SUMMARY
I have been dealing with my fears of failure and success, yet I keep moving forward daily.
This month, June, I have been gathering and organizing note and plans for the MOOC about prayer to be launched on September first.
Next month, July, the focus is on offering some webinars and beginning an online community centered around praying for one another as well as enrolling volunteers for the MOOC.
Then August is for enrolling, training, and leading the teams of volunteers for the MOOC.
Pray for and watch for the first webinar about prayer to be announced in early July.
At the end of this document is a list of prayer requests.
DETAILS
These days I have been facing my fears and yet taking bold action steps.
I am finding that I was often stuck in my Comfort Zone due to the unwillingness to deal with my twin fears. I have feared failure and I have feared success.
It feels risky to daily follow what I believe is the guidance of God. I pray much about the launching of the online ministry. Then I get inspirations, insights, and instructions. A great many times lately God has sent to me the exact right lesson from an online teacher that addresses my current challenge. Such incidents of synchronicity were rare in my life yet are becoming common.
For a long time, I have felt led to offer an online course and an online community. So many hours each week at invested in receiving inputs from online courses and online communities. This both fuel and inspire me. I have online folders with PDF guides that are helping me design the online ministry from the highest levels of strategy to the lowest levels to tactics.
These have been my experiences. Yet I still have some trouble sleeping. I still get odd sensations on my hands and arms. Thankfully, the headaches are gone. Those symptoms are likely a combination of stress and spiritual warfare. Therefore I am requesting your best prayers.
What I can do is take the next step one day at a time by faith. I can trust in the Lord that he began this good work in me and He will complete it. I can do what it takes to learn and apply the lessons He is sending my way.
The fear of failure happens when I imagine that all this activity will result in zero results. The enterprise in my notes has many moving parts. These need to work well and to flow together as a system. I have never done anything like this before. But the online teachers have. So I can hope that there will be a success. And I can maintain an attitude of a willingness to learn from my future errors and then to make improvements.
The fear of success happens when I imagine the opposite. What if most of the plans in my files work out well? What if lots and lots of people want to participate? What if this online community attracts not only wonderful and supportive people but also mean and divisive people? Generally, I like to deal with words and data. They do not make a fuss. They are predictable and controllable. Yet in order to trust and obey the guidance from God, I need to open the doors wide and let all sorts of people enter. Note that I have never wanted to be a pastor just for the reason that all kinds of personalities will show up.
So, on the one hand, I feel bad that this message is already this long. On the other hand, this is a simple summary. I did not ramble too much in my opinion. And the purpose of this is to enroll targeted prayers so such information is needed.
Yesterday I made the 4 videos that are in the links. The Holy Spirit has been prompting me to make them for a while. Yet part of me thinks they are far too long. People will not watch them soon. But if this ministry grows in the coming months and years such messages will serve as a benchmark of the origin story. You are invited to watch and comment.
Recently I have enjoyed a few enriching phone conversations with key men at my local church. They asked and I told them of my current challenges and next steps. So let me give a quick summary to you.
I continue to believe that the wisest use of my time and talent is to offer a series of MOOCs. MOOC stands for Massive Ongoing Online Course. Lord willing the first one will launch September first. It will be named Let's Pray Better - Why and How to Pray more Effectively. There will be 3 levels of engagements and lessons. These are for children, teen, and Christian leaders. So this will be a huge and complex operation to interactively learn from one another how to serve these different populations.
Then like I told my church friends that is not all. There is more.
I could never give my wholehearted commitment to just help Americans. I MUST also serve those on the mission fields worldwide. So from the beginning, we will be collaboratively creating educational modules that will be used by missionaries and indigenous workers. These will be in English text. That can be rapidly translated online for free into other languages. The text can be read by computers and people to reach those who are illiterate. I have always had a heart for the nations. I have never felt led to any one people group. So this is my way to serve those who serve my brothers and sisters in Christ thousands of miles away. It will be offered under a Creative Commons license so they can edit and adapt to the local cultures.
Other MOOCs will follow in 2019 and beyond. These systems will grow and mature.
