Encouragement for Writers and Speakers: Insights from Cynthia Heald
This excerpt is from a conversation that Joyce Koo Dalrymple, author of Women in the New Testament and Jesus’ Passion Week (LifeChange Bible Studies) had with renowned Bible study writer, Cynthia Heald. Joyce had asked Cynthia, “What encouragement do you have for someone who has this kind of calling—writing or teaching people how to study Scripture? What challenge or caution do you have?” And then Joyce follows up with another question, “What is something God is teaching you these days?” Cynthia’s responses to these questions are below.
Well, the answer to your question about encouraging someone to a calling to write and teach applies to me and not to anybody else, but it’s the best answer I have. I was doing a question-and-answer time at a conference, and this one lady stood up and asked, “How did you receive your call to write and speak?” And I looked at her and I said, “I haven’t received a call to write or speak.”
I felt everyone in there getting a little agitated—If you haven’t received a call, why are you here? I quickly prayed, “Lord, why am I here? When did you call me?” I had never even thought about it.
Just as quickly, he said, “Cynthia, don’t you remember when you were twenty-two and I asked you to give me the steering wheel of your life? And you turned your life over to me? That was my call to you.”
I shared a little bit with these women about my total surrender to Christ. We all must surrender daily, but I’m no longer driving the car of my life; God is. God’s call on my life is to abide in him. It is to walk with him. It is to deepen my intimacy with him. Then he can direct my walk with him to use me as he pleases. And I think that’s God’s call on all of us.
These precious women come up to me and say, “God has called me to write and speak. What advice do you have?” And I say, “The best thing you can do is just stay close to Jesus. Walk with him, abide in him, and see.” I always sign my emails “Keep Your Hand in His” because it’s a great picture of staying connected to Christ, abiding in him. Oswald Chambers said in My Utmost for His Highest, “Let God fling you out.” We don’t have to try to manipulate things so that “Oh, I can speak” or “I can write.” If God calls you, you want to be obedient. My challenge is for everyone to pray for God to lead them on the path that brings glory to his name. That’s Psalm 23:3. That’s what I pray.
I often ask a question that I’ve learned from reading Oswald Chambers: Am I willing to be even an obscure servant if that brings glory to God? Writing and speaking seems so glamorous in the Christian world, and a lot of it is anointed and we need it. But I think sometimes our motives get mixed up, and we just need to be sure it’s what God wants. We just want to be sure we’re in the center of God’s will.
When you ask, “What is something God is teaching me these days?” I think right now he’s just saying, “Cynthia, I am God and you are not, and I just need you to understand that life is not always lived on your terms. I love you and I am for you, and I want to continue to conform you to the image of my Son.” One of my favorite quotations is from Erwin Lutzer, who said in a sermon at the Heart-Cry for Revival Conference in 2002,
God . . . says, “I am that I am” (Ex. 3:14). He is who He is and not who we want Him to be.
I think that’s a great lesson to learn: that God has a plan for us. That’s what this book, Becoming Like Jesus, is about. God’s plan is to make us like Jesus, and his ways are not our ways.
It’s very freeing to let God be God in your life and not try to take over or manipulate circumstances, but to trust him. Years ago in a Hallmark store, I saw a magnet that said, Dear child, I can do it myself. Love, God. So over and over, over my life, over the years, I’ve just said, “God, it’s your life. It’s not mine.” More and more I just realize that God is enough, God loves me, he knows what he’s doing, and I’m blessed to be his child.
Adapted from Becoming Like Jesus: Reflecting Christ in Your Everyday Life by Cynthia Heald. Copyright © 2024. Used by permission of NavPress. All rights reserved. Represented by Tyndale House Publishers, a Division of Tyndale House Ministries.
Cynthia Heald uses her speaking engagements, Bible studies, and books to encourage women around the world to deepen their relationship with God. In addition to her popular Becoming a Woman Of . . . Bible study series, which includes the best-selling Becoming a Woman of Excellence and Becoming a Woman of Freedom, Cynthia has also written Abiding in Christ: Becoming a Woman Who Walks with God, a Gold Medallion–winning devotional. Her husband, Jack, joined her in writing two Bible studies about marriage: Loving Your Wife and Walking Together. Cynthia’s other nonfiction books include A Woman’s Journey to the Heart of God and When the Father Holds You Close.
When she is not writing or speaking, Cynthia loves to spend time with Jack and their four children and eight grandchildren. She is an avid reader, especially of the classics. Cynthia and Jack are full-time Navigator staff members in Tucson, Arizona.
