Nehemiah's Focus: Defying Digital Chaos in Christian Blogging with Strategic Resolve

Have you ever felt the pull of distractions steering you away from your purpose, especially in the bustling realm of Christian blogging? Join me, LeeAnn Fox, as we confront this modern-day battle of focus versus frenzy, armed with wisdom from the story of Nehemiah. I'm here to illuminate the path through digital chaos, discussing the recent shake-ups like Google's Helpful Content Update and Amazon's image link policies, and how to fortify your resolve amidst these storms. As your digital ministry coach and the heart behind Kingdom Bloggers Ministry, I pledge to guide you through these challenges, ensuring that your blog remains a beacon of impactful content that perseveres through digital disruptions.

Feel your spirit waver in the face of endless online changes? Step into a sanctuary of encouragement and strategy, where I’ll nurture your dedication to the mission God has placed in your heart. Drawing parallels to Nehemiah's relentless focus on rebuilding Jerusalem's walls, I urge my fellow Christian bloggers to cement their feet firmly on their own walls of purpose. We'll explore how unwavering commitment and divine support can lead to the realization of His grand vision for your ministry. So, brace yourself for a journey of resilience and faith, where your labor in the Lord's digital vineyard is not only necessary but destined to flourish.

If you are interested in taking your digital discipleship to the next level through blogging, YouTube, social media, and/or online Bible study groups, be sure to join my private FB group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/kingdombloggers
You can also follow me on YouTube where you will find a variety of helpful tutorials for navigating each of these important platforms: https://www.youtube.com/@KingdomBloggers

Transcript

LeeAnn Fox: 0:02

Welcome to the Kingdom Influencers podcast, where our mission is to get more Jesus online. This podcast will equip and empower ministry leaders as well as regular everyday Christians to take the message of Jesus Christ throughout the digital realm. I'm your host, LeeAnn Fox, digital Ministry Coach and the creator of the Kingdom Bloggers Ministry, and I am so excited and honored to be a part of this journey with you. Let's get started. Hi everyone, leanne here from Kingdom Bloggers. So today I want to talk to you about distractions. I think we can all agree that distractions are everywhere. Sometimes you know they're normal distractions, such as our family and you know just our daily kind of lifestyle things, and I mean you might not think of them as distractions, but when you kind of get lost in them, then they do become distractions. Spiritual warfare is real for us here in this online space, and it often comes in ways that we probably don't recognize or realize, and so it's very important that we start learning to discern how the enemy is coming at us. You know, over the last couple of weeks I do these you version like Bible study reading plans and things like that, and then I have my walking with Grace that I read from every morning over and, over and over again and all the reading plans that I've been doing and things like that. I keep being brought back to Nehemiah. You should all be familiar with his story, right? He's trying to build this wall. You know they kept coming and they're like, hey, these other guys are, they're trying to plot against you, let's go chit chat about it, let's come down, stop working, come over here, and you know let's just talk about these things. But Nehemiah knew that none of what they were saying was true and he knew they were just trying to get him to come down off that wall in hopes that it wouldn't be completed. Now you can read the rest of it. Nehemiah is sick.

LeeAnn Fox: 1:47

I want to talk specifically to some things that have been going on lately for us in the Christian blogging world. Just recently, google update, google's latest HCU update called helpful content update. If you didn't know what that HCU stood for, I don't know what's helpful about this update, because actually, what has come about from the update, the results? When you look up things, it's horrible. As far as what I'm talking about today, that Google update has been a serious distraction for so many bloggers. I think it's been almost a month now, maybe a couple of weeks since it like completed and like here's the mess right.

LeeAnn Fox: 2:22

And when I go into the different like, I open Facebook. I'm in a lot of Facebook groups so I can keep tabs on what's going on and anything I need to know about. But also I see what people are struggling with. Even as of this morning, several weeks after the update is finished, I see people who've been just going on and on and on about this and in my mind, as much as I see them still complaining about the update, what I don't see is any progress. And so when I come back to Nehemiah, when I'm thinking about things like this, these update another one. Amazon just this past week announced it's getting rid of the image links, right, and so if you have those and they give us like a two week window to get it all cleaned up, well, obviously you need to take care of that. But what I see is people just going on and on and on and on in the Facebook groups and while it may take a second to tighten that complaint right to make the post, I'm pretty much guarantee that that wasn't the end of it. They're probably back there every day. What are people saying about it. And then, of course, I do go back and they're responding to every single comment.

LeeAnn Fox: 3:25

That's the same y'all, like you were spending all this time doing this, right, you've come down off your wall and now you're doing all these things that literally have no value. There are things beyond your control, there are things you have no say in the matter, but yet you're spending all this time not up on your wall completing the task that God has put you to, and so just like for you to think about that Anytime. You're going along, blogging's great and you're pumping out content, you're creating products, and you're doing all the things and then all of a sudden, boom, google does another update, or Amazon comes up and does something really crazy. Don't come down off your wall Like deal with a problem, for example, with Amazon, you gotta go and fix all those links, okay, but don't come off the wall to do it. Coming off the wall means you stop working on your wall, on your blog, working on things that are actually going to be fruitful, working on things that are actually going to have an impact, because they guarantee you.

