for the weak or hurting…And because he’s clever, he spends a lot of his time among the suffering. “He lies in wait with lies, wanting to consume the fragile and vulnerable.” The Enemy Doesn’t Give Up Though we know from Scripture that satan’s fate is already decided (spoiler: he loses), he doesn’t give up trying to attack and destroy us. As Billy Graham wrote, “Satan never gives up and decides to let us alone, because his goal is to draw us away from God — and he always hopes he’ll be able to do this. “And let’s face it: Sometimes he’s successful. This is why the Apostle Paul warned, ‘If you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall!’ (1 Corinthians 10:12). Never Forget The Cougar is Prowling Just as the cougar stalks its prey, watching and waiting to spot any vulnerability, and then STRIKES with speed and vicious force, so the enemy of our souls is there, watching and waiting for any possible way to strike. With a force more vicious than we can imagine. Know Your Vulnerabilities So what do we do? Well, first, don’t be afraid of the enemy. He’s NOTHING compared to almighty God, who watches over and protects us. Second, know your vulnerabilities. And third, submit those vulnerabilities to God the very moment you realize they are there, and seek His help to address them. Which is exactly what we’ll dig into in our next podcast! Until then, why not do some study to prepare yourself now for the enemy’s attacks? Strategy for Study Scripture is your first source, of course. What wisdom do you find in God’s word about dealing with the enemy’s attacks? Consider: 2 Corinthians 10:4––the weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. James 4:7 – Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 1 Peter 5:8 – Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Psalm 91 – He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. …he will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the deadly pestilence. He will cover you with his pinions, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness is a shield and buckler. You will not fear the terror of the night, nor the arrow that flies by day… More Scriptures for You Luke 10:19 – Behold, I have given you authority to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall hurt you. 1 John 5:4-5 – For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God? Isaiah 54:17 – No weapon that is fashioned against you shall succeed, and you shall refute every tongue that rises against you in judgment. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord and their vindication from me, declares the Lord. Books to Read Read some of the books out there about this issue. Such as:  Overcoming the Adversary: Warfare Praying Against Demon Activity by Mark Bubeck Victory Over the Darkness: Realize the Power of Your Identity in Christ by Neil T. Anderson This Present Darkness by Frank Peretti Other Strategies Talk and pray with fellow believers, and fellow writers, about the enemy and his attacks. Cover each other in prayers for God’s protection and wisdom when the attacks come. Review Ephesians 6:10-18, ensuring you understand and are using the full armor God has given you. Be aware of attacks that come against you in your work as a writer. Take every negative thought captive the second they come to you, submitting them to the Author of Truth for verification or dismissal. Don’t let negative emotions set in when things don’t go the way you hope. Keep your focus set on The Master of all creativity. Trust Him, even when everything around you seems to be saying otherwise. He will sustain you, He will protect you. A Final Word As unsettling as it is to realize we are the targets of a supernatural battle, that a being that hates God hates us as well and is actively at work to “devour” us, you do. Not. need. to. be. Afraid. Hollywood and books and so many other sources of information have filled our minds with the terrifying images of satan and his work. And, indeed, the evil he perpetrates against God’s creation and people is horrific. And yet…God is with us. Who can be against us? God is sheltering us. Who can harm us? God IS. And satan was defeated before he began. Know, friends, as sure as you know anything, that He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world. God has you covered. Never doubt that. Amen Over the past ten years or so, we’ve also seen traditional and Christian beliefs attacked with increasing vehemence. Those who find such beliefs offensive spew vitriol and organize to criminalize those they feel have offended them. Share on X WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! What is one thing you can do today to be ready for the enemy’s attack? THANK YOU! Thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! Special thanks to our June sponsor of the month, June sponsor of the month Kimberley Woodhouse! She’s an award-winning and bestselling author of more than forty books.  Her books have been awarded the Carol Award, Holt Medallion, Reader’s Choice Award, Selah Award, Spur Award, Christian Market Book Award, Golden Scroll Award among others. A popular speaker/teacher, she’s shared with over 1,000,000 people at more than twenty-five hundred venues across the country. Check out her latest book: Set in Stone available now and we’ll link to it in the show notes! Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. The post 215 – Are You Ready for Attacks? appeared first on Write from the Deep.

Writing is a solitary occupation, and yet God created human beings with a need for fellowship. This is why it’s crucial for writers to seek—and not neglect—community. Don’t miss being blessed—and blessing others—through this God-designed need for relationships. But first, thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! Welcome to the deep! In some of our episodes this year, we’ve talked about various spiritual disciplines, by which we mean practices that help us develop a deeper, closer relationship with God. Here are links to our episodes about Rest-211, Prayer 208, Silence-205, and Solitude 199. The Christian writing life is hard. Knowing God and trusting God is crucial on this journey. Today we want to focus on a practice that we don’t always think of as a discipline, and that we sometimes might even take for granted or feel like it sort of just goes without saying. What is this practice? It’s Christian fellowship. What is fellowship? Let’s start with what fellowship is. Among Merriam-Webster’s definitions are: Companionship, company, the state being comradely. The BibleProject.com defines fellowship as: “shared participation within a community.” Dalla Willard in his book The Spirit of the Disciplines writes this about fellowship: “In fellowship we engage in common activities of worship, study, prayer, celebration, and service with other disciples.” Willard categorizes fellowship as a spiritual discipline of engagement. Whereas things like fasting, silence, and solitude are disciplines of abstinence, where we cease doing certain activities for a time, disciplines of engagement, like fellowship, are where we commit to participation, to involvement in activities we are at times likely to neglect. Bible study and prayer are other examples of disciplines of engagement. So fellowship is something we do, something we participate in, either in a large group of people or just a few. Why do we need fellowship? But why is fellowship important? What is the basis of it? 1. We were made for fellowship. Justin Whitmel Earley, in his book The Common Rule, has this to say: “One of the defining marks of the Christian faith is that God is three persons in one triune God. Among the thousands of radical implications of the Trinity, my favorite is that God is a fellowship. This means we are made in the image of fellowship.” So we’re made for fellowship and in the image of fellowship. The BibleProject article we mentioned earlier says: “God enjoys perfect fellowship within himself. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are in eternal relationship and always participate in acts of self-giving love toward one another. This fellowship is the essence of heaven.” Jesus talks about his fellowship with the Father in John 17:5: “And now, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began.” (NIV) The BibleProject article goes on to say, “[God] created humans in his image so that we could share in his eternal self-giving fellowship and partner with him to share it with all of creation.” So again, it seems clear that God designed us for fellowship. Here’s another great quote from the book The Common Rule that talks about the implications of this: “We came from friendship. Everything in the universe has its roots in friendship. That means the longing to be in right relationship with other people and things is at the heart of every molecule in existence—and most powerfully in our own hearts. We can’t be happy without knowing and being known, because that’s the image of the trinitarian friendship we were made in.” The bottom line is that fellowship is necessary for human flourishing. 2. We need connections with other believers to help us with our spiritual formation. The second reason why we need fellowship is that we need connections with other believers to help us with our spiritual formation. We all know how strong the influence of the world around us is. We’re bombarded with messages that undermine the reality and truth God has revealed to us. Ben Beasley, one of the pastors at my church, was preaching about this a few weeks ago. I loved how he phrased this. He said, “Our spiritual formation must be stronger than our cultural formation.” We can’t easily achieve that without connection to other believers. In Dallas Willard’s book, The Spirit of the Disciplines, he talks about how the gifts God gives to the body of Christ are meant to be reciprocal in nature. They’re spread out among the members. Without fellowship, we wouldn’t get the full experience of God’s gifts for his church. We’d only experience a part of what he wants for us. 1 Peter 4:10 (NIV) says, “Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms.” Because our gifts are to be used for the common good, our responsibility is to be part of the body so we can both give and receive gifts. This is how we grow and develop in our spiritual formation, and help others do the same. In fellowship, we also help to sustain each other. Willard says, “The members of the body must be in contact if they are to sustain and be sustained by each other. Christian redemption is not devised to be a solitary thing, though each individual, of course, has a unique and direct relationship with God.” So in fellowship, we help each other cope, endure, and stand against the world that tries to tear us away from God. We help each other “work out our salvation with fear and trembling” like it says in Philippians 2:12. 3. The amplification of God’s presence and power happens within groups. The third reason why fellowship is important is that there is an amplification of God’s presence and power found within the body of believers. Dallas Willard says this in The Spirit of the Disciplines: “Personalities united can contain more of God and sustain the force of his greater presence much better than scattered individuals. The fire of God kindles higher as the brands are heaped together and each is warmed by the other’s flame.” Jesus makes a point to say in Matthew 18:19-20 (NIV): “Again, truly I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything they ask for, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven. For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.” Of course this doesn’t mean God only listens to prayers from groups, and it doesn’t mean that prayer asked for with impure motives will be granted. The point here is that Jesus does, throughout the whole surrounding passage, emphasize the power and responsibility of the body of believers. Why is fellowship specifically important for writers? We’ve talked a lot about why we as Christians need fellowship, but what about the specific reasons why fellowship is important to writers? First, as writers, we’re a creative, artistic group, often introverted. Fellowship with other believers who aren’t writers, and who may have a more linear, logical bent helps to round out our perspective on life. The same is true of our relationships with people who are more extroverted. The gifts found in believers who aren’t writers are still necessary and vital to our spiritual and artistic formation. Second, as writers we also need fellowship with other writers. We share common experiences other “normals” don’t have. We think about ways our characters can kill people, or the designs of storyworlds vastly different from our own. We have coffee with our characters because they’re like real people to us. Amongst other writers, we find support, understanding, acceptance, and encouragement for our unique bent and gifts in God’s overall design. Practical ways to participate in fellowship Fellowship is important, even vital. But how do we do it? What are some practical ways? Here are some ideas we’ve come up with, and let me say that while we’ll talk about the benefits for you in all these, please remember that what you bring—your gifts and service and participation—is equally vital to others in the opportunities. Join a prayer group either in person or online where you not only are praying for each other but you get a chance to get to know others, hear their various perspectives and experiences, encourage and support them. Attend church services to experience a larger group of believers in fellowship as you worship, take communion, pray, and learn from preaching. Join a worship group, or a worship band. My husband and I moved to Kansas a few years ago, and eventually he started playing in the worship band at church, which has been a wonderful way for him to begin building relationships with people in the church. Join a Bible study group, again either in person or online. It’s amazing what other people bring to the table in terms of their perspectives and insights. We can’t help but be enriched. And what we have to add matters, too! Get involved in parachurch organizations like Fellowship of Christian Athletes, InterVaristy Christian Fellowship or The Navigators. When I was in college, my connection to InterVarsity is what led me to Christ and played a huge role in my spiritual formation as a young believer. It also gave me a place to serve, and to grow through my service. Go on a mission trip. You can not only enjoy fellowship with others in your group, but you’ll also likely have the opportunity to develop cross-cultural relationships and expand your perspective. You’ll also be helping to meet the needs of others. Participate in celebrations. These might be potlucks, banquets, parties, or all kinds of other possibilities. In our church, there’s a whole special service where they do baptisms. It’s a big day of testimony, encouragement, commitment, and celebration. Go on a retreat. This might be a marriage retreat, family retreat, writers’ retreat, or a men’s or women’s retreat. Join an accountability group of some sort. These might be things like Celebrate Recovery, or it might be just a group formed to hold each other accountable for some common spiritual goal. Maybe help with overcoming some specific sin, or maybe encouragement to engage in other spiritual disciplines. Join a Christian writers’ group either locally or online. For example, check out WordWeavers or American Christian Fiction Writers. My friendships and connections in my local ACFW group have been an incredible blessing. Our group often got together for lunch before our monthly meetings, which was a great way to foster and nurture relationships. Go to a Christian writing conference. There are always opportunities for fellowship and for engaging with others to begin developing relationships. Many have worship sessions, prayer teams, or group meals you can participate in. Join (or start) a mastermind group with other Christians. For me, this is one of my favorite forms of fellowship. I’ve been part of a mastermind for quite a few years now. The women in my group are amazing. They all bring their own gifts, perspectives, specialties, knowledge, experiences. We pray for each other, we encourage each other, we help each other. They’ve been a huge blessing. Invite others to a meal. Maybe you have one meal a week that’s dedicated to fellowship with others. Maybe it’s as simple as inviting folks over for dinner after church. Or meeting at a restaurant. Or hosting visiting missionaries or international students. Maybe you have a regular brunch group or a group from work that does lunch together. Nurture friendships. We also don’t want to forget fellowship in the form of friendships with others, either one-on-one or friend groups. As Justin Whitmel Earley wrote in his book The Common Rule, we all desire, deep down, to be known. But we also fear it, so it’s not easy. In true friendship we learn to be vulnerable. We learn to be people who still love each other when all our human messiness is out on the table. We learn to trust, and to be trustworthy, we learn to protect and to protect others. We hold each other accountable. We learn the value of authenticity and the freedom found in it. We tell truth, and we hear truth from others. This is all a vital part of the human experience and God’s design for us, and we need to dedicate ourselves to pursuing it. Recently my neighborhood was grieving the loss of a man who committed suicide. Neither his friends nor his family had any idea he was in such a desperate state. That makes it twice the tragedy. It’s important to be intentional in your friendships. Sure, doing fun activities together is great, but it’s also important for conversation to happen. You’ve probably seen people sitting together at a restaurant and everyone is engaged with their phone. That’s not an experience of knowing others and being known. You might even consider “conversation appointments” where you all know the goal is to talk. Maybe you chat at a park while kids are playing, or you meet for coffee, or whatever. The point is that you’re being intentional about conversation and getting to know each other. Start now! Whatever paths you take to engage in fellowship, the most important thing is that you DO it. That you intentionally take steps to make this happen in your life. God designed us for fellowship, for relationship with him and with others because he knows that this is how we work better. This is how we flourish even in the midst of a broken world. Our friends, our fellow believers, are anchors for us in the midst of the trials and storms. Don’t miss this spiritual discipline. It will make your life so much better! Books mentioned in the podcast The Spirit of the Disciplines by Dallas Willard The Common Rule by Justin Whitmel Earley (Just as a reminder, we use affiliate links for the books we mention. Using one of our links, if you choose to purchase a book, is a wonderful way to help us out, because we’ll get a small commission.) Writing is a solitary occupation, and yet God created human beings with a need for fellowship. Don’t miss being blessed—and blessing others—through our God-designed need for relationships. #amwriting #christianwriter Click To Tweet WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! What are your favorite ways to engage in fellowship? THANK YOU! Thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! Special thanks to our May sponsor of the month, Priscilla Sharrow! She’s working on her memoir called Bonked! Life, Love, and Laughter with Traumatic Brain Injury, which will release with Redemption Press. Learn more about Priscilla at her website priscillasharrow.com and follow her blog for the TBI/PTSD community. Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. The post 214 – Why Writers Need Fellowship appeared first on Write from the Deep.