So in order to make this happen, I must enroll, train, and lead lots of others. I will need to work with those who bring a wide range of skills, spiritual gifts, and natural talents. Frankly, this frightens me. The scale of this is far too big for my mind to grasp today. So all I can do is take it one day at a time. Leave the results up to God.
All of my life I have been the solo nerd that mostly hangs out at the library or online. I take some comfort in the saying that God does not call the qualified, He qualifies the called.
Do you see how this could become a huge flop or an out of control mess? PLEASE pray much!
So here is the game plan to get this enterprise rolling.
During June the focus is on reviewing my MANY notes from the previous 10 plus years. The aim is to bring them together online in orderly ways that will suit the current vision and game plan. As a perfectionist, I would like to say at this stage for another 6 months to get it just right. But that is not how God is guiding me.
During July the focus is to study for the third time the book my brother sent me about Internet marketing and make applications. This is a proven system that has served all kinds of online businesses. Some of the moving parts of that system include offering some webinars. These are called masterclasses. They give generous samples of lessons for free to prospects. Then in my case at the end, they are offered 3 options. One option is an invitation to subscribe to an email list that will alert them to future lessons. Another option is to join an online community. There they can meet and greet like minded people. They can form friendships, find prayer partners, and join prayer groups. I will be sharing my teachings with the community. Later I will be sharing interviews with ordinary people that experienced major answers to prayers. Such testimonies will glorify God and strengthen the faith of many. The third option will be to enroll partners. I will need intercessors, advisers, and donors. I will be enrolling volunteers to help with the MOOC
During August I will be working with the initial teams of volunteers. I do not know who will show up and of those who will stick with it. I will be recruiting from the ranks of missionaries, retired people, seminary students, Bible college students, as well as stay at home moms. There will be a huge amount of work to be done to set up the MOOC for the launch in September. It will run until mid-November. During that time and after educational modules will be made for the mission field.
PRAYER
So in conclusion, please pray as the Holy Spirit prompts you.
My ongoing challenges include the following.
learning from and planning to use the many lessons I have already received
making wise choices about what additional lessons I need soon and later
bringing together the many notes and ideas into an initial blueprint of the ministry
especially need diagrams and flowcharts to help me understand and share the overviews
have a general idea of what needs to be ready at the time of the launch and how to get ready
begin to understand how the webinars, newsletters, online community, etc. interact then iterate
sketch out a game plan to roll out the key parts that will cause initial momentum
design and use an editorial calendar to guide my research, writing, video recording and publishing
gain and maintain a holistically balanced lifestyle with right exercise, nutrition, meditation, social, etc.
consistently improve my productivity with healthy habits, wise rhythms, accountability, etc.
navigate and negotiate the distractions, interruptions, opportunities, hopes, fears, worries, joys. etc.
focus on what God shows me is important while not being derailed with the urgent
beware of my weaknesses related to fears of failure and success then be led to conquer them
sooner and later not be derailed by perfectionism and procrastination
trust God to set me free from my tendency toward workaholism
weave suitable spiritual practices into my days and weeks.
VIDEOS
There are links to 4 videos. These a vlog posts. They are about the Past, Present, and Future of my activities related to the ministry. These are like video journal entries. It has been a very long time since I made such videos. So these are rather long. It is my hope that in the future as the online community grows I will make such vlog posts often and much shorter.
There are those who will like these and those who will not like them. But I want to offer the option. Making such videos is very therapeutic for me. It makes me say what I had been thinking. It is a personal way to connect. There is a spiritual value to state publically what God has been doing and how He is guiding. It is useful to make a personal appeal for prayers and later testify how God answered prayers. So please pray that this becomes a healthy habit of mine.
Note that one of the kinds of videos I watch often is biographies. I am fascinated by the stories behind the inventions, businesses, artwork, missionary work, a famous preacher, world leader, etc. This is not appealing to most people. But such vlog posts are like the journal or diary entries of those before the internet. I also write in a journal but I am not as transparent in that writing. Mostly I just let off steam or dream of a better future.
I do invite your comments to this text message and to the videos.
Shalom
Brother John
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