#181: Prayer for Launching Your Book with Boldness

So let's now pray for boldness as you launch your book. Your book is published, it's finished. Now it's time to share it with the world. This is not a time to be shy. But launching a book can feel very vulnerable. Have you ever felt that? Especially when it's about your personal story. I felt this so strongly when I launched my book Broken Crayons Still Color. And I really had to overcome so much of that feeling of like, fear or insecurity. And. And what if nobody reads it? Or what will they think of me? What if it doesn't make an impact? But again, our job is obedience. God will take care of the results. And so we wanna pray for you as you release your book with boldness and trust. Boldness and trust. It reminds me of Acts when the early church was praying for boldness to share the Gospel. Your book may not contain the gospel, and that's okay, it might be a cookbook. But you pressing publish, you doing the book launch because you are a daughter or son of the king, there is going to be resistance. And so we need to pray for boldness and then pray that we would trust God with the results. Cj, why don't you pray for us?

Yeah. And this comes from Luke 5, verse 4. And it's one of the most powerful encounters that we see between Jesus and Peter.

At this time. Simon, before he was renamed Peter by Jesus, it says when he had stopped speaking Jesus, he said to Simon, launch out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.

And so some of you are being beckoned by Jesus. I've helped you to this point. Now it's time to launch out into deeper waters. It's time to get your book out there. It's time to spread out the net. It's time to watch me bring in a miraculous catch. And we don't. We hesitate to say numbers. We're not saying you're going to bring in this X amount of people for your book. We leave that to the Lord. Just like this random number of the catch of fish was brought in. I think it was 153 if I'm not mistaken. I'd have to keep reading. But the bottom line is that it was the Lord who brought this miraculous catch after Peter obeyed and launched deeper into the deeper waters and his Father. We're asking right now that you would help us as we stand on this, in this place where we're ready to launch our books, we're ready to share with the world, we're ready to do Things that, so to speak, are like spreading the net out into the deep and then waiting. We're at this place where we're going to be waiting for you, Lord, to bring in the right fish, so to speak, into our nets, to bring in the people that you have for our very specific books, very specific genres, very specific subject matter. Each of these kingdom writers specialize in something unique, something that you have uniquely given them perspective and authority on based on their experiences. And Father, we know there are specific people that you have in mind to receive these books. There are specific readers that you want to get a hold of what they have written so that they're impacted for eternity. And Father, would you do what only you can do as we launch out into the deep? Would you then bring forth a miraculous catch? And we're going to give you the glory and the honor for what happens next after those books are launched. In Jesus name, Amen.

I did a check and I did a quick search and it was 153 that Peter had. And so I always. I often test CJ on scriptures and I'll say, what was this? What was that? Because God has given him a gift of knowing the scriptures and being able to apply it. And so anyways, I just wanted to share that. That was great. But the. The picture I got as I was praying for those of you that are launching your book into the world, believe it or not, God gave me a picture of Girl Scout cookies.

Cake. Girl Scout cookies.

Now we know she's hungry.

Yes. And I love Samoas. That's my favorite Girl Scout cookie. What is your favorite? But cj, he also loves Thin Mints. But how many of you know that if you see this cute little girl, second grade, whatever, third grade, will you buy some cookies? How many? Not only do you love the cookies, like you really enjoy them, but you're happy to help this little girl out, right? I was a Girl Scout back in the day, and so I had to do some of this. But I just want to say that, you know, I think there's a lot of you that when you come to your book launch, you feel embarrassed or ashamed or shy for sure. But, like, you feel like, I don't think anyone's gonna want to buy my book. I don't wanna. I don't wanna push this. I don't wanna be pushy. I don't wanna be pushy. I don't wanna be salesy. I just. I don't know. But I feel like the Lord's, hey, guess what? Your book is like these Girl Scout cookies. And for the right person, the person that loves Samoas, it's gonna be a no brainer. Yes, I want that. I wanna buy those and I wanna support this person, this writer, that they've written this book. I want to be part of their. I want to help support them and encourage them. And just like I would want to help support and encourage these Girl Scouts that are selling these cookies. And sometimes I have to pass because the temptation's too much. But for the right person, it's a no brainer decision to buy your book. And for the right person, they're going to enjoy that book so much, they're going to get so much impact from it, they're going to be changed. They're going to whatever. I'm not saying Girl Scout cookies change the world, but.

I'm just saying we need to change our mindset of selling. My one of my coaches early on told me, business coaches, Shelly, selling is helping. You have something valuable to offer. And so what if we switched our mindset instead of thinking, oh, I don't think anyone would want to buy it. I don't want to. They have to pay money for this. I don't want to be pushy. Yeah, what if we saw it like a Girl Scout cookie? Like somebody out there is just sometimes I'm just waiting, like, where are the Girl Scouts? I want my Samoas.

And there's certain people that are waiting for your message. And so I am going to pray for you. We literally cannot impact lives unless we take some steps to put it out there. God can supernaturally just have people find our book. And I truly believe he has done that with our books too. But I really believe some of you, the impact is like less than what God has for you because you're holding back. You have this big pile of Girl Scout cookies in the garage, right? And you need to get out there and say, hey, are you, would you be interested? Would you want some of these cookies? So let me pray for you, God, thank you so much that selling is helping. It's part of the ministry you've given us. It's part of being able to reach the right person at the right time with the right message. It's part of the reason why these Kingdom writers are even here right now listening to these prayers is because I have taken steps of obedience to do marketing and they have found us somehow. And so, Lord, I just pray you would help them to change their mindset about selling, that you would help them to break off any people pleasing or anything that says, but what will this person think of me? Think that I'm greedy? They'll think that I'm out for the money. And you know what? At the end of the day we are only accountable to you and what you've called us to do and the message you've called us to be able to steward. We are stewards of this book and of this message. So Father, give us the boldness. Give us the trust that you'll bring the right results at the right time. Help us not to get disappointed. I remember my book launch for Broken Crayons Still Color. I only sold about a hundred books and I was disappointed because I thought oh this is going to be such a bestseller. But if I would have quit we wouldn't have reached the 5,000 plus people that have purchased the book since then. We wouldn't have ever been able to get the emails of people who said I was going to commit suicide. Then I read your book and God rescued me. There are so many miracles on the other side of putting ourselves out there and being able to take the steps even if the results are feel less than that what than what we expected or what we wanted. Lord, help us to trust you with the results and I pray this in Jesus powerful name, Amen. I also want to say that there is a very real thing of postpartum depression with after launching your book. So you give birth to this book baby and the post launch blues. It's a very real thing. So take care of yourself, have some self care and know that God is the one that will help you to steward this book baby and get it into the right hands at the right time. He's the one that has the divine solutions, the answers, the connections. We've seen it. I could just talk for hours of testimonies of what God has done with our books.