The Bible tells us to be holy, and that without holiness we won’t see God. But what part does holiness play in the face of utter devastation? And how do we write through it? Guest Karen Stiller shares wisdom and encouragement from her difficult journey through grief and pain. About Karen Stiller Karen Stiller is an award-winning writer, a senior editor, and host of the Faith Today podcast. She’s written about being a pastor’s wife, and her newest book, Holiness Here, offers practical and inspiring ways to transform your life by helping you see the holiness within your ordinary, everyday life. You can find out more about her at Karenstiller.com.  Thanks to our sponsors on Patreon, we’re able to offer an edited transcript of the podcast! Erin: Welcome, listeners. We’re glad that you’re here in the deep with us. Today we’re continuing our conversation with Karen Stiller. Now, Karen, you did mention grief. Let’s go there, because you had said before, when we were doing some emails, that you had to complete this book during a season of grief. First, how in the world did you do that? How did that affect you and the book?  Karen Stiller: Yeah, I’ve been thinking so much about that because sometimes I think, over the last year and a bit, I think, I don’t know how I did it either, sometimes. And yet I do. My husband had a kidney transplant, which should, for most people, be routine. You know, it changes your life, but it’s not a thing that will kill you. But that did happen with my husband. My husband experienced a very severe and rare side effect of post-transplant lymphoma. He went into the hospital in the end of November, and he was dead by mid-January. He never came home again. Karen Ball: Oh my gosh. Karen Stiller: Yeah, it was very unexpected. The way he experienced lymphoma was on his brain, so it was a rocky path. As anybody who has loved anyone into heaven with brain cancer, it’s…well, I guess it’s probably different for lots of people…but it was hard. Very hard. Karen Ball: Yeah. Karen Stiller: I had written up till then. When I signed my book contract, I immediately set up a writing schedule. I signed in July, and I was going to do three chapters by the end of July, two by the end of August. One by the end of September, October, November, and December. The book was due in January and I had built in time for revision. I felt really confident. I’m a big list person. I make lists and I make schedules, and that’s the way I get things done. I love a deadline. When Brent went into the hospital, I think I was around chapter eight. I just obviously set the book aside. After he died, you know, actually there was a time where I thought, “I’m never gonna write again.” I just couldn’t imagine…I couldn’t imagine a way forward in many things. But I also thought, “How will I ever find the desire or ability to write again?” My agent knocked on my door at some point. The timelines are a bit off for me. It’s all a big blur in some ways, but she basically said, “If you can finish the book by a certain date, we can get back on the same timeline. Editing will be shortened. But there’s no pressure.” My publisher was amazing and said they’d take the book whenever. They were, of course, wonderful during that season. They had sent a bouquet of flowers once, and I remember that theirs was the only one I carried upstairs to my bedroom. I think now that those flowers were like a symbol of hope for me. There is a little dot of light off in the distance if I can keep that alive. I was off my day job as an editor and podcast stuff and all that for about three months. I just slowly picked up the book again and thought, “Can I?” I dipped my toes in, and what I found was that writing a few mornings a week gave me a shape to the sort of endless days and weeks I was in. It kind of woke me up a little bit, and it gave me a sense of purpose, which I had lost, and it changed the book. I would be interested to hear from listeners who maybe made, or would’ve made a different choice, or have thoughts on this, or have gone through this. But my husband was very much part of my writing, obviously in The Minister’s Wife, but again, in Holiness Here. My husband was very much part of my formation as a follower of Christ. I’d quote him throughout the book, or I’d tell a little story about something that happened in our church that involved him.  All of a sudden he died, and I didn’t know how to handle that as a writer in terms of the actual material. I talked to a few people and I had in my head—I don’t know if people have heard this writing advice—write from your scars, not your wounds. Karen Ball: Right. Karen Stiller: I thought, “Well, I’m bleeding. I am deeply wounded, but yet I can’t not write about this huge thing.” I felt like it would not have been honest to finish those last chapters without telling some, without sketching out a little bit of what had happened. This has been a big knock for me. I’d love to say that I’ve just been a conqueror in Christ through this, but no. I am pulling apart what it means to trust God and realizing that maybe I did think some things that weren’t true. I never would’ve thought that, because my husband was a very, “Why me, why not me?” kind of man. He had a very robust, sound theology of suffering, which I thought I believed, too. Then when he died a very hard death, I just…I just couldn’t believe it. Karen Ball: Right. Karen Stiller: I felt like I couldn’t finish this book about holiness honestly without tackling that. I wrote a chapter called “Sorrow,” and I wrote it very carefully because I knew I was writing from my wound. As a beginning writer who would get an assignment from an editor, I would often write the angle on a post-it note and stick it on my computer wall so that I would stick to my assignment. Now I had a post-it note in my mind where I was like, “Your assignment is holiness. Your assignment is not writing a book about grief. Your assignment is holiness. So where is the holy in this horrible mess?” I kept my lens tightly in on that, and it was good for me. It was good for me to write that. I offered to show it to all my children. Only my eldest son accepted the invitation. I just wanted their blessing. He thought it was honoring to his dad and to what we had gone through, so that made me feel comfortable, and I trust the editors. Karen Ball: Mm-Hmm. Karen Stiller: Where would we be without people telling us hard and wonderful things, right? Karen Ball: Right. Karen Stiller: I submitted my work to the process. I also knew that it is a privilege to have a book contract. My husband would’ve kicked my butt if he knew I had let it float away and that I couldn’t finish it. I knew last year when I was doing this work that this year I would be glad I had done it. There was a discipline there, actually, which we have to have as writers, right? We know that a working writer knows how to work, and that woke me up. That woke me up. I also thought that if I was a chef, I would be cooking. If I was a painter, I’d be painting. If I was a baker, I’d be baking. I’m a writer, and I’m writing.  Erin: Wow. Well that was a lot to have to deal with. Karen Stiller: It was a long answer. Erin: No, I mean it was a great answer but a lot for you to wade through in trying to deal with that. I think your process was amazing. Just the notion of using holiness as a lens, because writers go through all kinds of things in their lives as they’re trying to write something. It isn’t always as awful and traumatic as losing a spouse, but if we were able to realize that there is something to be said for just the discipline and the lens and trying to turn this book in even though this, this, and this is happening, because our lives may always be this, this, and this. It doesn’t mean that we’re not supposed to write, it just means we’re supposed to be learning how to work through that. Karen Stiller: I think that’s so important. Erin: I was curious if, after you had been through this experience, when you went back in revisions and in other places in the book, how did your experience through this grief and this theology of suffering, like how did that maybe change other things in the book? Karen Stiller: Wow, that is a very perceptive question. I did a lot of work. I went back and in every sentence I asked myself, “Do I still believe this, and if I don’t, is this because I’m just in this terrible situation and I will come back to this and I will recover from this?” I made a lot of phone calls. My husband being a pastor, we had a lot of pastor friends. I probably need to apologize to a bunch of people for all my questions like, “Hi, do you have twenty minutes to talk to me? Okay, tell me why my husband died. Tell me what heaven is like. Tell me what he’s doing right now. Like, what do you think? What do you think? What do you think?” I did a lot of those kinds of conversations with people to try to sort through my stuff and my pain, and partly so that I could try to understand what was happening, and then have that help me look at the work and say, “Yeah, I can still say this. I can still stand here.” I think we all have fences in our writing lives, probably, of things that we won’t do, or won’t write about. For me, again, married to a priest, that was very much part of my calling, too. I always had a very simple way kind of guardrail for my life as a pastor’s wife. It was: Do no harm. Do no harm. I’ll not harm my husband’s work. I will not always say what I want to say. I will do no harm. That probably has seeped into my writing life, too. I would think like if I had just gone full-wound bleeding on the page, it wouldn’t have helped anyone. It certainly wouldn’t have helped the book. I knew that I was on a journey of hopefully recovery and healing. You know, you always live with grief. I’ve been told that, and I see that that is true. So I just wanted to be really careful, and so I did interrogate the whole book again. I did make some changes. There are some statements I changed into questions, but that’s the kind of writer I am anyway. I am not an answer giver. I’m a question asker and so I’m pretty comfortable with that.  Erin: Yeah. What I love is—I know this seems awful—but this was also a gift in terms of how you had to go back and ask yourself those questions. Karen Stiller: Yeah. Erin: Not every believer faces that kind of a situation where they’re forced to go back and say, “Do I still believe this? In light of what’s happening in my life, do I still believe this? Do I still believe this?” I think that is one good thing that came out of that and can come out for other people who are going through these kinds of issues. Karen Stiller: Yeah. One really big thing I learned…I’d spoken with a spiritual director for writers a couple years ago, and she kind of set me up to think in this way because there was a time, like when I was writing the Minister’s Wife, if I had a little fight with my son in the morning, I’d think, “Oh, there goes my writing day.” Like,”I’m in a bad mood now. I can’t write.” My spiritual director for writers, she had helped me dig into that a little bit and think about how that kind of compartmentalization cannot help us be writers. Everything does not have to be perfect for me to write. That set me up well for believing, and for the questions we were talking about in the last episode, “Anxiety, what do you have for me? Fear? What are you bringing to the table?” I had to believe that my grief was then and is now, in there doing something that I will write out of, even if I don’t write about it. I think that’s important for writers. Karen Ball: It’s a thread. Everything that we’re faced with, everything that we experience, is a thread in the tapestry that God is weaving of our lives. Every single thread adds an element that we may not understand, or see, or appreciate until we see the completed tapestry. Then we can look at that and say, “Ah. Okay. That’s why that was there, because it needed to be there to compliment this, and to bring this out, and to enhance this, and to clarify things.” I think when we face these difficult questions, ”Do I still believe this? Is God who he says he is? Is God’s goodness real?” And I’ve heard believers say, “I’m starting to doubt the goodness of God…” I listen to those things, and I think because I don’t have a theological mind, I have a simple mind, a simple faith of trust because I saw such a powerful example of that in both my parents. I was raised with the sure knowledge that God is who he says he is. But when my husband and I were separated, and I had been emotionally abused and all of those kinds of things, I had to acknowledge that…I’d always thought that when I finally came face to face with God, I would run and leap up into his lap, like a child, just grab him and hug him. One very dark night, I was talking with him and I said, “I don’t think I know you well enough to jump into your lap, and I’m not sure that I trust you well enough to do that, because this was not the cruise I signed on for.” I’m not at the end of it. Don and I still work through things. We’ve been married for either 45 or 46 years—I’m not a math head. But as I I look at it, I think to myself that I wouldn’t have known God to the depth and the certainty that I know him now, at sixty-six years old, had I not gone through all of that. All of it, every single thread needed to be there for me to be able to say with absolute certainty that God is who he says he is, and God is good, and all things do work together for our good as followers, because it’s all about him. It’s not about me. It’s all about him and how I can reflect him. When you’re talking about working toward holiness, that self-examination, that coming to understand ourselves in light of who he is, it’s vital. Karen Stiller: Yeah.  Erin: We’re coming to the end of our time here. Do you have any final words of wisdom you want to leave with our listeners? Karen Stiller: I’m struck, from what you just shared, Karen, about the work of finding meaning and that we can find meaning without getting into causation. For example, I can believe that I will find meaning that will show up in my writing out of what we’ve gone through as a family, and that doesn’t mean that’s why it happened. You know what I mean? Erin: Right.  Karen Stiller: The two things do not have to equal, but we will not waste it. When my husband was dying, and after he died, throughout that time I kept speaking with my children, who are young adults, because Brent could not communicate what he would’ve wanted to communicate. I knew him so well, I knew what he would’ve wanted said, and I said those things. One of them was that we have to honor what has happened here, this terrible tragedy and pain, by not letting it go to waste. We have to make this mean something, and that hopefully makes us more beautiful people, and more empathetic, and all of those things, and aware of the suffering of the world, and aware that God is with us in that. He is with us. That is a big faith thing to say. Karen Ball: Yes. Karen Stiller: Even that little thing, it sounds so little, but it’s really big. So I guess I would encourage writers, whatever you are going through…you know, we can be like hungry hounds for material, right? Well, you are your greatest material. It doesn’t mean you have to write about yourself. Of course, we’re not all going to do that. But you can honor what is happening in your life by allowing it to become part of the garden of your writing. I think that’s a beautiful thing that artists do, whatever kind of artists we are. Writers are artists and makers, which reflects something of God’s creative nature. Don’t build those walls inside yourself. Tear those walls down and see what grows there. I think that can be a beautiful thing.  Karen Ball: I love the imagery that you mention of it becoming a part of the garden of our lives. I live in the northern part of Washington state, and right now we’re seeing some blossoms in the garden, but it’s still pretty barren. During the winter with the cold and the snow, it’s easy to believe, to look at it and to think, and I confess, I thought it a few times, “It’ll never be beautiful again.” A garden has to die in order to come to life. It’s the cycle that God has created. In our own lives, some things have to die before he can bring it to the full, bright, fragrant bloom that he intends for us to be in him. And that he intends us to see him in all that beauty and in all the growth that comes from the death. Thank you so much for being with us, Karen. You have been a phenomenal blessing, and I pray that God will continue to guide and to touch and be present for you.   Karen Stiller: Thank you Karen and Erin, and thank you on behalf of writers everywhere who listen to this show and the wonderful guests you bring on and the way you minister. And again, that idea what you said at the beginning that you’re chaplains to writers? Writers need chaplains, so I’m really thankful. Karen Ball: Thank you. Guest @karenstiller1 shares wisdom and encouragement from her difficult journey toward holiness through grief and pain. #amwriting #christianwriter Click To Tweet Holiness Here: Searching for God in the Ordinary Events of Everyday Life by Karen Stiller WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! Have you had to write through grief? What helped you move forward? THANK YOU! Thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! If you want to add your support, visit patreon.com/writefromthedeep.  We’d sure appreciate it! Special thanks to our May sponsor of the month, Priscilla Sharrow! She’s working on her memoir called Bonked! Life, Love, and Laughter with Traumatic Brain Injury, which will release with Redemption Press. Learn more about Priscilla at her website priscillasharrow.com and follow her blog for the TBI/PTSD community. Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download.   The post 213 – Holiness and Grief with Guest Karen Stiller appeared first on Write from the Deep.

