The Church Talk Podcast
Jason, Rob, & Courtney have conversations about the Church, culture, and leadership. If you are a church leader, you are invited to join them!
The Church Talk Podcast
Holy Ghostwriting with Jeff Miller
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In this engaging interview, Jeff Miller from Christian Ghost Writing shares insights into the world of ghostwriting, especially for pastors and church leaders. Discover how ghostwriting can serve as a powerful tool for authority building, message amplification, and ministry impact, while also exploring the process, costs, and ethical considerations involved.
Find out more about Jeff & ghostwriting!
Chapters
00:00 Introduction and Light Banter
02:52 Introducing Jeff Miller and Ghostwriting
06:17 The Writing Process and Importance of Ghostwriting
09:43 How Ghostwriting Works: The Process Explained
13:51 The Art of Writing in Someone Else's Voice
18:06 Different Engagement Models for Writing
21:00 Publishing Insights and Market Realities
27:09 The Purpose of Writing a Book
36:05 The Role of Ghostwriters in Publishing
40:04 Navigating Church Hurt and Leadership
50:21 The Impact of Writing on Ministry
Follow us on Insta @churchtalkproject. www.churchtalkproject.com
Welcome back to the Church Talk Podcast with Rob and Jason. I'm Jason. Rob's over there. And uh we're we're just excited to have another conversation today. Rob, I mean, the sun is shining. You mentioned something about canceling this and going to play golf, but you know, we have a guest and I really didn't want to be rude again. So what uh what are you doing today? Are you gonna go play golf after this?
SPEAKER_04I'm not. I mean, you know, that's the uh that's the problem with recording something in an afternoon. I know it takes up your it takes up your day. All my uh golfing buddies who were actually willing to skip work today, today's my day off when we're recording, so I would have been, you know, just doing something leisurely on my day off. But yeah, yeah, actually one of them who you know, Andy, he's been and actually this is hysterical because my other buddy, Rob, works with Andy, and we love to joke around about, you know, does Andy even work? You know, sometimes. So Rob faithfully listens to our podcast. So he's here that Andy was totally willing to take half a day off and and go golfing with me. So I love that. Rob, I think that you should, you know, whatever, cut this clip. Of course, keep it from Ryan, the owner of the company, but definitely uh definitely hold it over Andy's head a little bit. I think that you know, I mean we're here to we're here to serve people in the Trick Talk podcast. So that's what we're gonna do.
SPEAKER_03If we can get somebody fired, all the better, right? That that's that's how that works. Oh man. Well, yeah, I have no plans to play golf. I'm simply going to have to mow because I've been traveling and uh you gotta cut it when it's when you can.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I'm actually gone most of the next five days, and I haven't mowed for a week and a half, and my lawn looks like there's like you could have an African safari. Like I'm pretty sure I have at least three tigers and uh you know a zebra hiding in the grass in my yard. So I need to cut it before I leave tomorrow. So whether that's later today or tomorrow or whatever, it's gotta get done.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah. The joys of having to travel occasionally. Well, yeah. Well, enough catch up. We are glad that uh you have tuned in. And uh we've got we've got a conversation today that I am I was excited about. I'm still excited about it, but then before we hit record, we started to have a conversation with our guest about something totally different and had nothing to do with the conversation conversation we had planned. And now I'm even more excited uh because I think it's gonna be a great day. We have with us the one and only Jeff Miller, who is uh I I don't know all the titles here, but basically you are part of the website Ghostwriter uh Ghost Christian Ghostwriting.com. See, I told you I had to get it right. Christian Ghostwriting.com, which of course we'll put a link in the show notes and stuff. And you basically help people, and our general audience is is usually church leaders or leaders within church settings, write a book that they have in them that they can't, they just want to get out, but you come alongside and offer various ways. So, Jeff, welcome to the podcast. I can't wait to talk about this. How are you doing today?
SPEAKER_05I'm doing great. Thanks for having me.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Did did you did you think about bailing and going to play golf instead of talking to us?
SPEAKER_05No, I'm not gonna pay to get mad. That's what would happen if I played golf. But I but I am thinking about my yard and my my teenager. My my wife said yesterday that it some people call this no moy. And I don't know, our yard already looks pretty bad, so I don't know if I can do that. But she says it's a movement and people do it on purpose so that they the bees and the tigers can multiply uh for the month.
SPEAKER_04So if if I participated in no moy, I would have seven feet of grass in my yard. I have like four to five acres of mowing to do. I live on 20 acres here. And uh yeah, that that just I mean, you know, it would go back to being woods at that point. So I can't I can't participate.
SPEAKER_03I'm this for me, it's it's mowing. Like I got multiple. Yeah, and and my HOA would probably like start fining me or something if I didn't. So then again, what are they gonna do? It's an HOA, they can't really do anything.