LeeAnn Fox: 4:20

All the time that you're spending complaining, first complaining, then responding to everybody else who's responding to your complaint. You just get in this thing and next thing, you know, you and everybody else are sitting there on the side of the wall not doing anything and the enemy's over here, like I'm just gonna drink my coffee because mission accomplished. So let me just read you the verse here. This is Nehemiah 6, verse 3 and 4. So, and this is the NIV translation.

LeeAnn Fox: 4:46

But they were scheming to harm me, so I sent messages to them with this reply I am carrying out, carrying on a great project and I cannot come down. Why should the work stop while I leave it and go down with you? Four times they sent me the same message and each time I gave them the same answer. Right? So all these things the enemy's like okay, I didn't distract them with that Boom, I'm gonna throw Amazon in here. What's gonna be next? Is Pinterest gonna tank? Then I remember when Pinterest tanked, like two years ago oh, my goodness, four months I would see the same people in these Facebook groups still going on and on and on, and I mean it was recognizable to me that it was these same individuals, but I'm like they couldn't possibly get in the beginning of any work done because they're here all the time, every day ranting about what Pinterest did and I'm like, move on, get over it already.

LeeAnn Fox: 5:32

Go start finishing your wall, right, and your wall. Maybe you need to get a few different supplies. So what does that mean for us? Like, when Pinterest tanked, okay, go work on your blog. When Google traffic hits and you're like you take a traffic loss, how do you continue building your wall? Maybe you focus on some different aspects of it, right, updating that content. Or maybe you start using different supplies, materials. What does that look like? Maybe you start getting active on social media, or maybe you start building a YouTube channel, right? So this wall has many different pieces to it. It's not just one single thing. So here's a little further down.

LeeAnn Fox: 6:08

So this is still the NIV translation. This is verse nine. They were all trying to frighten us, thinking their hands will get too weak for the work and it will not be accomplished. But I wanna read the amplified version because I think it makes a little more sense to us. So verse nine from the amplified version says, where they all wanted to frighten us, thinking they will become discouraged with the work and it will not be done. But now, oh God, strengthen my hands, okay. So that's what the enemy wants. He wants you to get so frustrated because you've done all this work and now you just lost half your traffic. You've done all this work and your Amazon commissions are amazing and now it's not gonna be because Amazon did what it said. Maybe you have great Pinterest traffic and boom, pinterest has another midlife crisis and y'all remember two to three years ago like it was ridiculous. But that's okay.

LeeAnn Fox: 6:57

Don't become discouraged from what was taken. Don't come down off that wall and just be like, well, I don't know, I'm just gonna sit down here and complain with everyone else who it's happened to. But we know what happens when a group of complainers get together Nothing, nothing happens. Nothing grows, nothing fruitful, nothing comes from it except more complaining. So get back up on that wall. Remember what God has like, the calling, has put, the mission has put you on. They focused on that mission. Deal with the little obstacles that come right. Remember that. Phew, phew, phew, phew, phew, phew. Y'all know my crazy animated Wonder Woman story, but deal with it and move forward. You will never accomplish your mission if you stay in that same place of complaining and everything else. But, most importantly, don't get down off that wall.

LeeAnn Fox: 7:39

Y'all, keep pressing forward and I see this from a place of experience. You know, two, maybe a year and a half ago I don't know Google's been updating like all the time now, but it was about a year and a half, almost two years ago, google had this massive update like major. It was one of the first major ones. Since then we've had a lot, but this was like when it kind of first started. I had just reached about 100,000 monthly views with my site and I was just on top of the world, closed out December. Boom. January. The update happened. I went down to 47,000, okay, half of my traffic gone, a little over half.

LeeAnn Fox: 8:09

For months Now I kept pressing forward, but for months I was not seeing any recovery happen. Now the hemorrhage stopped so I wasn't going down anymore, but I was just staying and I'm like nothing I'm doing is working, but I kept doing it. I avoided all the group complaint. I avoided all the you know chiming in on posts that I would see. Actually, I spend minimal time on social media. Y'all know that. But when they do pop up, I'm like, okay, they're still complaining. I got better stuff to do. I stayed up on my wall and, as a result, I'm more than recovered. I regained what was lost and then some, and added two more websites.

LeeAnn Fox: 8:46

So when you stay on that wall, stay on your mission. They focus. The enemy wants to distract you like he did, like he attempted to do with Nehemiah. But be like Nehemiah and stay up on that wall and know that all these things going on around you are from the enemy. If God puts you here on this wall, he is going to help you through it, but he can't help you if you get off right. So, anyway, that is my work. Godly wisdom for today for the you Christian bloggers out there that are really just struggling right now. You feel that calling, but you just you're like man, I just can't catch a break. Or you're a rabbit trail chaser, right, you just following all these trails and never get anything done. Stop, get back on your wall and continue building that foundation. Continue building your wall, because God has something amazing planned for you on the other side of it. All right, guys, god bless, have a great day and I will see you all real soon. Bye, bye.