Holiness. It’s one of those BIG words for Christians. So how do we, as Christian writers, develop holiness and bring it into play in our writing? Guest Karen Stiller shares her journey toward holiness and how God has blessed and challenged her. About Karen Stiller Karen Stiller is an award-winning writer, a senior editor, and host of the Faith Today podcast. She’s written about being a pastor’s wife, and her newest book, Holiness Here, offers practical and inspiring ways to transform your life by helping you see the holiness within your ordinary, everyday life. You can find out more about her at Karenstiller.com.  Thanks to our sponsors on Patreon, we’re able to offer an edited transcript of the podcast! Erin Young:  Welcome, listeners! We’re delighted that you are here with us today. We have a guest. Yay! Karen Ball: Yes, we do! Karen Stiller is the author of The Minister’s Wife, A memoir of Faith, doubt, friendships, loneliness, forgiveness, and More. And the co-author of Craft Cost and Call, how to Build a Life as a Christian Writer. She’s an award-winning writer whose work has appeared in Reader’s Digest, the Walrus, Extasis. Christianity Today and many other publications. She’s a senior editor of the Canadian Magazine, Faith Today, and hosts the Faith Today Podcast, where she has interviewed wonderful thinkers, leaders, and writers like Phillip Yancy and Ann Voskamp. Karen’s work has taken her to the South Sudan, Uganda, Senegal, Cambodia, and across North America. She’s also moderated the Religion and Society series at the University of Toronto, a debate between leading atheists and theologians. Karen loves to teach writing and coach writers on their journey. Welcome, Karen Stiller! Karen Stiller: Thank you so much, and I just love the way you two talk and introduce the show. That lilt in your voices, it just lifts a person’s spirit. So I always enjoy that.  Karen Ball: Oh, thank you. Our hope is always to encourage and to, in a way, be chaplains to writers. To let writers know that they’re not alone and that God’s got them.  Karen Stiller: That’s beautiful. Chaplains to writers. Love it.  Erin Young: So, Karen, what does the deep mean to you?  Karen Stiller: That is such a deep and challenging question. My answer today is probably different from the answer I gave a couple of years ago when I was on your podcast for the first time. When I think about the deep right now, I think about the place from which we experience our deepest longing and yearning, pain and hope, and the place of our deepest honesty and transparency. And hopefully, because of all that, the place  we write from.  Erin Young: Amen. How can we write without transparency? One of the cool things that’s happened recently for Karen Stiller is she has a new book out called Holiness Here: Searching for God in the Ordinary Events of Everyday Life. This is a quote from the book, “Holiness is a search that marks the life of a Christian.” So, Karen, how might that look specifically our search for holiness as writers? Karen Stiller: I know and I understand theologically that we are holy because God has made us holy and that our our holiness as believers comes from the fact that God is holy and has said that we are too through our relationship with Jesus Christ. And we may wonder, what does it mean that I’m holy? I’ve seen this through my years as a minister’s wife. It seems to be common that we actually don’t think we’re holy and we reject that title or that word because it feels awkward. I mean, no one wants to be quote unquote holier than thou. And also it feels so other from how we know ourselves to be on the inside. So I’ll just preface my answer in that way. As a writer who is perhaps trying to write spiritual things––and not every Christian writer has to be writing Christian fiction or spiritual formation books––we want to make sure that we are writing in honesty, that transparency. We want to honor God, and be true to ourselves and what we know of God in our lives. For me, it really is about the honesty piece. I feel that my vocation is to write as honestly as possible in the Christian space. That is very much a part of how we are holy as writers. Of course, there are some individual elements to how we live and what we are called to write about. But yeah. Let’s start there.  Karen Ball: It’s also important for us to recognize that holiness is not something, in essence, we can attain. Holiness comes to us by Christ’s blood covering us. It’s His holiness that the Father sees, not our holiness as individuals. We can seek to live “holy lives” as we emulate and follow what Christ has told us to do. And again, it’s His holiness. But trying to attain true holiness on our own can become a distraction that the enemy has put in our hearts and minds because we do feel so inadequate. And so we need to rest in the truth that our holiness is really Christ’s holiness. We need to embrace that and then follow Him and submit to Him in our writing and in our lives and say, “lead me. Help to hear Your voice and see Your guidance because we too often get confused and distracted by what’s working in the market and how do I do deep point of view, and all of these aspects of being a writer that can d interfere with our primary focus, which should be on Christ. Karen Stiller: Paying attention and being very mindful of what is happening inside of us as we think about these things is important. So I may say out loud, and mean it at the time, that I’m not gonna chase the market or that I’m really truly cheering on another writer, that I’m not jealous or envious of their success, I know that’s right.  But then on the inside, my gut may be feeling something a little different. My heart may be feeling something a little different, and as we pay attention to what’s happening on the inside, that does help our sinking into and living out of the holiness God has given us. Because then we can repent. Say we’re sorry. A big part of my book is that we grow and change. We grow closer to God through the arc of our life of attempts at faithfulness. And through our spiritual disciplines, our attempts to live out of our holiness, which God has told us to do, and asked us to do, and shown us how to do. I have a chapter on hospitality and I playfully say that Jesus actually gives instructions for a dinner party. You know, who’s to sit where, and who should you invite. So something is required of us. Yes, it is one  hundred percent grace, but in our response we find our sanctification. And that is really important. We are participants of God in our faith journey.  So in the life of a writer, it has all kinds of implications for our posture toward our writing. I have been thinking lately about how our posture impacts our practice. You can’t talk about holiness without humility. And so humility helps our writing because it means that we are open to showing it to other writers. We’re open to the editing process. We embrace revision because we know it’s not right the first time. We know other people have good things to say to us about our work and that makes our work better. You know, there are all kinds of implications for that collaboration with other writers. For example, the ways we pour into the writing community. All of the good ways of doing that could be viewed as acts of holiness and it helps in everything.  Erin Young: I love that. I to go back to what you said about running across a lot of people who doubt their holiness. For writers, that could make them doubt their qualifications to be a Christian writer. So both of you are correct: it’s Christ’s holiness, and yet we also have a responsibility to take part in the process. Our works of faith prove that we are followers of Christ, though we’ll never do them perfectly. But if there are writers out there may be doubting themselves or God’s call, realize that that is one of the lies that we writers are so susceptible to.  Karen Stiller: That reminds me of the scene I have in the book where I had this lovely moment with a younger writer who was going through that phase. At some point, we all go, “Am I a writer? Can I call myself a writer? “ This conversation between us happened in the sanctuary of our church. And I said, “Hannah, I pronounce you writer. You are a writer.” And I could tell because I had been in a bit of a mentor role with her and I was an older sister in Christ, it felt special. And she still refers to that moment as being so important. That she just needed someone bossy to tell her that. To validate.  And in the book I draw a parallel with our sense of our own holiness, our acceptance of our holiness. Because once you start to say, “I’m a writer,” people actually start to expect some writing from you, right? And if you believe what God says about us––how beloved we are and that He has made us holy––then all three of us in this conversation are holy. It may feel ridiculous to say, even off-putting and “aaahhh!” But when we view ourselves that way, then we can start to act a little different in light of that holiness. And that can be an adventure! I’m really trying to shift the thought of holiness away from a big, heavy thing and help people just like consider it a warm invitation from God to a life of adventure and and beauty and love.  Erin Young: I love that when you said those words to that person, you were speaking truth. As writers, we should be so aware of the power of words. Words have truth and we pray our words make things happen via God. You know, He’s the One doing these things, but He gives us words to use to take part. So for you guys out there who are wondering if you’re writers? Yes! Karen Stiller: Yeah, we pronounce you writers. Erin Young: That’s right. So you can walk and act accordingly. Now, we may have touched on this a little bit, but what do you think then holiness has to do with money and work as it comes to writing?  Karen Stiller: In the book, when I talk about money, partly I share my own journey with worrying about money and wanting more of it. So in my writing life, I was looking for a job that I could do around the raising of my children. And I was very fortunate, because being a mom helped me become a writer. My husband was a priest, an Anglo priest, and we were not a high income family. We had just always lived at a certain level from student life into having children. So not being used to two incomes ever, we didn’t have the hard work of shedding things to be able to afford my being at home. And that enabled me to build up my writing life over the years as my kids’ schedules allowed.  But I was trying to make a living, to bring more money into our household to pay for ballet and hockey. And I was ambitious, right? I had what I used to call a ball of fire in my belly. So I really wanted to have a writing life that paid money. Sometimes that probably was not fueled by the right things, but sometimes it was from a desire to care for my family and contribute. So honest self-examination is important on the path of holiness. Taking time to think, “What’s going on here? What am I actually thinking and feeling and doing? Where is God in this? And where can God be more in it?” For me, as for many others, money often is where the rubber hits the road.  And I remember the publisher saying, “Money?” Because that was one of my proposed chapters. “What does money have to do with Holiness?” And I was like, “Oh, well for me it had a lot to do with holiness. Because I had to wrestle that monster to the ground.  Erin Young: Yeah.  Karen Stiller: And I have good friends who don’t have any issues around money at all. So I know it’s not universal, but it’s very common that we need to deal with our thinking about money.  Karen Ball: Karen, you mentioned self-examination earlier, which helps with this. We need to look into why we worry about money and why we want to make more. Of course, there are good, solid, and even holy reasons for doing that, but making that too important often stems out of fear. We fear won’t be enough, or that God really doesn’t supply our needs. So if we don’t do something to build up our bank account and savings––and as I say savings, I’m laughing to myself. Writers with a savings account?––but if we don’t do everything that we can to build that up, then what will happen to us?  Erin Young: Mm-Hmm.  Karen Ball: We did a podcast on George Mueller and the power of his praying life. Whenever there was a need, he would go to God and pray for that specific need, and then walk away, trusting that God would provide. And He always did. Sometimes in phenomenal ways, sometimes little things trickling in, but always enough to meet the needs . Erin Young: One of the interesting things about money for me has come from Jeremiah 2:13, which says, “My people have committed two sins. They have forsaken me the spring of living water and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.” So I try to think, well, am I digging my own cistern here? Which parts of this desire for money are just letting God flow, and which part is me just wanting that cistern, that security. It’s always something to wrestle with. Karen Stiller: It helps to have a good friend to talk with, to share our struggle. It’s hard to be honest about our feelings around money. It can be scary to be the person to confess that you want more of it, or live without enough of it, or whatever the issue is. I agree with everything you’re saying, and yet I work really hard.  Erin Young: But that’s okay, too.  Karen Ball: Right. Trusting and resting in God doesn’t mean you don’t work hard. It means you don’t make that your primary goal and you don’t worry about it. Anxiety can be a killer for creativity and for trust in God. When we let anxiety creep into our hearts and our spirit, it’ll do harm.  Karen Stiller: But here’s what I do…and this has a little bit to do with that deep place answer…and I am definitely in the middle of trying to figure this stuff out….but if I am experiencing anxiety or sorrow or fear, my temptation before would’ve been to feel badly that I feel badly. So now I try to almost welcome it in and say, “What do you have for me? What is the message you have for me, fear? Anxiety, what are you trying to tell me?”  These feelings add to the experience we’re having in the world. You know, I keep thinking of the word curiosity. Why not be curious about what is happening in our spirit and in our hearts? Not, “I’m disappointed in my disappointment,” or being grieved over our grief. Instead, know it’s all part of being a human and ask what is this teaching me? And how can I write about it?  Karen Ball: Right. They say nothing is ever wasted in a writer’s economy! And there’s a big difference between having the feelings and dwelling in the feelings.  What a great conversation, what a great exploration of holiness. In our next podcast will be going on with Karen Stiller, and there we’ll be talking about holiness in the face of utter devastation. So don’t miss it! How do we develop holiness and bring it into play in our writing? Guest @KarenStiller1 shares her experiences and wisdom. #ChristianWriter #amwriting Click To Tweet Holiness Here: Searching for God in the Ordinary Events of Everyday Life by Karen Stiller WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! Do you struggle with the idea of holiness in your life and writing? What steps can you take today to embrace holiness? THANK YOU! Thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! If you want to add your support, visit patreon.com/writefromthedeep.  We’d sure appreciate it!  Special thanks to our April sponsor of the month Christy Bass Adams. She’s the author of a devotional titled Learning As I Go: Big Lessons from Little People, and a middle grades novel, The Adventures of Cricket and Kyle: Imagination Checkers. She’s also a speaker and leads women’s conferences and Bible studies, and she’s a monthly contributor to Inspire-a-fire and a newspaper columnist for Greene Publishing. Find out more about Christy at her website christybassadams.com Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. The post 212 – The Writer’s Path to Holiness with Guest Karen Stiller appeared first on Write from the Deep.

