#347: Mentoring Moment: Progress

Welcome to Kingdom Writers, where we help equip and empower Christian writers of all genres to share your unique gifts with the world. We're your hosts, C.J. and Shelley Hitz.

This podcast is filled with spiritual encouragement as well as prayers to help you overcome the resistance you face as a writer. Your story matters.

So the encouragement for today that CJ has for you is on the theme of progress. So, cj, share with us what you have to encourage us with today.

Yeah. So I'm going to take you over to Ezra, chapter three, and we're going to begin in verse 10, read a few verses. But just to give you the background here, any of you that have read Ezra, and I do highly recommend it, that the book is just pregnant with all kinds of things that I think we Kingdom writers can take from it. But just to give you a background, you know.

The people are beginning to return from exile in Babylon, and their first task is they want to rebuild the temple that was destroyed over 70 years before by Nebuchadnezzar II. And, and so they're returning now, and they have been given permission by Cyrus, who is the king of Persia, who now runs the area and rules the area after defeating the Babylonians. And so this Cyrus is a good character. You know, he's given Israel, the. The Jewish people permission to return to their land and gives his full blessing to begin rebuilding the temple, the place where they can come and offer sacrifices and worship the God of the universe, by the way, not just the God of Israel, but the God of the universe, the only God, the only true God, the one that we worship here. And so I want to pick up here in verse 10, where they have made some progress. There's that word. And verse 10 says, when the builders completed the foundation of the Lord's temple, the priests put on their robes and took their places to blow their trumpets. And the Levites, descendants of Asaph, clashed their cymbals to praise the Lord, just as King David had prescribed. With praise and thanks, they sang the this song to the Lord. And I love this. And you'll recognize this from even some of David's writings in Psalms. He is so good. His faithful love for Israel endures forever. Now, I want to pause right there.

I want to encourage every one of us, no matter how small your progress is today and tomorrow, want to encourage you to be habitual in pausing. And every time you make even just a little bit of progress, I want you to be able to say, he is so good.

His faithful love for me endures forever. He's allowing us to progress. He's allowing us to begin laying a foundation in our books or whatever we're working on today.

And then it goes on and it says, then all the people gave a great shout praising the Lord, because the foundation of the Lord's temple had been laid. The first step to building this temple had been completed. But here we have verse 12. It says, but many, the older priests, Levites and other leaders who had seen the first temple. Oh, that. That little burr of comparison sometimes comes in those who had remembered. There were some. Some old guys there that had remembered what the previous temple had looked like. That tells me they had to been at least 80, 85, 90 years old, because that temple was destroyed 70 years before.

Maybe even longer. It says that those who remembered wept aloud when they saw the new temple's foundation. And that word wept aloud. It wasn't a crying for joy, it was a bemoaning. It was like saying, are you kidding me? This brings me to tears to see this compared to the former temple. Like, you call this a foundation for a temple. That's essentially what they were saying. They were bemoaning it.

But the others, however, in other words, those who hadn't seen, those who were excited about the progress that was made, here's what they did. They shouted for joy. It says the joyful shouting and weeping mingled together in a loud noise that could be heard in the distance. I want to say here.

Pause right there again, I want to say that some of you are going to be tempted to compare what you're doing now to maybe something that you did years ago. Or like many of us writers do, we compare to other writers and their books and we say, oh my goodness, my book. You know, this. I can't even. I can't even consider this, you know, a book. And we start having these, these thoughts. And why even go forward, you can almost see these old guys that had seen the former glory. It's as if they were like, we're going to continue with this. We might as well just close shop and go home. And you can just kind of hear the negativity. But the ones that had not seen, they were overjoyed with that progress that had been made. And I want to submit to you today.

That I believe God was also rejoicing.

I don't believe God was on the side of the bemoaning. I don't believe God was on the side of comparing to the former. I think he was so excited that they had begun the work that they had made. Progress that they had seen their small beginning manifest into something material that says, we've completed the first step.

The priests and the Levites, they basically said, you're so good, Lord, thank you for this. Thank you for allowing us to make it this far. So there's going to be a temptation to compare. But now go to the first few verses of the next chapter, because we also need to know that there is an enemy at work. There is an enemy that wants to frustrate, wants to discourage, wants to deter us. Guess what? From even being here in this spot right now, this virtual writing retreat, some of you faced, that you faced, you know, just sort of taunts, oh, you're not going to get anything done or why even show up. You got a million other things you could do today, tomorrow, there's all kinds of things. But listen to the first few verses of chapter four. Now it says, the enemies of Judah and Benjamin heard that the exiles were rebuilding a temple.

