I recently spoke with a pastor in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. His congregation is small—150 or so members—and his routine is busy, with duties extending far beyond the partitions of the church constructing.
The pastor’s typical week is a testament to his dedication to his parishioners. Most of his time is dedicated to visitation, prayer, and pastoral care, often in nursing homes and hospitals. He reserves Saturdays for sermon prep and tries to maintain Fridays for time together with his family.
Sometimes, the pastor receives invitations to go further afield: to talk at conferences, contribute to Christian media outlets, and even write books—all alluring opportunities and an indication of his mental prowess and extensive network in ministry circles. However, he typically declines when considering how much that work and absence would affect his flock’s spiritual growth. Instead of constructing a platform, he’s nurturing a community. Or, within the words of writer Jen Pollock Michel, he’s leading a life as a substitute of leaving a story.
I actually have struggled with that selection for myself. After graduating from seminary, I began writing and teaching at my local church. Because I didn’t have to earn a living from my writing, I’ve had the posh of flexibility, and shortly, on the lookout for places to be published became a job in itself. It was gratifying and humbling to be invited to be a member of a writers’ guild and have others promote my work. But I also began to see that often writing for public consumption was complicated, hard, and unsustainable if I desired to remain invested in my congregation.
I would like to write down to serve the church, but writing increasingly takes time away from my actual church. Suppose I spend all my time pitching publications, constructing my following, creating Christian content, and attempting to make it within the “Evangelical Industrial Complex.” Am I still being Christ to others? Am I showing his love?
On the opposite hand, if I feel a calling to write down and consider I actually have something worthwhile and faithful to say, is it flawed to make use of my talent to advertise my work? Should I be content with obscurity, just like the pastor in Pennsylvania? Should I sit with the lady whose mother died, whose husband walked away, or who got a phone call from her doctor a few CT scan? I actually have often asked myself whether I actually have the intelligence, wisdom, and resilience to navigate the lifetime of a Christian author.
This spring’s discourse amongst Christian writers on the dynamics of Christian ministry and the publishing landscape suggests I’m not alone in asking this query. The whole conversation is formed by how technological changes have transformed how writing works. In some ways, publishing is now democratized. Between podcasts, social media, Substack and other newsletters, and video platforms like YouTube and TikTok, there’s no dearth of Christian content, and minimal barriers to entry enable many more voices to talk on theology, spiritual growth, and Christian living.
The trouble is what happens after entry. The journey toward recognition entails deliberately cultivating a private brand and skilled network. “Publishers are continually evaluating book proposals, not on the content of the book alone, but on the platform of the writer,” Michel wrote on Substack, in a post about deciding to quit publishing but keep writing. “Can this person write? Yes, it’s one query. But I’d argue it’s not even crucial one within the publishing calculus. Can this person sell? Now we’re talking.”
You should construct a strong digital presence and expand your audience. You hope other writers will promote your work just as you promote theirs—whom you recognize and tag in your social profiles becomes currency. It’s not enough to be gifted by the Spirit; you need to market your gifts on social media. You create Instagram content, write nuggets of wisdom, and begin doing reels within the hope that the more content you create, the more people will notice.
Is this how I needs to be spending my time? Where does it leave my lay ministry? Where does it leave people going through divorce, illness, and parenting struggles—or people just on the lookout for community? If I write about Christ, am I neglecting his body? As theologian Nika Spaulding asked after I interviewed her, “Am I missing the imperative to prioritize the needs of the local church? Do I require a recalibration of aspirations and ambitions?”
I wrestle with this each day. I think God calls me to faithful service where I’m planted, to like God and love people in my local church—to not be a platform builder or influencer, searching for an admiring audience’s validation (and dopamine hit). But I also consider writing is a way God has equipped me to serve, and the publishing industry says I have to construct a platform if I would like anyone to read my work. In my conversations with journalist and author Devi Abraham, she observed that in American Christianity, like American culture more broadly, it seems “obscurity shouldn’t be the reply for achievement.”
I don’t have a settled answer to those questions, but I do have more questions that will bring clarity—and a story that reframed my considering.
Can we discover contentment in obscurity? “I spoke at two fairly large women’s events, and for the primary time, didn’t incentivize anyone to subscribe to my newsletter,” writer and ministry leader Sarah K. Butterfield said of a period through which she took a break from writing. “I showed up with the only purpose of serving those that attended with no hopes of growing my following. The result was liberating!”