One of the most profound, and necessary, gifts we can give ourselves is rest. Not only is it a good idea, but God designed us to rest. Yet too often we just keep going. We don’t want to be lazy, after all. Guest Kathleen Denly shares what happens when our misguided ideas about rest become unhealthy, and how we can ensure this gift is the blessing it’s meant it to be. About Kathleen Denly Kathleen Denly writes historical romance to entertain, encourage, and inspire readers toward a better understanding of our amazing God and how he sees us. Award winning author of the Chaparral Hearts series, she also shares history tidbits, thoughts on writing, books reviews and more at KathleenDenly.com. Thanks to our sponsors on Patreon, we’re able to offer an edited transcript of the podcast! Erin: Welcome, listeners, to the deep. We’re glad that you’re joining us today. We’ve been talking with our guest, Kathleen Denly. If you didn’t catch the first half of this interview, go back and listen, because it’s great. Now we’re going to dive right into part two with Kathleen Denly.  Kathleen: I am just as valuable in that position and just as loved in that position as I am today. As I was in my mother’s womb.  Erin: Yeah.  Kathleen: And that was the biggest thing that pulled me out.  Erin: Wow.  Kathleen: That firm belief that God loved me no matter what.  Erin: I love that. I’m guessing, though, that was a slow journey for you. Kathleen: Yes. Erin: With lots of little milestones along the way, things you learned along the way. What are you doing now? This all happened by you driving yourself, right? You were so driven to do all these things. So how do you let yourself rest now?  Kathleen: I had to change the way that I view rest.  Erin: Mmm.  Kathleen: That came from a couple of things. It came from the physical. The way we were designed, our bodies need rest, and that means more than just sleep. Our brains need rest. I had been raised with this idea that I need to constantly prove that I wasn’t lazy. And people who rested were lazy. How stupid is that? But that’s what I believed. Underneath everything, that’s what my actions were saying, that rest was wrong, rest was sinful. But when I actually went back and looked at the scriptures, I realized that even Jesus directed his disciples to rest. Karen: Right. Kathleen: God rested on the seventh day. Am I any better than God that I don’t need rest? I mean, come on. It’s just silly. What I realized is that resting isn’t a symptom of laziness. Instead, it’s just something like eating. You can eat to an extreme. Whether that’s not eating enough or eating too much, you can use that and turn it into sin. Same thing with rest. If you take it to an extreme, and you’re using it as an excuse to avoid doing things that you’re supposed to be doing, then yeah, it’s probably sinful. But God designed us to need rest. The truth is that we are the most creative, and we are the most competent, and the most effective when we have taken the time to rest. That’s something that can be really hard to rewire in our brains because our culture rewards busyness. Erin: Yeah! Kathleen: I can’t tell you how many times I would have friends be like, “Wow, how do you get all that done? I’m so impressed.” That’s such a nice thing for them to say, except that in hindsight, they were reinforcing these bad beliefs that I had about myself. Karen: Yes. Kathleen: I don’t think I’m the only one who gets that message.  Karen: No, no. Not by a long shot.  Erin: Busyness, yeah. Busyness equates to being “productive,” and we then equate productivity with meaning. And it’s not. If we’re busy doing the wrong things, we’re not creating meaning.  Kathleen: Exactly.  Karen: That’s why I love the story about Jesus and Mary and Martha so much. Martha’s bustling around and doing everything, and Mary’s just sitting at his feet and soaking in his presence and being with him. Martha’s like, “Tell Mary to come help me. She’s not working.” Erin: That would be me saying that, too. I’m sorry! Karen: And I’d be sitting at his feet! I love it when Jesus says that Mary has chosen the better way. Like he’s saying, “I will not be here forever. And she has chosen the better way, sitting and resting.” I think,, too, that a part of the key for dealing with all this is that God created our bodies to give us warnings. The pain and the things that you experienced that you just brushed off and didn’t pay any attention to… We like to think that we are super people. Erin: Yes. Karen: That we can keep going and keep doing. But when all that is stripped away, as it was for you, and as it was at a point for me, you sit back and you say, “Sometimes the very best things that I can do are just to go outside and watch the birds.” There is blessing that comes in that, and there is blessing that comes from that. I can then take what I gained from rest and share it with others, and it gives me the energy to do what God wants me to.  Erin: I think this just goes back to our problem way back in the Garden of Eden, wanting to be like God. We don’t like to acknowledge our limitations. We don’t like to have them. We want to be superhuman, as you said Karen, and not acknowledge those limitations. I think that’s another reason why God made us rest. Karen: Yeah. Erin: He made us need it so that we would have to acknowledge our limitations. When we don’t, bad things happen. Then we have to look at it. Either way, we’d have to look at it.  Kathleen: The really sneaky thing about the devil is that he will take God’s scripture and try to give it to us with his own spin. Karen: Twist it. Kathleen: Yeah. Like, “Oh, I can do anything in God’s strength.” Weeeeell, but are you supposed to right now? Are you supposed to be doing something in God’s strength? Maybe the thing you’re supposed to be doing in God’s strength is resting. Resting and trusting that he will take care of the things that you’re not working on right now. Karen: Right!  Erin: Which makes a very good argument for why we not only need to know our Bible, because Satan does too, but we need to understand it. We need to be meditating on it and thinking about its meaning. It’s not enough to just know what it says. We have to understand what it means, to the best of our ability.  Kathleen: Yeah, and some of us are really good about taking spiritual things and using it to justify what we’re doing. Like, “Oh, well, yeah, it’s the Sabbath, and I know I’m supposed to rest. But I’m gonna do this ministry, and I’m gonna help this person, and these are all spiritual things, so it’s okay to do that on Sunday, right? I don’t actually have to rest because I’m doing all these spiritual things.” Karen: Yeah. “I’m going to write on Sunday because it’s really my only free day, and God understands that. So it’s okay for me to do that.”  Kathleen: And, “As a Christian author, my writing is a ministry. So that’s allowed on Sunday.” There’s a lot of ways that we can trick ourselves into thinking we don’t actually need to rest. Erin: Yeah. What are some of the ways you’ve incorporated rest, or that you’re working to incorporate rest into your life?  Kathleen: One of the things that I did was I had to make myself a hard and fast stop to the end of the day. Six o’clock, no matter what. If I haven’t met my word goal. If the kids were crazy and they interrupted my work time and I didn’t do the things that I wanted to get done today, it doesn’t matter. I stop at six o’clock. Period. End of story. There’s no negotiation, because if I don’t stop, then what happens is I’m working till eight o’clock, nine o’clock, ten o’clock. I’m supposed to be going to sleep at ten o’clock, so then I’m borrowing energy from the next day, because I’m not getting the sleep that I need. I’ve found that I have to stop at six in order to give my brain time to shut down and to stop being in work mode. I need the shut down time in order to be able to go to sleep at ten o’clock. If I don’t stop working until eight, that means I’m not really getting to sleep till midnight.  Erin: Yeah.  Kathleen: So a hard, hard stop on work is one of the things I’ve needed to incorporate. Also a hard bedtime, which has been a struggle for me my entire life. My mom said I was nocturnal in the womb. For my entire life, I was the kind of person who wanted to be up till two AM and sleep till noon. My whole life. I’ve learned that that just is not going to work. I’ve got kids. I’ve got responsibilities. I need to have a more practical sleep schedule, and so I work really hard at making sure that I have all of my screens turned off by nine o’clock, and I am going to sleep by ten.  Erin: Wow. Good for you! Kathleen: So those are two things. The other thing is I work really, really, really hard NOT to work on the weekends. Erin: Mm-Hmm.  Kathleen: If I have to trade a day, say maybe I spent all day Tuesday running the kids to medical appointments, then I have to talk to my husband and get permission from him. I ask him, “Can I work on Saturday to make up for that?” He will help me decide if I’m making a healthy decision, or if I’m letting pressures that are not necessarily healthy push me into making a decision that’s not good.  Karen: So you’re not making these decisions in a vacuum. You’re getting trusted allies to help you with it. Kathleen: Exactly. Karen: That’s very smart.  Kathleen: Yeah, because as much as I’ve learned all of these truths, I’ve lived forty-plus years with all those lies, and they want to come back. They want to come back all the time. I’ll be honest, there have still been some days when I’ve been like, “I’ve gotta do this, and I’ve gotta do that, and I can’t do this, and I’m never gonna get all this done!” My husband’s like, “Breathe. Just breathe. Have you done a grounding exercise? I think you need to do a grounding exercise.” For those of you who don’t know what this is, one of my favorite grounding exercises is called 5-4-3-2-1. I look around for five things in the room that I can see, four things that I can touch, three things that I can hear, two things I can smell, and one thing I can taste. What that does is take me out of my brain that is panicking and thinking only about my to-do list. Or when I’m having a flashback that’s trying to take me backwards in time and tell me I’m not actually where I am, this exercise forces me to pay attention to the details of where I am and what’s around me. There’s something about that that just makes you go, “Yeah. Okay. I can deal with this.” Erin: Yeah. Kathleen: Once I’ve done that, then I go, “Okay, time to pray.” Erin: I actually like that you have a tool before you pray. You have that grounding tool first, and then it helps you focus so your prayer can be more focused. You’re able to hear God, seek God. Again, it’s this marriage between wisdom from the field of psychology and counseling, which is okay! It’s knowledge that God has given us. But it’s this marriage between that. It’s this marriage between your physical body and what you’re doing, and it’s this spiritual side. It’s all together. I like how it incorporates everything. That makes a lot of sense.  Kathleen: Yeah. Because without that, my prayers sound a lot like, “God, what am I gonna do? What do I do? God help me. Help me. Help me. Help me. Help me!” God doesn’t ever get a word in edgewise. Being able to use the grounding techniques helps me to listen better. Karen: How does it feel now? Now that you have changed the way that you see what you need to do, the way that you see the world, and the way that you see yourself? What’s the difference in how you feel as a person, as a believer, as a writer?  Kathleen: A big difference. The first thing that came to mind when you said that is I feel more relaxed. Erin: Mmm.  Kathleen: I feel more at peace.  Karen: Yeah.  Kathleen: I feel more trusting. I thought I was trusting God. I really did. But now I FEEL that. I feel less worried. I feel less anxious. I feel more comfortable in who I am because I see who I am more clearly through him. That’s the ironic thing. The theme for all of my novels is helping my characters see themselves as God sees them and not how the world sees them. And I’m sitting over here doing what I was doing! Now I see myself more clearly.  Erin: What’s interesting, though, is that this peace…you’re a non-anxious presence now. It helps you be a non-anxious presence in the world. That is beyond valuable. It’s one of the greatest lights that we can have as a Christian in this world because there’s anxiety everywhere—in people. All over the place. Just the fact that our body, mind, and soul is more relaxed, it’s one of the best ways that we can witness for Christ. I look at your whole journey. It’s hard that these trials make us look at these things. They force us. Kathleen: Right. Erin: We don’t want to go there, and they force us, very much like we force our characters in our stories. But look at what’s happened now. Look at where you are now. It’s just astounding  Kathleen: It is. And I want to be careful not to give the impression that, “Oh, I’m over it now and I’m fine.” It’s a daily thing that I use those tools. Like I said, I still have flashbacks. I’m still going to therapy for my PTSD, and it’s something I will struggle with. But God has been good in showing me a lot and helping me change a lot. Erin: Yeah. Our time is about up here. Do you have any final words of wisdom or encouragement that you would want to leave with our listeners?  Kathleen: Yeah, I do want to share something that I think a lot of us are nervous about. If we see somebody who is struggling with mental health issues, there are three things that I have found very helpful, because it can be hard to know how to respond, how to help. The first thing that I would say is validate their feelings. A lot of people go, “Oh, I don’t wanna agree with them.” Because if you hear somebody say, “I’m a terrible person,” and you care about them, the first thing you want to do is say, “No, you’re not a terrible person.” But what you’re actually doing by saying that is arguing with them. We don’t want to agree because we don’t think they’re a terrible person, but we also don’t want to argue with them. Because even if that lie they’re believing isn’t true, the feelings that they’re getting from it are true. They’re real. They feel them. A better thing to say in response is, “Wow, it must be really painful to feel like you’re a terrible person.” It’s a very subtle difference, but it’s something that allows them to hear you.  Erin: Yeah.  Kathleen: The second thing that I have found helpful is to gently share the truth with them when they’re ready to hear it. You can’t shove truth in their face. You can’t approach it like an argument, but you can gently say something like, “I want you to know that I don’t think you are a terrible person.” Erin: Yeah.  Kathleen: You can even add on to that and say, “I think you are a responsible, caring, loving person, and I’m blessed to have you as my friend.”  You can say things like that because it’s your opinion. You’re not arguing with them. You’re not telling them their feelings aren’t real, because again, even if the lie is false, the feelings are there. Erin: Yeah.  Kathleen: The last thing I would say is don’t underestimate the value of just being present. If you don’t know what to say, just stay. Just sit there and listen. Because one of the tricks the devil likes to play is to convince the suffering person to be silent and alone. Erin: Yeah. Kathleen: The devil will tell them, “Nobody cares about your suffering. If they knew what you were thinking, they would think you were a terrible person.” If all you do is sit there and listen in compassion, then you’ve already broken that lie.  Erin: I love that.    Karen: Well, I’ve got tell you, this has been an amazing show, and your story is terrifying and inspiring all at the same time. That we can do these things to ourselves and so damage ourselves without even realizing we’re doing it, with thinking that we’re doing the right thing. Kathleen: Mm-Hmm. Karen: God help us. Seriously, God help us all. Give us eyes to see when we are mistreating the child that he created, the child that is us. I’m so glad that he put the right people in place for you to help you. That he put the right voices to offset and replace the voices of the enemy. I firmly believe that he will do that for anyone who reaches out and asks for help, whether they’re asking for help from him or from anybody else. Mental illness is not something you deal with by yourself. Follow Kathleen’s wisdom. Have people that you can rely on, have people who will speak truth to you. Remember, just because the clouds are there, just because you can’t see or hear him, doesn’t mean God’s not there. He is. He has you, and he loves you no matter what. Just because he created you, he loves you. And for that, we could all be grateful. Kathleen: Absolutely. Do you think resting is just being lazy? You couldn’t be more wrong! Guest Kathleen Denly shares how this God-given gift has been instrumental in bringing her back to mental health! #christianwriter #amwriting Click To Tweet WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! Do you find it easy or difficult to truly rest? Why? THANK YOU! Thanks to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! Special thanks to our April sponsor of the month Christy Bass Adams. She’s the author of a devotional titled Learning As I Go: Big Lessons from Little People, and a middle grades novel, The Adventures of Cricket and Kyle: Imagination Checkers. She’s also a speaker and leads women’s conferences and Bible studies, and she’s a monthly contributor to Inspire-a-fire and a newspaper columnist for Greene Publishing. Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. The post 211 – The Gift of Rest with Guest Kathleen Denly appeared first on Write from the Deep.