SPEAKER_04Jeff, we do have actual questions about this whole ghostwriting thing, but I do need to point out when you said that you're not gonna pay to get mad or matter or whatever it was, it was funny how this works. I just saw a video earlier today. It was some old guy, and he said, Hey, I I just heard a statistic that the average person like curses, you know, 34 times per round of golf. And uh, and uh he you know, he kind of has his golf shirt on, he's standing out like a golf course, and he goes, and and he goes, for the first time in my life, I'm finally above average at something. So I just thought that was that was good.
SPEAKER_05No, no. So you said you're in Ohio, is it? Okay, yeah, we both are. Yeah, all right, all right.
SPEAKER_03Yes, the beautiful central Ohio, which actually where Rob lives is is beautiful, the Mohican State Park and all that stuff. It is really pretty out there. Near Columbus is the opposite of pretty in a lot of ways, is just flat and construction this time of year. It's basically construction.
SPEAKER_05I spent one summer in Worcester.
SPEAKER_02Oh yeah. Yeah, it's right up by Willow.
SPEAKER_05Okay. Yeah, I was a I was a member of the Ohio Light Opera. That's really cool. That was actually my first church plant. I was I was d newly saved and trying not to sin. So I really planted a church for the summer among the singers and instrumentalists and and uh to keep myself out of trouble. And later on, when when that came around as a thing, I thought, oh I yeah, I think that think that that that does sound like me.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Yeah, that's great. We're gonna get back to that, but first, I gotta know about the ghostwriting. Okay. So I have I have wanted to to write a book for years, and I've even I've done a book proposal. I did an article proposal for a leadership journal and got through two rounds before they said, we don't think we like you. And I've, you know, I've done I've got two or three books in my head outlined, you know, all the stuff. But I don't have the time, which really means I don't have the discipline, to sit down and start writing. Because honestly, it's just this big, overwhelming task as I see it, because I I don't I've never done it. I don't know how to do it. Tell me about ghostwriting and about maybe even just the writing process and why pastors should even care.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, good question. I think that we should try to normalize having ghostwriters because it's it's a very specific, hard kind of skill, kind of writing as is writing books, because it's not just writing, it it's a it's a huge hairball to take an idea and figure out a core message and a reader promise and a structure, a structured outline that provides a transformational journey, which is what most pastors are going to be trying to write. A lot of times, a lot of jobs I'll get will be a sermon series to book. And those are really hard because it's hard not to just have a book of sermons. And so to turn that into a book, you've got to somehow fit them together in a way that I mean people do that. I think pastors, good pastors will do that when they're building a series. But we also have each of those things stands alone because you never know who's coming. Just gonna be there that that for the for the first time, you know, on chapter four. Right. But but for me, I think it should be, think it should be normalized because there's a lot of us writers out there who know how to write books but don't have anything else to write about necessarily. And then you've got people with influence who could get people to read books and have a message. The message to me is the most important thing. And if you've got the message, it's just a matter of how do you how do you write it in a way that people can follow and get into them. So yeah, I think it should be normalized. I don't think it should be secret. I don't think I stopped signing NDAs a long time ago. If someone doesn't want to give me any credit, I don't do it. But yeah, so so yeah, it's not, it's not you shouldn't, you shouldn't feel bad that it sounds hard.
SPEAKER_02Because it is. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, and it's it would be no different for a pastor, right? Like if someone, someone's like, hey, I'm gonna preach my first sermon. I don't know what to do, I don't know how to start, you know, where you know, for some of us, like we've been doing this for 20, 30 years or more, and it's like, oh, it's the easiest thing in the world. Like you just sit down and do it. Well, that's the day that wasn't like that day one, right? And I'm sure for writers too. I mean, I have a buddy who's now in his early 50s, and uh, we actually planted a church together in our 20s, and and we're still good friends. I'm actually gonna see him this next week. And uh, he's a guy who always had a passion to write. His dad was a writer, one of the many things his dad did. And so in his 20s, he literally like started, you know, writing stuff. Like every day he'd sit down and write for like a window of time. Jason, he had that discipline you were talking about that, you know, and that he worked, uh maybe still does for many, many years for Max Lucato as a researcher and as a writer, uh, doing some writing for him and some research and stuff, and that bolstered all of that. And so, you know, I mean, just like in ministry, we have developed some skills over time. You know, people who are writers, you know, develop skills too that then can serve others in the broader church and and pastors. Jeff, I got a I got a how question. So, you know, I mean, you see all kinds of things floating around these days, you know, like people are like, hey, you know, we use AI to turn all your sermons into books, like instantly, or you know, how does it work with your organization? I mean, are you the writer? Do you have a team of writers? Is I mean, what's the process look like to turn whatever someone's bringing to you into a book?