Do we now have it in us to do likewise? How would our writing, pitching, and publishing habits change if we weren’t continually attempting to increase our readership? Is there a dissonance in our souls, such that we can’t be satisfied with the little and continually find ourselves eager for more?
If God has given us a creative gift, what does it mean to make use of it for his glory? We must use our gifts for God and the extension of his kingdom, but what if the reach that he wants us to have in our ministries, either church or parachurch, was meant to be limited? What if he wants us to minister—and even write—to simply a small number of individuals, not 20,000 books sold but faithfulness to the few in our circle? Our “platform” is perhaps an area church or neighborhood.
“Serving in an area church and community is tough, difficult, and exhausting,” Bible teacher Jen Wilkin told me. But additionally it is gratifying to see, in person, people come alive within the knowledge of Scripture and love for God. In the digital cacophony of voices vying for attention and affirmation, we in Christian ministry need to search out ways to construct substantive relationships and foster the expansion of spiritual depth in those inside our literal reach.
I had an extended chat about this with Al Hsu, associate editorial director at InterVarsity Press. Even within the publishing industry, he said, “Platform shouldn’t be”—or shouldn’t be—“an end in itself. It is an extension of our mission and vocation.” Our platforms should align with our callings and whom we’re called to serve, so platforms must look different for various people.
Can we be patient in our development? Like many writers, I’ve aspired to be just like the leaders, teachers, and authors who’ve massive platforms and have reached fame. Perhaps I’ll someday, but they didn’t get to that level overnight. Prominent writers like Beth Moore and Ann Voskamp “labored largely unknown for years,” as author Karen Swallow Prior has noted, “and, more importantly, didn’t set out in hopes of gaining the wide platforms they’ve.”
Author Christine Caine writes about how she was “developed, not discovered.” She desired to serve God at an early age, so when church leaders asked her to serve on the cleanup team as a young adult, she agreed. That led to greater responsibility and mentorship, and after years of wiping up messes, her faithful yes at 21 prepared her for the large ministry she leads today. God developed her faith and skills in obscurity.
What can we actually want? Maybe God wants us to minister on a small, local scale. Or perhaps he’ll help us write for hundreds of thousands. In either case, writer Mary DeMuth said in our conversation, we must listen to our hearts. “Do we discover ourselves loving the feed greater than the people behind the feed?” she asked. “God is looking people to the context of loving humans with skin on, and we’d like to hunt to bless them, love them, and know them.”
God calls us to a lifetime of knowing him and walking with him, and we must cultivate that first. If a big audience is something God wants for us, he can bring it to pass. We needn’t waste our time striving for prominence and platform. We can grow where we’re planted, grow within the knowledge of God, and practice his presence within the mundane. The true measure of success shouldn’t be a follower count or sales record but our depth of fidelity to God.
I recently read a brief history of the Frankish princess Bertha, who moved to Canterbury within the English kingdom of Kent across the yr 580 to marry its pagan king, Ethelbert. Christianity had been introduced to England at the moment but had not yet been widely established.
Bertha was an individual of strong Christian faith. She married on the condition of being permitted to stay a Christian and brought a bishop together with her to her recent home. She corresponded with the pope, who later wrote that her “good deeds are known not only among the many Romans … but in addition through various places.”
In 597, after years of Bertha’s apparently “unsuccessful” faithfulness, a mission team led by a monk named Augustine arrived from Rome. On reaching Kent, they preached the gospel to the king, who finally acknowledged Christ’s sovereignty. Many people followed the king’s example, and Canterbury became the middle of Christianity in England. To this present day, it’s the spiritual home of many Christians.
Bertha left no writings and no record of public exercise of power. Yet her years of faithfulness helped result in the evangelism of England and plenty of other nations. Today, UNESCO recognizes her prayer chapel because the oldest place of unbroken Christian worship and witness within the English-speaking world. God used her prayers to do immeasurably greater than she could have ever asked or imagined (Eph. 3:20).
He may use our obscure faithfulness the identical way. While “we prefer the spectacular,” as writer Skye Jethani has said, referencing the parable of the sower, “God is pleased to work through the subtle. And while we expect outcomes are based upon how God’s Word is proclaimed, God knows the outcomes are determined by how his Word is received.” Is our concern to construct a platform for ourselves, or is it to be the hands and feet of Christ, sowing where we are able to and letting God give the rise?
E. L. Sherene Joseph is an adult third culture kid and author who focuses on faith, community, and culture. As an immigrant to the United States, she shares her experiences of living between different worlds. You can find more of her work at www.sherenejoseph.me.