We don’t like to talk about it. We’re afraid to admit to it. But the fact is that being a firm believer doesn’t keep mental illness from striking. How do we, as believers and writers, deal with the reality of mental illness? Guest Kathleen Denly joins us to share how God met her in her own struggle and continues to guide her to soundness of body and mind. About Kathleen Denly Kathleen Denly writes historical romance to entertain, encourage, and inspire readers toward a better understanding of our amazing God and how He sees us. Award winning author of the Chaparral Hearts series, she also shares history tidbits, thoughts on writing, books reviews and more at KathleenDenly.com. Thanks to our sponsors on Patreon, we’re able to offer an edited transcript of the podcast! Karen: Hi guys, and welcome to the deep. We are delighted you are here because we have an outstanding guest to share her experiences, knowledge, and wisdom with you.  Erin: We do. Her name is Kathleen Denley, and I get to introduce her. Karen and I both got to know Kathleen through her writing. We both edited her work and it’s been great.  Welcome, Kathleen Denly Kathleen is the award-winning author of the Chaparral Hearts series. She writes historical romance to entertain, encourage, and inspire readers toward a better understanding of our amazing God and how He sees us. Kathleen enjoys finding the lesser known pockets of history and bringing them to life through the joys and struggles of her characters. California, a favorite setting to her stories, is also her home, and she lives there with her loving husband, four young children, two dogs, and yes everybody, 10 cats. As the member of the adoption and foster community, children in need are a cause dear to her heart, and she finds they make frequent appearances in her stories. So Kathleen, welcome. We’re glad to have you here.  Kathleen: Thank you so much. I’m glad to be here.  Take Courage in God’s Strength Erin: Let’s just jump right in. Kathleen, we love to ask people, what does the deep mean to you?  Kathleen: I’ve been listening to your podcast for so long. I thought about this for quite a while, and I feel like it changes depending on the season of life I’m in. Writing from the deep is about taking courage in God’s strength and wisdom, being able to go into those raw, dark, honest places that make you nervous. But again, leaning on God’s courage and strength to share the lessons he’s taught you from those dark and hard places with others. Erin: I love that because we do, we have to go to the places where we’re nervous. That’s where it gets real.  A Scary Truth Today we wanted to talk about something more real than Christians sometimes want to admit, but we need to admit it. We need to talk about it, and it’s mental illness. We asked Kathleen to share her story with us. But first, Kathleen, why do you think that Christians sometimes struggle to admit the reality of mental illness?  Kathleen: Well, first, I think it’s scary. We don’t want to think about the fact that this could happen to us. We wanna think, “Well, no. I’m a good Christian. I do all the right things, therefore I am impervious to this.” But that’s not actually what Scripture plays out.  Karen: Right. Kathleen: Several people in the Bible struggled with mental illness. If you look for the signs, you can see them easily. And there are even people who showed signs, and expressed the words, of suicidal thoughts, where they were despairing of life and they thought God had abandoned them. They had real struggles just like we do today. Mental Illness Taboo in the church? Kathleen: But our culture has made it somewhat taboo. There is a history in the church of misunderstanding back in the 1700s, 1800s, and even farther back, of what mental illness actually was. They thought it was strictly a spiritual thing, or it was a sign of moral depravity or immaturity. And so a lot of taboo and stigma developed. It’s not as scary if we can say, “Oh, well, not me. I don’t struggle with that.” I don’t think people intentionally think, “Oh, I’m better than them, because they have that.” I think it’s more of a fear-based reaction.  Erin: And some Christians seem to think, “Hey, we have God so nothing can be wrong with our minds. We’ll just pray it away.” You know, as if you could pray away a broken leg.  Karen: It’s like they’re trying to cover God’s backside. “Oh, he would never let you go into that. That can’t affect you because you have Jesus.” It’s A Brain Problem Erin: But there are very real struggles with the way our brains function. A friend of mine knows that I battle chronic fatigue and she just sent me an article about a recent study where they took MRIs and there’s a real dysfunction that they can see in the brain. It’s not like, “Oh, you’re lazy. Oh, you’re tired for no reason.” It’s a brain problem.  Karen: And people don’t  recognize that about mental illness. There is often a physiological component to it. Kathleen: I heard a quote on another show that I was watching and they said science is finally catching up with the Bible. The Bible has shown us that these things are real and they have not just a spiritual component, but also a physical component. I’m so grateful that we are at the point now where science is starting to help us understand that physical part of it. Erin: Yeah, exactly.  Situational Components Karen: There’s also a situational component that comes into play. My father-in-law’s alcoholism, and the abuse that stemmed from that, resulted, for Don and his siblings, in some issues. The defenses they developed as children against what was happening to them tend to carry over into adulthood. At one point Don and I were in a counseling session, because our marriage almost didn’t survive what had happened to him, and the counselor said to Don, “The defense mechanisms that kept you alive as a kid are destroying you as an adult.” So often we need to learn how to live without defenses we no longer need and, as believers, to know that we’re safe because God’s got us.  Erin: So, Kathleen, you’ve had your own journey with this situation. How did you first know something wasn’t right? Not Myself Kathleen: Basically I started acting very not myself. I had experienced postpartum depression after delivering one of my children several years ago. I mean, he’s 13 now. But when I started struggling this time my thoughts were going to places that were darker than normal for me. I even had, in the beginning, fleeting thoughts of, “I don’t wanna be alive anymore.” As soon as I had that thought go through my head, I went, “Wait, what? No, that’s not me. That’s not okay. That’s not normal.” I learned later that what I was going through was a side-effect of some pain medication that the doctor put me on. I had incurred––and it sounds so silly to say it this way––a repetitive strain injury. That just sounds so simple, so much less than what it actually was for me. There came a point at which I was in so much pain that I started screaming and I couldn’t stop.  Karen: Wow.  Losing My Grip on Reality Kathleen: It became so bad that, as my husband was trying to get me to medical care, I was beginning to lose my grip on reality. I was so consumed with pain that all of my other senses just shut off. I wasn’t seeing anything. I  wasn’t hearing anything. It was almost like I was out of my body  and the only thing that existed was pain. I would float in and out of being able to see what was going on around me, just completely consumed by pain. The whole time I was screaming and screaming and screaming. I was convinced I was going to die. I thought, “There’s no way I can live through this. This is beyond anything. If I don’t die, I’m gonna lose my mind. I’m gonna go insane from just the sheer level of pain.”  Erin: Wow.  Kathleen: Finally I got medical help and they were able to help me grab onto reality long enough to tell them what was going on, as much as I could understand, because we were still waiting for all these tests and to see specialists. “I did it to myself” Kathleen: Finally the doctors gave me pain medication that brought me back into reality permanently. But that particular day, when it was so bad, is something I still have flashbacks to. And now I have been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. And the really, really frustrating thing is that I did it to myself. I didn’t know I was doing it to myself, but I did. I worked myself into that injury. I had pain off and on every time I wrote a first draft because I would do marathon writing sessions. The first time I did this, I started getting pain in my shoulder and my arm and my elbow and my wrist. But I just took an ibuprofen and keep working. Then, when the ibuprofen wasn’t enough, I would take a day off. And by “a day off” I mean I would type with my left hand instead of my right hand.  Erin: Wow.  Kathleen: And then, when taking a day off wasn’t enough, I would take a week off. By my third book, it got to the point where nothing helped. The pain just kept getting worse and I wasn’t able to type at all. The pain interferied with my ability to even think about my stories, let alone type them out. So I finally went and saw a doctor. Because it was interfering with my work. It had nothing to do with the pain other than I needed it to go away so I could get my work done.  Listen to the Warning Bells! Erin: Well, that’s a warning bell right there.  Kathleen: Yeah, but I didn’t think about it that way at the time. I thought, “This is what good responsible people do. They get stuff done and they don’t let pain get in the way.” This is how I was raised. In hindsight, I learned that what I had going on underneath was fear of what other people would think about me if I didn’t get stuff done––if I missed a deadline, if I wasn’t as successful as I could be on social media, if I didn’t have enough subscribers to my newsletter, if I didn’t have my platform strong enough, if I didn’t write enough guest posts… I was even planning my to start my own podcast at the time. But I thought I was just doing all the things that you were supposed to do.  Karen: You could have started the Scream podcast: “Okay. Scream with me folks.” I bet there are a lot of people who would join you. Kathleen: Actually, I bet there are days when people would log on. You Can’t Do It All! Kathleen: Basically, I took all the advice from writer’s conferences, but I didn’t take it as suggestions or guidelines or things to think about. I made it all my life. Because I assumed––and again, this was not a conscious thought, this is something I figured out in retrospect––I assumed, “Well, my husband knows who I am. My kids know who I am. My mom, my friends, they all know who I am. They don’t need me to prove to them that I’m a good person.” But all these other people––my new publisher, the other writers that I don’t know, the readers––they’re just getting to know me and need to have a good impression of me. And if I’m gonna give them a good impression, I need to do all these things and do them right now. And I need to do them perfectly.  Karen: Man! Kathleen: ‘Cause I can’t give a bad impression and I can’t offend anybody and I can’t disappoint anybody.  Do You Hear Yourself? Erin: Wait, just stop there for one second. Listeners, did you hear that? Do you hear yourself in there? Just a little bit? I think almost every beginning writer or intermediate writer, even experienced writer, sometimes hears that. So then what? What happened from there, Kathleen?  Kathleen: The sad result is that my family took second place to my work. Everything took second place to my work. Even my Bible study started taking second place. And I started thinking, “Oh, I’ve spent an hour and a half on Bible study this morning. I should have been writing. I should cut that down to 20 minutes. And how backwards is that? That’s totally backwards.  Writers Need Bible Study Time! Karen: That’s insane, is what that is. Kathleen: Right? I’ve since learned that I need my Bible study to do good work. I need my Bible study to guide me in making the right decisions. Instead, I got focused on being perfect. I got focused on getting everything done and I became a workaholic. And worked myself into injury.  Erin: Which, for a lot of people, is not an unusual story. And there might be people out there who are heading that direction right now. If so, this is a cautionary tale for you.  Kathleen: I hope so.  Erin: What happened then?  The Body Always Knows Kathleen: Well, one thing I want to share is that before all this, I had done everything to make sure my setup was ergonomic. I had a chair that was completely customized. I had my screen elevated, my keyboard at the right level…everything was exactly how it should be. So I actually thought I’d protected myself from this kind of an injury. Except nobody told me that you can’t just keep working. You have to take breaks. Your muscles wear out even if you’re doing everything the right way. After the injury, my physical therapist taught me to set an alarm every hour. To get up, move around, do stretches, move my body so that it’s doing something different than sitting and writing. And I learned how vital it is to eat healthy and drink well to stay hydrated. To take care of your body because if you don’t, it doesn’t matter what your mind’s doing… Karen: Yeah.  Kathleen: …the body will eventually overrule you.  Erin: The body always knows. I had a conversation with a counseling psychologist and she said the body always tells the story. So this injury forced you to stop trying to do it all, perfect or otherwise.But then you were on painkillers and they were messing with your mind. The Process of Healing Kathleen: Yes. I focused on healing physically, but eventually my brain started going, “Okay, now that we’re not in physical survival mode, here’s all this stuff I’ve been holding back on you.” That’s when the PTSD symptoms started kicking in––the panic attacks and the anxiety and the flashbacks. I didn’t have a flashback until almost a year after the injury. When I say flashback, for me it’s audible, visual, physical––the whole thing. It’s like somebody places a film over my eyes and I’m seeing where I was then laid over the faded image of where I actually am. And I feel the pain that I felt that day, and hear the sounds that I heard that day. It can be triggered by a noise, a smell, a specific environment. Anything. I had to change my bedroom around because I spent six weeks stuck in bed, unable to do anything. I needed help to shower, to eat––with everything. So once I was better, we had to rearrange my bedroom so it wouldn’t remind me of when I was stuck there. Erin: Wow. Okay. That’s hard.  Coming Back from the Dark Kathleen: I needed therapy and a researching of the scriptures to get myself back from the dark place I had fallen into. One day I looked at my author bio, because I was trying to get work done, and every single thing in that bio––the one that you read at the beginning of this podcast––I wasn’t any of that anymore. I couldn’t hike. I couldn’t craft, I couldn’t write, I couldn’t mother, I couldn’t wife, I couldn’t do anything. I still lived in California and I was still married. Those were about the only things that still applied  It felt like my entire identity had been stripped away from me, and my world had been turned upside down and I didn’t understand anything. So I clung to who God was. I knew His character and I clung to that like I was holding on with my fingernails to a rock ledge over a thousand-foot drop.  Why Me, God? Kathleen: I didn’t know why He was letting me go through this. I didn’t know where this was gonna take me. All I knew was God. God is good. God is unchanging. God loves me. God has a good purpose for my suffering. That was what I clung to. I had nothing else in the darkest of times.  But the thing is, God knew there were so many lies being poured into my head at that time. Things like, I was worthless. I was helpless. I was a burden. I wasn’t helping anybody and they were all having to help me. I didn’t realize I had this underlying belief that I was only as valuable as my accomplishments. I was only as valuable as much as I could help somebody else. And I didn’t know that until that was taken away from me. Karen: Mm.  A Deep, Dark Place Kathleen: When I found myself in that dark, dark place, I had legitimate thoughts of ending my life. But God knew I would get to this dark place, and He prepared in advance the things that I would need. He gave me a husband who would not give up on me, who would not leave me alone, who would get me to the help that I needed. And God also prepared the therapist and the psychiatrist that I would need to diagnose me, to treat me, and to provide me with the medication that I needed, all of which helped my brain work in a way that allowed me to battle the lies Satan was pouring into my head. A Three-Tiered Approach Erin: Wow. So you had a three-tiered approach there.  Kathleen: Yeah. I really needed mental help, physical help, and spiritual help. God is so good and in His infinite wisdom, He gave me the shovels I needed to dig my way out from under that mountain of lies. And He never left me. That was the one thing I knew, even when I was thinking about ending my life. It wasn’t because I thought God had abandoned me. It was because, in that moment, in that few minutes where I went that dark and that deep, I lost sight of the light. He was there. I just wasn’t looking at Him. But He was there.  The Light is Still There Karen: The enemy makes a concerted effort to pull the curtains so that you can’t look at God. To make it feel as though you can’t see Him. I think anybody who’s been in that place, whether it’s mental illness or whether it’s just a place of despair, and is considering suicide––which, I’ve been there––we need help to find the light again. I went to the Psalms and found them comforting because David was so immersed in, “How long, O Lord, will you forget me?” And yet in the next Psalm it’s, “Praise the Lord! He is faithful and glorious! And He is the only one worthy to be praised.” That  reminded me that yes, we go into those dark places, but the Light is still there.  Look Past the Fog When I was a kid, we used to go up into the mountains to get Christmas trees and the first time we were going up, there was fog that coated the valley. We eventually climbed higher than the fog, and there was sunshine there and blue skies! It had never registered with my brain that just because there’s fog or clouds doesn’t mean the sun is gone and that the skies aren’t blue. They’re just being veiled.  And that’s often what depression and mental illness can do to us, even when we’re not aware of it.  God Loves You No Matter What! Kathleen: The Scripture that had the biggest impact on me was about God knitting us together in our mother’s womb and loving us before we were born. It struck me so much harder than it ever had in my life. He loved me before I was born. What does that mean? That means I hadn’t done a stinking thing to deserve to be loved, to be cared for, to have any kind of value of my own. I just was existing, and even that only because of Him. So why did He love me? Because He created me! Period. End of story. I did nothing. I can do nothing to earn or deserve His love. So if tomorrow I have a terrible accident and the only thing I can do was lay in bed while somebody else feeds me and clothes me, I am just as valuable and just as loved as I am today. As I was in my mother’s womb. And that was the biggest thing that pulled me out. That firm belief God loved me no matter what.  Karen: Amen. Erin: Amen. Do Christians Suffer from Mental Illness with guest Kathleen Denly #amwriting #Christianwriter Click To Tweet WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! Have you or someone you’ve known suffered from mental illness? How did God help you through it? THANK YOU! Thanks to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! Thanks so much to our March sponsor of the month, Tammy Partlow! She’s a speaker at women’s retreats, and her debut novel Blood Beneath the Pines, a suspense set in the deep South, is now available. She’s hard at work on the next book in the series! Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. The post 210 – Do Christians Suffer from Mental Illness? with Guest Kathleen Denly appeared first on Write from the Deep.