We might say the enemies of God heard that. Susan showed up here to begin working on a book. She began to set things in order, get organized. The enemy's heard about this, and I'm telling you, the enemy wants to frustrate and take our legs out from underneath us, right even before we've even started the foundation. But they had heard that the foundation had been laid. They heard that the rebuilding of the temple of the Lord was taking place. So they approached Zerubbabel and the other leaders and said, let us build with you, for we worship your God just as you do. We have sacrificed to him ever since King Esarhaddon of Assyria brought us here. But Zerubbabel, Jeshua, and the other leaders of Israel replied, you may have no part in this work. We alone will build the temple for the Lord, the God of Israel, just as King Cyrus of Persia commanded us. Then the local residents tried to discourage. There's that word, discourage. And frighten the people of Judah. To keep them from their work, they bribed agents. Think about this. They bribed, they paid people to basically come against them and to frustrate their plans. This went on during the entire reign of King Cyrus of Persia and lasted until King Darius of Persia took the throne. So I want to say here this morning that we all know we face it. We face it daily. We face a resistance. We face taunts from the enemy. You're going to rebuild the temple. You're going to do this and that. What gives you the right? Who? You're not qualified. You're not this. You're not that, you know, you hear all these different taunts, but I want to tell you what many of you have begun. You have put your rear end in the chair and you have begun. And by putting your rear end into the chair and beginning to type or write words, you have started a war. You have started a battle. You have.

Basically shaken a hornet's nest. How's that for encouragement? Well, I just want to say here today that you're in the right place at the right time. God wants to use you. You're not here by accident. You didn't find us by coincidence. Somehow the Lord led you here. Because you know what? We pray regularly that the right people at the right time find us. We're not in the business of wanting people that aren't happy with their membership. We want people to be here that are going to make progress on their books that they feel called by God to write. These people were endeavoring to do something, to set up the temple again to worship the God that they revere, the God of the universe, the same God we worship here today. They were endeavoring to do this and they were going to face opposition. It was just a no brainer. You and I are going to face opposition as well. But. But praise God for any progress that any of you make today and into tomorrow. We are all rejoicing with you. We are blowing loud trumpets. You don't really want to hear me blow a trumpet, but we are all clanging cymbals, banging. Heck, if you have.

Cymbals and you get something done and you are not going to create too much havoc, clang those cymbals, you know, celebrate. I'm here to tell you there should be a party. Any little progress we made, because that is proof that the Lord is inspiring and working through us, empowering us. And that's our prayer for you this weekend, is that progress will be made.

Yeah. And lately I have felt like even as CJ was talking, the picture just came to me, that I felt like I'm walking through quicksand. Like it's just so heavy and the progress feels slow. Anyone else feel that way? Like it just is, like, oh. And yet the Lord is like always reminding me, shelley, your feelings are not facts. Amen. Our feelings are not God's truth. Always. We always have to go back to what is God's truth. Say, and obedience is success, Right? Obedience is success. When we stay connected to the vine, when we abide in him, when we stay connected with him. No matter what resistance is coming, no matter what people are saying. No matter what progress we see today, we can move forward in what God has called us to do. Just like CJ was saying, whatever the progress is, however big, big or small, and celebrate that. And so I want to encourage you today, God is with you. He is moving you forward. Even if you feel like you're walking through quicksand right now, it may just be the enemy trying to get you to stop and not click publish on that book, not click publish on that post, not go live on your Facebook page or whatever it is, whatever it is, if it's marketing or writing or publishing, he wants to stop us. But God says, I am greater than he that is in the world. And I've given you assignment. I've given you something to join me in doing. And I will strengthen you. I will give you what you need to do what I've called you to do. You are never alone. You are supported, and God is with you. All right? Amen.

So, cj, why don't you close us in a time of prayer?

Father, thank you so much for these stories in your word that we draw from. There's so much that can be applied to our writing and our endeavoring to worship you through that gift, through that means. And I just want to pray, Lord, that you would allow each Kingdom writer here to make progress.

To pause and rejoice and give you the thanks for whatever work is done. And I believe with many here today, there's going to be some foundation laid. It's not going to look elegant here in the beginning. It's going to be messy. There's still much to be done. And I just want to pray, though, Lord, that you would allow us to be thankful. Yes, grateful for every step that's made. And we come against every foul spirit, every taunt from the enemy, and we say you have no part in this. Just like. And the team of people rebuilding that temple said, this is a work that we are called to. And with your help, Lord, we will overcome. Because you are the God who aids, who overcomes all obstacles despite the worst odds. We see that over and over in your word. And we thank you, Lord, that we serve you and you alone. So, Lord, I just pray that progress would be made in our writing today and tomorrow.

Whatever steps people are taking to move forward. Thank you, Lord. We give you the honor and the glory in Jesus name. Amen.

Thank you for listening to this episode of Kingdom Writers. We believe that you as a Christian writer have a specific role to play in the Kingdom Kingdom of Heaven to impact lives for eternity.

And because of this, we choose to pour out our lives into encouraging writers like you to not only tell your stories, but to take the courageous step of self publishing your stories in books that will outlive you and leave behind a powerful legacy. This podcast is sponsored by Christian Book Academy, where we help you give birth to your books. We invite you to join our community of Kingdom writers.