Insight into Rejection

Welcome to another Thursday UNFILTERED blog post, the only blog that is against picketing, but doesn’t know how to demonstrate it.

If you missed the big announcement, my brand new book recently dropped.

You can check out samples, new interviews, and ordering information at 48Laws.com.

I didn’t expect the response to it to be so overwhelming.

But I’m humbled and grateful that so many of you got a copy and are sending me beautiful notes about how it’s impacting you.

Some of you said you’ve never highlighted a book so much. Others said you didn’t learn half of the principles in seminary.

I appreciate the feedback.

Whenever you labor tirelessly to put a book into the world, you have no idea how readers are going to receive it.

Which brings me to today’s subject — rejection.

Many of you who read these Thursday articles are leaders and/or creators of some kind.

Because you lead in some manner and you serve in some way, you struggle with rejection.

As a person who trains authors as well as those who minister regularly, I’ve noted that the feeling of rejection is widespread.

Unless you have hundreds of thousands of dollars to spend on ads for Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Twitter, you feel pretty invisible.

But that sort of thinking and the feelings that go with it are rooted in trying to hit a baseball with a golf club.

Your focused is misplaced.

On the heels of my birthday last month, one of the best compliments I’ve ever received was this:

“Frank, your work has changed my life. As a leader myself, I’ve noticed that you are one of the few bestselling authors who has worked hard at not being a Christian celebrity and a star. You are an artist.”

Right or wrong, I actually do regard my work as art.

Art is any expression of creative imagination and skill.

If you haven’t yet read 48 Laws of Spiritual Power, Law 5 is called “Detest Celebritism.”

(You can listen to that entire chapter gratis on Tuesday’s episode of the “Christ is All podcast.” It’s also posted on the 48Laws.com website.)

I hate the celebrity Christian culture worse than I hate poison.

From the beginning, I refused to have a Facebook fan page, I don’t permit video recordings when I’m speaking or doing interviews, I don’t have handlers or an “armor-bearer,” I don’t pay for clicks, likes, and shares on social media, I am not on TikTok, my wife isn’t called “the first Lady,” and I’m accessible to my readers and peers.

My chief aim is to put a body of work out into the world that meets my own standards of quality and that changes the game.

Since it changed the game for me, I am betting that it will do the same for some people.

But the key word in that sentence is some.

My work isn’t for everyone. In fact, it’s not for the masses.

The same is true for your work.

Even though my books in total have sold over 600,000 copies, 99% of the “Christian world” doesn’t know who I am.

That doesn’t bother me because I’m not writing or speaking for them.

If your work is for the masses, it will be average. Mediocre.  And it will never change the game.

So my advice to all of you who create and all of who minister in some way is this:

Get clear on WHO exactly you’re speaking to.

Narrow that audience as small as you can.

Keep laboring to put your work out into the world.

But do it for them … that small targeted group.

Be faithful and leave the results with God.

And if someone shows disinterest in what you’ve created, tell yourself the truth.

And that is.

What I’ve created isn’t for them.

Thanks to all of you who consume the art that this ministry produces.

You make it possible for me to keep putting it out into the world.

And together, we’re changing the game.

Stay faithful and learn how to interpret rejection so that it never stops you.

On a somewhat related note, I continue to appreciate your prayers for energy and motivation as I continue to rewrite The Untold Story of the New Testament Church. The book is up to 2,000 footnotes right now. We expect it to release in 2025.

Your brother,

fv

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ATTENTION PASTORS AND CONFERENCE HOSTS: Frank is still taking invitations to speak in conferences and seminars for next year. If you are interested in inviting him to speak at your event, go to his Speaking page.

To see his …

entire book catalog (all 20 volumes)

all the podcasts (Insurgence, Christ is All, The Deeper Journey)

full archive of articles (over 1,000 articles)

YouTube channel (200+ videos)

online courses (How to Live by the Indwelling Life of Christ, The Day I Met Jesus, etc.)

the deeper life network (Master Classes: Galatians in 3D, Ephesians in 3D, etc.)

Just go to Christian Stuff That’s Not Boring.

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