Anyone who has ever attended church has heard about God’s glory. We’ve sung about it, we’ve read about it in the Bible. But do we really understand it? And do we realize that we, both as believers and writers, are tasked with displaying God’s glory to the world? But how can we, in all our humanity and weaknesses, do something so grand and important? It’s easier than you think! But first, thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! In our last podcast, we discussed George Muller and his amazing life of prayer. I want to take a minute to treat Muller like a character in a novel with goals, motivations, and conflict. So, George Muller had goals, he had ministries he wanted to start, like an orphan house. And he certainly had conflict—he had no money, no building, and no people to work with orphans. But what I love most is his motivation: He wanted people to see the mighty works that God did—how God provided, how trustworthy God is, and how deserving of praise God is. In other words, he wanted to glorify God. That’s a great motivation! And it’s right in line with God’s goal in creating us. Why Did God Create Us? God created us, and everything else, to glorify him. Here’s what Isaiah 43:7 says, “Bring all who claim me as their God, for I have made them for my glory. It was I who created them.” And Isaiah 43:21 says, “The people who I formed for myself will declare my praise.” Psalm 19:1 tells us, “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.” An article on DesiringGod.org puts it this way: “The supreme goal of God in history from beginning to end is the manifestation of his great glory. Accordingly our duty is to bring our thoughts, affections, and actions into line with this goal.” What is God’s Glory? But what is God’s glory? What do you think of when you hear that word? We might think about what glory looks like—maybe what Isaiah saw in Isaiah 6:1, when he saw the Lord high and exalted on a throne, with the train of his robe filling the temple. Or we might think of what Ezekiel saw. He describes a whirlwind, and living creatures, and wheels, and then he says, “…what looked like a throne of lapis lazuli, and high above on the throne was a figure like that of a man. I saw that from what appeared to be his waist up he looked like glowing metal, as if full of fire, and that from there down he looked like fire; and brilliant light surrounded him. Like the appearance of a rainbow in the clouds on a rainy day, so was the radiance around him. This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord. When I saw it, I fell facedown…”  Ezekiel 1:26-28 NIV Or we might just think of light or fire so pure, bright, and holy that we can’t even look at it—we’d be consumed. Like in Hebrews 12:29 where it says, “For our God is a consuming fire.” Or, We might think about a dictionary definition like honor, renown, magnificence, splendor, majesty, power. An article on DesiringGod.org defines it like this: “The glory of God is the infinite beauty and greatness of his manifold perfections.” An article on Christianity.com says, “God’s glory is an indicator of his value” So, God’s glory is God’s splendor, his worth, his value, his acts, his greatness, his brilliance, his power, his overwhelming nature, his majesty, his utterly beyond-ness. HOW do we glorify God? Yet here we are, little puny humans, who exist to help display all that. How do we do that? First, let’s realize that God has done the heavy lifting. We don’t have to do it all. He causes his own glory to be shown through his righteous acts and through his creation. Look at the proof in the following verses: “I have swept away your offenses like a cloud, your sins like the morning mist. Return to me, for I have redeemed you. Sing for joy, you heavens, for the Lord has done this; shout aloud, you earth beneath. Burst into song, you mountains, you forests and all your trees, for the Lord has redeemed Jacob, he displays his glory in Israel.” Isaiah 44:22-23 NIV “And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, ‘Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord.  This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.’ Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.’” Luke 2:8-14 NIV “I [Jesus] have brought you glory on earth by finishing the work you gave me to do.” John 17:4 NIV “The Lord will rescue me from every evil attack and will bring me safely to his heavenly kingdom. To him be glory for ever and ever. Amen.” 2 Timothy 4:18 NIV But, we still have a part to play. As the DesiringGod article said, it’s “our duty…to bring our thoughts, affections, and actions into line with” God’s goal of displaying his glory. We can do that by ascribing glory to God, revering his glory, and declaring his glory. Ascribe Glory to God When we ascribe glory to God, we’re recognizing it, we’re realizing it, we’re naming it. We’re attributing this characteristic to God, just like it says in these verses: “You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they were created and have their being.” Revelation 4:11 NIV “…Great and marvelous are your deeds, Lord God Almighty. Just and true are your ways, King of the nations. Who will not fear you, Lord, and bring glory to your name? For you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship before you, for your righteous acts have been revealed.”Revelation 15:3-4 NIV “Ascribe to the Lord, you heavenly beings, ascribe to the Lord glory and strength. Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name; worship the Lord in the splendor of his holiness.” Psalm 29:1-2 NIV We also ascribe glory to him when we acknowledge that his actions are ultimately for his glory, as it says in Psalm 79:9: “Help us, God our Savior, for the glory of your name; deliver us and forgive our sins for your name’s sake.” Psalm 79:9 NIV Revere God’s glory When we revere God’s glory, we’re acknowledging the seriousness of it, the awe it should inspire. God’s glory is never to be taken lightly. Isaiah 59:19 says, “From the west, people will fear the name of the Lord, and from the rising of the sun, they will revere his glory. For he will come like a pent-up flood that the breath of the Lord drives along.” Revering God’s glory means we’re careful not take God’s glory. Here’s what Psalm 115:1 says, “Not to us, Lord, not to us but to your name be the glory, because of your love and faithfulness.” Revering God’s glory also means we never, ever deny the truth of it, because we will face God’s wrath if we do. Romans 1:18-25 (NIV) has this to say: “The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse. For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles. Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.” Paul goes on in that passage to talk about all the ways we will continue to devolve into evil if we refuse to recognize and value the truth about God and his glory. It’s not pretty. Declare God’s glory In addition to ascribing God glory and revering God’s glory, we also are to declare it. We’re to tell it, to make it known as it says in these verse: “Sing to the Lord, all the earth; proclaim his salvation day after day. Declare his glory among the nations, his marvelous deeds among all peoples. For great is the Lord and most worthy of praise; he is to be feared above all gods.” 1 Chronicles 16:23-25 NIV “All your works praise you, Lord; your faithful people extol you. They tell of the glory of your kingdom and speak of your might, so that all people may know of your mighty acts and the glorious splendor of your kingdom.” Psalm 145:10-12 NIV “They raise their voices, they shout for joy; from the west they acclaim the Lord’s majesty. Therefore in the east give glory to the Lord; exalt the name of the Lord, the God of Israel, in the islands of the sea. From the ends of the earth we hear singing: ‘Glory to the Righteous One.’” Isaiah 24:14-16 NIV “Because your love is better than life, my lips will glorify you.” Psalm 63:3 NIV As writers, another way we declare God’s glory is through our words on the page. Those words tell of God’s truth and his worth, his actions and his attributes, his creation, his sovereignty, and his love. While it’s great if people read your words, don’t forget that just writing words is an act of declaration, and that is reason enough to write them. Bearing Witness to God’s Glory through trust Our trust in God is another way we bear witness to his glory. We can show our trust by believing his promises, like Abraham. Here’s what Romans 4:18-21 (NIV) has to say: “Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, ‘So shall your offspring be.’ Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead—since he was about a hundred years old—and that Sarah’s womb was also dead. Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised.” 2 Corinthians 1:20 (NIV) tells us, “For no matter how many promises God has made, they are ‘Yes’ in Christ. And so through him the “Amen” is spoken by us to the glory of God.” Our amen is our agreement, it’s our acknowledgement that we agree God will fulfill all his promises, and that glorifies God. Ephesians 1:13-14 says, “And you also were included in Christ when you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation. When you believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory.” Again, our belief is a mark of our agreement, our trust that God has and will save us. Bearing witness to God’s glory though our actions Another way we bring glory to God is through our actions. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 10:13, “So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.” We need to think about this and take it seriously. Everything we do should demonstrate that God is our supreme value. That God is who and what we hold most dear. This should be reflected in how we spend our time, how we spend our money, how we talk, how we write, how we treat others, how we handle disagreement, how we behave on social media, or at church, or at the grocery store, or during an interview, or driving down the highway during rush hour. You might be thinking—as I am—well that’s a tall order. But God doesn’t leave us to do this on our own. He helps us. He gives us his strength, his Holy Spirit, his promises, his living word in the Bible. And he gives us the right to come before his throne and—to the best of our fallen ability in this fallen world—behold God’s glory. These glimpses change us. The more we ascribe, revere, declare, and behold God’s glory, the more we are changed. Here’s what 2 Corinthians 3:18 (RSV) tells us: “And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being changed into his likeness from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.” As we’re changed, we’re better and better able to be a reflection of God’s glory, which brings God glory. But there’s more. As we shine, we also display God’s Kingdom to those around us. We shine in a dark, broken world that so desperately needs light. I was discussing this in my mastermind group and here’s how one woman put it: “We’re walking trophy cases to display God’s glory.” God does that. He makes us his delight, his display, his joy. God also makes us his fruit-bearers. Here’s what it says in John 15:7-8: “If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.” God’s glory. It’s more grand, more amazing, more indescribable than we can imagine. Yet he gives us glimpses of it every day in so many ways. How can we not share it with others? Especially when he helps us do so? As we end today, let’s join together in glorifying God, in sharing his Glory with those around us. Let’s let Psalm 57:9-11 be our guide: “I will praise you, Lord, among the nations; I will sing of you among the peoples. For great is your love, reaching to the heavens; your faithfulness reaches to the skies. Be exalted, O God, above the heavens; let your glory be over all the earth.” Why does God’s glory matter to you as a writer? #amwriting #Christianwriter Click To Tweet WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! What do you think of when you think of God’s glory? THANK YOU! Thanks to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! Thanks so much to our March sponsor of the month, Tammy Partlow! She’s a speaker at women’s retreats, and her debut novel Blood Beneath the Pines, a suspense set in the deep South, is now available. She’s hard at work on the next book in the series! Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. The post 209 – God’s Glory and Why It Matters to Writers appeared first on Write from the Deep.

There is nothing more intimate, nor powerful, than our conversations with the Creator of the universe, with the God who sees us and loves us and provides for us. And yet so often we treat prayer as though it’s a fall-back position, not a position of God’s power. Come learn from one man the keys to powerful prayers. But first, thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible Welcome Over the last ten years or so, I’ve grown aware of something that has troubled my heart and spirit. But when I decided to make this situation a topic of a podcast, I had no idea what I was getting myself into. Every word seemed a struggle. I wrote and rewrote. Researched. Deleted and started over. Not because I didn’t know what I wanted to say, but because I feel so ill-equipped to say it. Then, in my research, I discovered a voice and life I’d never really heard about before, and it is this voice and life that I want to share today. Because this man didn’t just address the issue so many struggle with, he lived a life steeped in, as he called it,  “the reality of the things of God.” A Man of Prayer This man is George Muller. Now, some of you may be well acquainted with him, but I was not. Nor was I familiar with his extraordinary life of prayer. And that, friends, is the topic of this podcast. Though we often gear our podcasts to the task of writing or our journeys as writers, for this episode we’re talking about prayer in every aspect of our lives. Before we jump in, I want to let you know that the primary source of my information on George Muller is the remarkable book, George Muller: Delighted in God by Roger Steer. And I want to encourage you to pick up a copy and read for yourself the many wonders and details we don’t have the time to share here. I also encourage you to pick up Release the Power of Prayer by George Muller. Or any of Muller’s other books. And I encourage you to find pictures of him online. What you’ll see is the face of a man filled with peace and the sure confidence in an Almighty, prayer-answering God. Seldom have I been so impacted by a man’s faith and life. May we all learn to live our lives as he did, steeped in prayer. The Least I can Do… As believers in Christ, we take on the mantle of the blood of Christ, sacrificed for us, which covers our sins and weaknesses and grants us entrance into the very throne room of Almighty God. In fact, it doesn’t just grant us entrance, it welcomes us. Into God‘s presence. To talk with him. Whenever we want. There is nothing more intimate, nor powerful, than our conversations with the Creator of the universe, with the God who sees us and loves us and provides for us. And yet I’ve heard believers say things like, “Well, at least I can pray.” Or, “I can’t do anything but pray.” Of course, there are times when “I can’t do anything but pray” is an acknowledgement of our limitations and God’s power, but what I’m talking about is the creeping attitude among believers that prayer is somehow our “fall back.”  The attitude is, “Well, if there’s nothing practical I can do, I can pray.” Or, when people ask for prayer, believers say they will pray, but do so almost in an attitude of patting a child’s head and muttering, “There, there. It will be okay.” Then on they go with their day. They may shoot a quick prayer heavenward, almost as an afterthought. But we should never treat prayer, or prayer requests, in this way. The MOST We Can Do! Friends, prayer is never the least we can do. It is the MOST we can do. No matter what else we are able to do in our lives, or to help others, we can pray. We. Can. PRAY! Stop and think about that. Do we understand what an awesome privilege that is? And what a powerful responsibility it is? To go to God with not just our concerns, but with the concerns and fears of others. To seek His will and intervention, believing He will answer. Consider what Scripture says about prayer. Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. (Matthew 7:7) Have faith in God…. whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. (Mark 11:22, 24) Get up and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. (Luke 22:46) If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer. (Matthew 21:22) Jesus told his disciples the parable of the persistent woman and the judge to show them that “…they should always pray and not give up.” (Luke 18:1) There is no equivocation in Scripture. Always pray. Ask and it will be given. Not it may be given. Pray and don’t give up. When you pray, believe that you have received it and it will be yours. What About…? “Hang on,” you say. “Not every prayer is answered. I’ve prayed for xyz for years, and it still hasn’t been answered.” Maybe this is where today’s believers started to lose their belief in the absolute power of prayer. Maybe, because we haven’t yet seen answer to our prayers, especially those that we’ve taken to God over and over, our certainty that God will answer has slid a bit. Because, well, He hasn’t answered. Or so we think. A Life of Answered Prayers George Mueller lived a life steeped in prayer. As a result, he, by God’s answers and provision, accomplished amazing things in his 93 years of life. Born in 1805, a troublemaker when young, imprisoned for a brief time for theft when he was 16, he encountered Christ at the ripe old age of 20. For the next 10 years he studied to become a missionary (and was disowned by his father for it), through God’s leading became a pastor instead, founded the Scripture Knowledge Institute, got married. In 1834 he felt led to form an institution established for spreading the Gospel at home and abroad. And so he prayed that God would show him if this was His will. By June of 1835, Muller had opened five day schools that taught over 400 children and distributed nearly 800 bibles and 750 New Testaments. In addition, they’d sent missionaries around the world financial and prayer support. All from donations that came to them by God’s hand. Why An Orphan House? Then, in December of 1835, God moved George to pray about establishing a house for orphans. At that time in the UK, there were accommodations for no more than 3600 orphans. So most orphans were sent to homes for foundlings or the work houses. Think Oliver Twist. But Muller’s reasons for opening an Orphan house weren’t what we might expect. His most important reason was to glorify God. You see, when people saw God’s provision in answer to prayer, it would prove the reality of total trust in God, thus strengthening believers in their faith. Second, he wanted to take care of  the spiritual welfare of the orphans. Third, he wanted to see to the orphans’ physical needs. The Big Ask As he was praying whether he should do this, if it was God’s will for him, something happened. George recorded it in his journal: “On December 5th, however, the subject of my prayer all at once became different. I was reading Psalm 81 and was particularly struck, more than at any time before, with verse 10: ‘Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it.’ “I thought a few moments about these words, and then was led to apply them to the case of the Orphan-House. It struck me that I had never asked the Lord for anything concerning it, except to know His will respecting its being established or not; and I then fell on my knees and opened my mouth wide, asking Him for much. “I asked in submission to His will, and without fixing a time when He should answer my petition. I prayed that He would give me a house­­­­––either as a loan, or that someone might be led to pay the rent for one, or that one might be given permanently for this object. Further, I asked Him for £1000 [approx. $150k pounds today]; and likewise for suitable individuals to take care of the children. “Besides this, I have been since led to ask the Lord, to put into the hearts of His people to send me articles of furniture for the house, and some clothes for the children. “When I was asking the petition, I was fully aware what I was doing, i. e., that I was asking for something which I had no natural prospect of obtaining from the brethren whom I know, but which was not too much for the Lord to grant.” The Big Answer He was right. Five days later he received a letter from a brother and sister who said they wanted to come work in his orphan house for no salaries because “God will supply all our needs.” This brother and sister also gave all their furniture for use in the house. Three days after that, a man said he’d been convicted by God to give weekly support to the house. And two more believers offered to work for no salaries, and give all their furniture to the house. And so it went. George had all of 2 shillings, roughly $16 dollars, when he started praying. But again, he opened his mouth, presenting his needs to God and believing God would provide in His own way and in His timing. And God did. Sometimes with just enough to meet the need, sometimes with large amounts. In fact, it’s said that Muller received so much in donations that over his life he was able to give away $80,000 pounds (nearly 3 million pounds, or 4.5 million US, in today’s money). Even more amazing is that Muller didn’t use any of the donations for the Orphan house for his or his family’s care. Instead, he trusted God for their daily bread, submitting his request and then waiting, waiting for God to act. His Life Wasn’t Easy Now, in case you’re thinking it was in any way easy for Muller to live this way or that his life was easy, here are some facts: His father disowned him when he decided to become a missionary His mother died while he was studying to be a missionary He and his wife lost two children, one in stillbirth, one when a year old to an illness Numerous serious health challenges plagued Muller throughout his life And what about the prayers that God didn’t answer right away? Muller said this: “We ought to love God, even though we have not answers to our prayers; but all this will greatly increase our love; and it is not only once, but if we mark the hand of God, we shall soon find that we have scores and hundreds of answers to prayer. And thus we shall be led to love Him more and more for all he has done.” But I’m Not George Muller And just in case you’re thinking, “Yeah, well, that’s George Muller. I could never have a prayer life like that. No one could but him. God chose him special for this prayer life,” George addressed that in his writings. He made it clear that his faith wasn’t the “gift” of faith mentioned in 1 Corinthians 12:9. Rather, he said he was able to trust God because of the “grace” of faith. Muller himself dispelled this when he wrote, “Think not, dear reader, that I have the gift of faith, that is, that gift of which we read in 1 Corinthians 12:9, and which is mentioned along with `the gifts of healing,` `the working of miracles,` `prophecy,”` and that on that account I am able to trust in the Lord. “It is true that the faith, which I am enabled to exercise, is altogether God’s own gift; it is true that He alone supports it, and that He alone can increase it; it is true that, moment by moment, I depend upon Him for it, and that, if I were only one moment left to myself, my faith would utterly fail; but it is not true that my faith is that gift of faith which is spoken of in 1 Corinthians.” George Muller’s Goal Why did Muller talk about this prayer life with God? To encourage believers in their faith. That’s why he made such a point of the fact that his faith––as is true of all believers’ faith––was given to him and sustained by God, but it wasn’t some special ability. It was, quite simply, the result of his determination to take God at His word. Something we all are expected to do. In his journal, Muller went on to write, “All believers are called upon, in the simple confidence of faith, to cast all their burdens upon him, to trust in him for everything, and not only to make everything a subject of prayer, but to expect answers to their petitions which they have asked according to his will, and in the name of the Lord Jesus.” In all, George Muller cared for over 10,000 orphans during his lifetime, giving them educational opportunities. He established 117 schools which offered Christian education to more than 120,000 people. According to an article in The Times, Muller received approximately 1.5 million pounds (equaling 2.6 million dollars) through faithful prayer and established orphanages in five locations. He spoke in countless countries, preaching and teaching about faith and trust in God, reaching hundreds of thousands with the Gospel. He is known to have had 50,000 prayers answered during his life. His was a life well lived, not because he was someone special, but because He believed in and trusted God to be all He said He was. Keys to Praying Like George Muller So if George Muller was no one special, meaning each of us can attain a faith like his, how do we go about it? First we must ask ourselves one question: Do I Believe? Go ahead. Ask yourself. Do you believe God is all He says He is? Do you believe He will do what He says He will do? That He will answer your prayers. Because you must if you expect an answer from Him. The Bible is clear on that in James 1:6-7: “But [you] must ask in faith without any doubting, for the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind. For that person ought not to expect that he will receive anything from the Lord, being a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.” Soul-Deep Belief There could be no doubt that George Muller believed with every ounce of his being. Just one example happened in 1877, when, while crossing the Atlantic, a dense fog descended. The captain of the ship slowed their progress to be safe. George went to the captain and said he had to be in Quebec by the following afternoon. The captain said there was no way they’d make it in time. What did George do? He asked the captain to pray with him. They went to a room below decks, with the captain muttering what a waste of time it all was, and Muller prayed. The captain started to follow suit, but George stopped him. In part, he said, because the captain didn’t believe. But mostly because the prayer had already been answered. Had Muller seen the fog lift? No, but he believed! He told the captain “I have known my Lord for more than fifty years and there is not one instance that I have failed to have an audience with the King. Get up, Captain, for you will find that the fog has gone.” They went back up on the bridge, and the fog was, indeed, gone. Are You Certain? How do we pray like George Muller? First, we believe like him. We pray with the utter certainty that God will answer, in His way, in His time. Do we believe God is able to do infinitely and exceedingly beyond anything we can ask for?  Do we believe that God has the power to provide and that he is not only willing to do so but delights in doing so? If you’re not sure you believe like that, then follow Muller’s lead and go to Scripture. Ask God to show you why you can believe this way. Here are a few verses to get you started: Don’t be afraid! For the Lord your God is living among you. He is a mighty savior. He will take delight in you with gladness. With his love, he will calm all your fears. He will rejoice over you with joyful songs. (Zephaniah 3:17 NLT) Be still in the presence of the LORD, and wait patiently for him to act…Day by day the Lord takes care of the innocent, and they will receive an inheritance that lasts forever. They will not be disgraced in hard times; even in famine they will have more than enough….The Lord rescues the godly; he is their fortress in times of trouble. The Lord helps them, rescuing them from the wicked. He saves them, and they find shelter in him. (Psalms 37:7, 18-19, 39-40  NLT) Therefore, I say unto you, whatsoever things you desire, when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you shall have them. (Mark 11:24, ) Now Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues on the Sabbath. And there was a woman who for eighteen years had had a sickness caused by a spirit; and she was bent over double, and could not straighten up at all. When Jesus saw her, He called her over and said to her, “Woman, you are freed from your sickness.” And He laid His hands on her; and immediately she stood up straight again, and began glorifying God. (Luke 13:10-13 NASB) How Long, O Lord? Eighteen years! Have you prayed for 18 years with no apparent answer? For longer? Are you will to wait for God to act, even if you don’t see it happen in your lifetime? Will you still believe that He will do as He promised? Remember, just because God hasn’t answered a prayer yet doesn’t mean He’ll never answer it. It can’t mean that. If it does, then God isn’t who He says He is. There were six people whom Muller asked God to bring to faith. Every day he prayed for those people. One came to faith not long after Muller began praying. One several years. Two more over a larger number of years. Only one was still unsaved when Muller died. So does that mean God didn’t answer that prayer? Not at all. The man came to faith a year after Muller’s death. There is no such thing as “taking too long” for God. He will answer when He knows the time is right. We don’t need to see the answers. We simply need to trust the Provider. Are You Ready? When you can say you believe with certainty that God is who He says He is, that He will do what He promised, then follow George Muller’s lead into Scripture. Yes, back into the Word of God. Why? Because Muller had been praying every day for years, but then God revolutionized his prayer life with a revelation. As he wrote in his journal: “It pleased the Lord to teach me a truth…I saw more clearly than ever, that the first great and primary business to which I ought to attend every day was, to have my soul happy in the Lord.” Soul Happiness How about you? Is your soul happy in the Lord? Are you content in Him? Resting in Him? Why did Muller think this was so important? Because if our souls aren’t happy in the Lord, then everything we do for him runs the risk of being done in the wrong spirit. So how do we achieve this soul happiness? Muller tells us: “The most important thing I had to do was to give myself to the reading of the Word of God, and to meditate on it, that thus my heart might be comforted, encouraged, warned, reproved, instructed; and that thus, by means of the Word of God, whilst meditating on it, my heart might be brought into … communion with the Lord.” So early every morning after that, he went to God’s Word. He asked the Lord’s blessing on His Word, then meditated on the Scripture, “searching as it were into every verse to get blessing out of it; not for the sake of the public ministry of the Word, not for the sake of preaching on what I had meditated upon, but for the sake of obtaining food for my own soul.” When Your Soul Is Happy in the Lord The result? Muller found his soul led to confession or thanksgiving or intercession or supplication… in other words, to prayer! And he would continue his reading and meditating, which turned the Scripture into prayer for himself and others. And, as he said, “My inner man almost invariably is … nourished and strengthened, and by breakfast time, with rare exceptions, I am in a peaceful if not happy state of heart.” So if we want to learn how to live a prayer-steeped life as George Muller did, start in God’s Word. Maybe even start by studying and meditating on the verse that so impacted Muller: “I, the LORD, am your God, Who brought you up from the land of Egypt; Open your mouth wide and I will fill it.” (Psalm 81:10 NASB) Muller’s Conditions for Successful Prayer Starting in God’s Word, letting it become prayer, will accomplish something else. Muller taught that there were conditions required for successful prayer, the first of which was that our requests must be according to God’s will. If we’re stepped in God’s holy Word, if we’re meditating and praying it, then we can be sure God will set our hearts and spirits right with Him. And He will show us what is in accordance to His will. George Muller’s second condition for successful prayer was that we “mustn’t ask on account of our own goodness or merit, but ‘in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ’ (John 14-13-14.)” He supported this condition with Psalm 66:18, which says “if I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened.” In other words, Muller said, “if I live in sin and go on in a course hateful to God, I may not expect my prayers to be answered.” The third condition we’ve talked about already, and that is to exercise faith in the power and willingness of God to answer our prayers. And the fourth condition is to “continue patiently waiting on God till the blessing we seek is granted.” As Muller stressed, there’s nothing in Scripture about when God will answer, only that He will. “Therefore,” Muller wrote, “beloved brethren and sisters, go on waiting upon God, go on praying; only be sure you ask for things that are according to the mind of God.” What Happens When You Take These Steps? Friends, if we take these steps, being mindful of these conditions, how can our prayers not be changed? How can we not be changed? Even as George Muller was changed. And how can we not be used? Even as Muller was used, or more? Charles Spurgeon says this about prayer: “Prayer is the natural outgushing of a soul in communion with Jesus. Just as the leaf and the fruit will come out of the vine-branch without any conscious effort on the part of the branch, but simply because of its living union with the stem, so prayer buds, and blossoms, and fruits out of souls abiding in Jesus. As stars shine, so do abiders pray. It is their … second nature.” Abide in God. Trust in His promises. Believe He is Who He says He is and will do as He promised. Don’t Let Yourself Be Derailed One final thought: Don’t let your feelings derail you. Because they can. If we’ve prayed and prayed and no answer seems forthcoming, we can become discouraged. Or we can feel that doing the things we’ve discussed just aren’t accomplishing anything. Muller warns us about this: “It is a common temptation of Satan to make us give up the reading of the Word and prayer when our enjoyment is gone; as if it were of no use to read the Scriptures when we do not enjoy them, and as if it were no use to pray when we have no spirit of prayer. “The truth is that, in order to enjoy the Word we ought to continue to read it and the way obtain a spirit of prayer is to continue praying. The less we read the Word of God, the less we desire to read it, and the less we pray, the less we desire to pray.” Don’t let yourself be derailed. Practice, Practice, Practice! William Arthur Arthur Rubinstein, the great pianist, once said, “If I neglect practicing one day, I notice; two days, my friends notice; three days, the public notices.” That applies to us as well, friends. Keep on keeping on. Because though it may take time, it’s the same as with any other thing we do. The more we do it, the more familiar it becomes. The more we learn and grow, and the more we are moved to do it. And ever and always, wait on God to act. As George Muller said, “I have found invariably…that if I only believed I was sure to get, in God’s time, the thing I asked for…To see that He is able, you have only to look at the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, for to raise him from the dead, He must have almighty power…assuredly if we believe, we shall receive––we shall obtain.” Hello, Powerful Prayer The least we can do? Hardly. Prayer is, in fact, a believer’s most powerful weapon. With prayer we can call on God to unleash the armies of heaven that He may be glorified on the earth. We can lift those we care about to the most powerful King in creation and seek mercy or healing or whatever is needed. Prayer is not our fall back. It’s our first and best act in any situation. As C.S. Lewis once said, “I pray because I can’t help myself. I pray because I’m helpless. I pray because the need flows out of me all the time, waking and sleeping. It doesn’t change God. It changes me.” And as Max Lucado wrote, ”Our prayers may be awkward. Our attempts may be feeble. But since the power of prayer is in the one who hears it and not in the one who says it, our prayers do make a difference.” Amen WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! What inspires you most about George Muller’s prayer life? THANK YOU! Thanks to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! A big thank you to our February sponsor of the month, Wendy L. Macdonald. She’s a writer, poet, podcaster, photographer, and nature lover, and I know you’d enjoy getting to know her! She has a free, special gift for you: 10 Good Habits to Help You Become a Great Listener! Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. The post 208 – The Keys to Successful Prayer appeared first on Write from the Deep.

How would it change the way you pray if you realized God is greater––make that far greater––than anything we can imagine, think, or dream of? That His work within us and for us is beyond our greatest imaginings? That our human minds can’t even begin to understand or imagine all He is able to do? Come explore what this means to you and your prayers! But first, thank you to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! I’m (Karen) part of a brainstorming group of roughly 10 women that has been meeting for 20 years or more. As you can imagine, we are all good friends. As believers, we spend a lot of time talking about the Lord and praying together. In this spirit, we pray and ask God to give us a word to focus on for each year. He’s been so faithful to do this for each of us, and to confirm our individual words with Scripture and quotes and other things. One of the women in my brainstorming group, Gayle deSalles, shared what God had shown her for her word. I was so moved and impressed that I asked her if I could use it as a basis for this podcast. She graciously agreed. Pay Attention! A part of what impacted me so much was that God had been stirring similar thoughts and questions in me over the past few weeks. I always love it when God whispers the same truths to different believers! And when that happens I often feel a holy “Pay attention!”, that there’s something important there not just for the person sharing, or for me, but for others. Gayle’s word for 2024 comes from one of the most familiar passages in the entire Bible. She said she wasn’t even thinking about this Scripture or word when it came to her. She’d been uncertain what her word was, so she decided to do something that we all need to do when we’re seeking God’s guidance: Meditate on His word, listen only to Him, and explore Scriptures as He directs. Decisions to Make? Do you have a decision you need to make? An issue where you’re seeking God’s guidance? Has some opportunity come to you but you’re not sure if it’s right? Are you considering writing something different, something you’ve never written before, but can’t shake a niggling concern about doing it? Or are you feeling that maybe you didn’t hear God right, and you’re somehow off-track with what He wants from you as a writer? The first, wisest step to take when you’re in a situation such as this is to do as Gayle did: Meditate on God’s word, listen only to Him, and explore Scriptures as He directs. A Guided Tour of God’s Word You may be amazed how immersed you become in the Word as God leads you through it. Verses you’ve known all your life are suddenly alive with a new meaning or importance. Chapters you’ve read again and again suddenly seem to have sections you’ve never seen. It’s not that you haven’t read them before. It’s just that God is highlighting them in your mind and spirit, telling you to pay attention, go deeper, take time to understand. Remember what Hebrews 4:12 says,  “the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. Embrace Freedom! Gayle described this process well when she told the group, “I’ve been enjoying myself so much that I keep getting the kind of dopamine rush I used to get when I took off on my bicycle for a long ride on a sunny spring day. A day not too hot or cold. When I headed down a path or wove through neighborhoods I’d never explored before.” Do you remember doing that? That sense of freedom and exploration, of excitement and anticipation? When we come to the Word of God seeking only to hear Him, to be guided by Him, it’s the same exhilarating sensation. Time to dig deeper At this point in her email, Gayle shared her word: IMAGINE. One of the confirming Scriptures God gave her was Ephesians 3:20. Some versions of the Bible render “imagine” as “think.” But the concept is one we all can embrace. The New International Version has the verse as, “Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.” (That’s actually Ephesians 3:20 and 21.) In the New American Standard Bible it’s: “Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us.” The AMPC, or Amplified Bible, Classic Edition, actually expands on what certain words in the verse mean: “Now to Him Who, by [in consequence of] the [action of His] power that is at work within us, is able to [carry out His purpose and] do superabundantly, far over and above all that we [dare] ask or think [infinitely beyond our highest prayers, desires, thoughts, hopes, or dreams]. And in The Living Bible, we find: “Now glory be to God, who, by his mighty power at work within us, is able to do far more than we would ever dare to ask or even dream of—infinitely beyond our highest prayers, desires, thoughts, or hopes.” GOD IS GREATER! How exciting is that verse? In each and every translation of it, we find an amazing truth: God is greater––make that far greater––than anything we can imagine, think, or dream of. His work within us and for us is beyond our greatest imaginings. We can’t begin to ask all that our God is able to do! Crosswalk.com shares this insight: “Paul had just previously written of God’s marvelous plan for the Gentiles: ‘God’s love for us goes farther than even time itself…His love for us is a love that doesn’t hold back. His love gives everything, to the point of sacrificing his very own Son …This is unquantifiable, immeasurable love.’ The article goes on to say: “God, who He is and what He does, will do, and has done is immeasurable. We only see and know a slice of the whole pie in the sky. And we can know a lot about God! He is not afraid of our questions, frustrations, and promises. When we seek Him with all of our hearts, we will find Him.“ You never need to feel alone, or that you can’t figure something out. Almighty God is always at work, in His immeasurable love, on the answer. HIS answer. For you. DON’T GET LOST Oftentimes, though, even if we have this knowledge in our heads, our feelings overwhelm us and we end up a bit lost. In Ecclesiastes 1, we see that Solomon, a man who once enjoyed deep fellowship with God, was led astray by his feelings. And yet, even in his emotional state, he is, in the pages of this book of the Bible, finding his way back, understanding that without God as the focus, life is meaningless. Consider what we find in Ecc. 1:1-11: “`Everything is meaningless,’ says the Teacher, ‘completely meaningless!’ “What do people get for all their hard work under the sun? Generations come and generations go, but the earth never changes. The sun rises and the sun sets, then hurries around to rise again…. Everything is wearisome beyond description…. “History merely repeats itself. It has all been done before. Nothing under the sun is truly new. Sometimes people say, ‘Here is something new!’ But actually it is old; nothing is ever truly new. We don’t remember what happened in the past, and in future generations, no one will remember what we are doing now.’” THE STRUGGLE IS REAL Now that’s a discouraged man. Have you struggled with discouragement like this? Feeling that no matter what you do, nothing ever happens? That you have nothing new to say or write, or that the same disappointments keep happening over and over? But how does this Solomon jive with the Solomon we see in 1 Kings 3: 3-14: “Solomon loved the Lord and followed all the decrees of his father, David, except that Solomon, too, offered sacrifices and burned incense at the local places of worship.  The most important of these places of worship was at Gibeon, so the king went there and sacrificed 1,000 burnt offerings.  That night the Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream, and God said, `What do you want? Ask, and I will give it to you!’” WHAT DO YOU WANT? Friends, what do you want of God? What is your fondest desire and goal? What would you say if Father God came to you and asked you this question? Solomon replied this way: “’You showed great and faithful love to your servant my father, David, because he was honest and true and faithful to you. And you have continued to show this great and faithful love to him today by giving him a son to sit on his throne. “’Now, O Lord my God, you have made me king instead of my father, David, but I am like a little child who doesn’t know his way around. And here I am in the midst of your own chosen people, a nation so great and numerous they cannot be counted! Give me an understanding heart so that I can govern your people well and know the difference between right and wrong. For who by himself is able to govern this great people of yours?” Solomon, the great king, knew he was “like a little child, who doesn’t know his way around.” No matter how long we’ve been following Jesus, how long we’ve been writing what God asks us to write, we, like Solomon, are, in many ways, “like a little child, who doesn’t know his way around.” We love God, we seek to serve Him as best we know how. But as we saw in the verses in Ephesians, what we truly know of God is miniscule compared to who He is and what He is doing for His children. For you. An Understanding Heart? This great king—Solomon—wanted an understanding heart, but what, exactly, does that mean? MinistryInsights.com has a fascinating article that explores An Understanding Heart. First it clarifies “heart,” saying, “In Scripture, the term ‘heart’ is used to denote a person’s inner self. The heart is the center of spiritual activity, moral understanding, and human will.” We all know how powerful the heart is. Scripture underscores this truth over and over, making it clear that our heart is affected by what we treasure (Matt 6:21); that the heart is the source of our trust in God (Prov 3:5); that we must guard our hearts because every we do flows from it (Prov 4:23); that a pure heart goes hand in hand with a steadfast spirit (Psa 51:10); that God’s peace guards our hearts (Phil. 4:7). The article on MinistryInsights goes on to say that an understanding heart, is humble and purposeful. Humble, in that it recognizes any strength we have, even in our writing, isn’t from us, it’s from God. A humble heart “invites God to work to cultivate deeper insight about those strengths.” Purposeful, in that it is “neither careless nor impulsive.” When we cultivate an understanding heart, we do so understanding our limits and God’s limitlessness, and we do so with purpose. How to Go to God? So when you go to God for guidance, start with meditating on His word, listening only to Him. Then, acknowledging how limited your understanding is, ask Him to give you an understanding heart. Of yourself, of others, of HIM. How did God respond in 1 Kings when Solomon asked for an understanding heart? He replied: “’Because you have asked for wisdom in governing my people with justice and have not asked for a long life or wealth or the death of your enemies—I will give you what you asked for! I will give you a wise and understanding heart such as no one else has had or ever will have!  And I will also give you what you did not ask for—riches and fame! No other king in all the world will be compared to you for the rest of your life!  And if you follow me and obey my decrees and my commands as your father, David, did, I will give you a long life.’” THE BIG QUESTION So ask your self: “How close do I want to go with God?” Gayle explained, “In short, God was saying to me, ‘Gayle, to the degree you are walking closely with me, abiding with me, fixing your eyes on me, one of two things will happen. You will either, in some degree or fashion, walk in Ecclesiastes 1 and get depressed by all you see, waking up each morning and saying––if not in your words, then in your heart––’same ole, same ole. “’Or you will embrace Ephesians 3:20 and seek me, asking me to reveal My heart. Start with boldness to ask me what is already on your heart and mind, and we’ll talk about the fact that I can do immeasurably more than that. Or than you can ever imagine.’” LIVING IN ECCLESIASTES 1 This question––“How close do I want to go with God?”, grabbed my heart and spirit. Just the night before Gayle’s email, I’d made the mistake of watching the news. As a result, I found myself unable to sleep. Wondering how God’s creation has come so far away from Him. How such unbelievable lies and deceptions have taken root in people’s hearts and minds. That night, I was living in Ecclesiastes 1, moaning about how there’s nothing new under the sun. How evil is rampant and people are rotten and Lord, why don’t you come down and annihilate us all??? Yeah, not a great place to live. If you’ve been there, or are even there now, it’s time to step out of Ecclesiastes. To go to Scripture and seek first the Father’s forgiveness for not trusting Him, and then ask His help. Ask Him to draw you closer to His heart. To share His understanding of the world, of evil, of all that so drags us down. Ask Him to open our eyes, to let us see the people and world around us with HIS eyes. To show us His truth and His work in our world. And to draw us  deeper into an understanding heart. ARE YOU READY TO STOP? So how about you? How close do you want to go with God? Are you ready to stop accepting “the same ol’, same ol’”? Are you ready to refuse to accept that’s just the way the world is, or that’s just the way publishing is, or that’s just the way the church is? Are you ready to shift your focus and understanding when trials come, because we all know they will come. Boy howdy, will they ever come. Our books won’t sell the way we want or hope. Pirates may steal our fair earnings. Contracts we’re expecting may not materialize. Projects we’ve been counting on may disappear with no explanation. Books we turn in may be rejected. We may fall sick and can’t meet a deadline. Family crises may leave us too battered to write. And that barely scratches the surface of all that can go wrong in our writing journeys. And if we walk in Ecclesiastes 1, we’ll just moan and groan and complain and ask why. But friends, don’t do that! Instead, prepare for the inevitable trials of life and publishing, with an understanding heart. GET READY FOR AMAZING! When we do that, something amazing happens. Those hard Scriptures, the ones we read and wonder how on earth we’re supposed to follow them, take on a new meaning and impact. Consider James 1:2-4: “Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.” Pure joy? You bet. Because an understanding heart will let you see what’s happening to you with God’s eyes. You’ll understand every trial will only draw you closer to Him. And it will help prepare you for eternity with the Father! ALL THINGS? When we ask God to grow in us an understanding heart, Romans 8:28 resonates as never before: “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” How often have we asked, “All things? Really?” I know I’ve asked that. Physical limitations. Diseases and Illnesses. Relationship struggles. Financial hardships? All those things are for my good? Yes, in any and every thing, God is working for our good. And he’s not just wringing his hands going, “Oh dear, how am I going to fix this?” No, he’s had a plan all along to shape and refine us. To give us compassion and understanding. To make us a reflection of Him to a world that so desperately needs to know Him. OUR UNWITTING WITNESS Don and I live in a remote area of Washington. There’s one highway that comes to our town, and the traffic on that highway is atrocious. I joined a Facebook group for my small town, and noticed how people would ask about the traffic situation on a regular basis. So when Don and I were stuck in a loooooong line of traffic, I hopped onto Facebook and posted about it to let folks know. Many of the responses to my post were nice, even grateful. But some of them. Holy cow! I had no idea I’d get blasted with sarcastic, angry, and insulting posts. That I’d be told to “go back to whatever city you came from if you don’t like the traffic!” I considered unleashing some verbal abuse of my own in response, but God got hold of me. Instead, I responded to a few people telling them it seemed they were having a tough day so I’d pray for them. And then I thanked the people who were kind and grateful in their responses. Well, it’s a good thing I didn’t follow that first instinct because the woman who lives behind us sent me a private message telling me where to post about traffic without getting blasted. Then she said, “Some people just have to be mean. But your responses to them were wonderful!” Thank God He moved me to turn my hurt and frustration into kindness. I shudder to think the kind of witness I’d have been to her if I’d responded in kind. THE BEAUTY OF AN UNDERSTANDING HEART That’s the beauty of cultivating an understanding heart. It turns us around. And it turns 1 Peter 4: 12-19, from one of those hard Scriptures to a wonderful strategy filled with promise and purpose: “Dear friends, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that has come on you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice inasmuch as you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed. “If you are insulted because of the name of Christ, you are blessed, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you…if you suffer as a Christian, do not be ashamed, but praise God that you bear that name. For it is time for judgment to begin with God’s household; and if it begins with us, what will the outcome be for those who do not obey the gospel of God? … “So then, those who suffer according to God’s will should commit themselves to their faithful Creator and continue to do good.” Trails coming? Be overjoyed when God’s glory is revealed! Suffering attacking you? You are blessed and the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you! Miseries reaching for you? Don’t be ashamed! Praise God that you bear His name! Carrying burdens? Commit yourself to your faithful Creator and continue to do good, because he will make you able. IMAGINE…WITH GOD Imagine. Imagine living that way. Imagine seeking God in His word, listening only for His loving, powerful voice. Imagine surrendering to Him and His work in everything you are and do. Imagine what it means to ask Him for, and open yourself to, Him creating in you an understanding heart. Imagine coming to Him and asking for whatever abundant, unfathomable, inconceivable blessing He wants to share with us! Start today, friends. Don’t spend any more time in an Ecclesiastes 1 life. Instead, step into a life steeped in Ephesians 3:20, and let your imagination soar. Meditate on God’s word, listen only to Him, and explore Scriptures as He directs. #amwriting #Christianwriter Click To Tweet WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU! What’s one thing you can do to live in Ephesians 3:20? THANK YOU! Thanks to all our patrons on Patreon! You help make this podcast possible! A big thank you to our February sponsor of the month, Wendy L. Macdonald. She’s a writer, poet, podcaster, photographer, and nature lover, and I know you’d enjoy getting to know her! She has a free, special gift for you: 10 Good Habits to Help You Become a Great Listener! Many thanks also to the folks at PodcastPS for their fabulous sound editing! STAY CONNECTED Want the latest news from Karen and Erin? Click here to join our newsletter and get an exclusive audio download. The post 207 – Imagine with God! appeared first on Write from the Deep.