SPEAKER_05Yeah, so right now, most of the time it's me on the front end. So the process typically would be this: someone will reach out, we'll talk, and once we figure out we can we should work together, then I'll set up six or eight meetings with them. If they've written something already, they'll send me everything they wrote. Sometimes that's the case, sometimes it's not. And we'll start talking and I'll record every conversation that we have. And we will develop what this, what the message is and what the process is going to be uh to get that message out. Once we've finished that, I'll spend a couple of months writing the rough draft. And I probably shouldn't do this, but I do it on a Google Doc that's shared with them. And then so we're kind of talking about it. It might not be the best way to do it because it is a it can be a frustrating process because we started doing this and then you know they read something or had another idea. So, so that can sometimes take longer than I think it's going to because of that. But once I'm done with it and they sign off on it, the process after that is actually very, if I'm publishing it, which most of the time nowadays I am, the process after that is very structured with my team. They're much better than me at saying, here's the rules. You signed saying that we were gonna have it for 30 days, then you're gonna have it for 30 days, then we're gonna have it for 30 days, and then we're gonna do this. And once you sign off, the the cover designer's gonna do this, and then you sign off, and then if you want to change it, these are the consequences. I don't do any of that on the front side because it's it's just a lot more relational. So so after that, then then the team I have a team of editors, formatters, cover designers, and they're all contractors, but some of them just work for me. So they probably at some point will be employees when we if we structure it that way. It would be nice for me to find writers because I have I'm writing uh 11 books right now, and it's starting to feel it's starting to be a lot. So, and especially because I think there was a promise of AI. You mentioned AI. There was a promise in that that was made it seem like we were going to be able to do a lot more. And as as it turns out, it's almost just as hard, if not harder, to write using it, at least in our process, especially to write something that doesn't sound like everybody else. So Yeah. And and the copyright laws have have have solidified a little bit more so that you can't even copyright anything that you write with AI. So that's a that's a that's a you know, that's a you you could still publish a book. You just you're just disclosing this is not copywritten, this is just written by AI, or at least it was partially written by AI, or this part's copyrighted by me, but this part is AI generated. And so we're we're we're still learning how to how to manage that. Cause I because just like I believe in ghostwriters, I believe in whatever tools it takes, because the I'm not a I'm not a literary person as much as I am a message person. And so I love ideas, I love truth, I love truth seeking and application and being confronted with it. I love helping people say the truth. I believe that is what's gonna change the world. And so if there's a why behind it besides just the economics of it, to me, it's just like you got something to say, you're bold enough to say it. Even if I don't agree, I'll help you say it because we'll get it, we'll get you'll get feedback on that. And I want to consider what you're saying if you really think this is true. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04So, Jeff, I gotta I gotta follow up here because I really want to chastise Jason. Like you're writing 11 books and he can't even muster the the discipline to do one. So I really want, but I'm not going to because I'm not writing one either. So, you know, to point that out to him would also be shining an inappropriate light on myself.
SPEAKER_05By the way, it's easier to easier to write somebody get the discipline to write somebody else's book, especially if they're paying you, than it is to come up with your own.
SPEAKER_04No, but I'm curious, you know, you said you're writing 11 books right now. And, you know, how when I read, you know, something that, I mean, I don't know, just would pick right. I mean, in the church world, whether it would be uh Irwin McManus book or uh whatever, you know, when I read someone's book, especially if I've read a lot of them, I mean, they have ways that they say things. This is like listening to somebody, you know, like we all have mannerisms and perspectives that kind of bleed into all we do. So when somebody works with you and now, you know, you're taking their stuff and writing it, like how how do you, as you're doing this, think about I'm trying to like really speak and communicate and write in their voice, not just my own.
SPEAKER_05Yeah.
SPEAKER_04How does that work? Kind of just from your question point.
SPEAKER_05I would say there's a skill of writing books, and then there's another skill on top of that of ghostwriting. So I just think a lot of how I got into this was just the convergence of a lot of my background all coming together into one target. And when I mentioned to you guys, I don't remember if it was after we started or before, that I was in I was in in the Ohio Light Opera. I was an opera singer before I was a pastor.
SPEAKER_04Can you give us a little note or something right now?
SPEAKER_05No.
SPEAKER_04I don't know.
SPEAKER_05I mean that's good. That's good. But for that, I studied acting. So part of my, so half of my master's degree was in was in acting, in the acting program. And it is very much like acting. You study a character, you become somebody different than yourself, you get into it, you get in the moment, and you just be that person. So part of my interview process is getting to know them, not just so that I know their message, but I know how they talk, I know how they would say it. Obviously, I'm getting them to write as much as I can get them to write. So, you know, the the more the more I can actually get exactly from them the way they would say it. And most of them, they won't like it if it doesn't feel like them anyway. They'll say, This is great, but it doesn't sound like me. And so, okay, well then let's get, let's get, let's work on that. Let's get let's get that figured out. So that's probably, and I think that is what probably keeps some good writers from becoming ghostwriters, because they wouldn't, they just wouldn't be as for some reason, they just don't have a knack for that. Yeah, I mean, I would say I would say starting out with a lot of insecurity as a you know young man growing up and learning how to assimilate in different groups was one was the first place to to do that. The second place was learning how to be on the stage. And so so yeah, and and and whatever the technique of getting in the moment and embodied in somebody else is very similar to what you have to do when you sit down to write as someone else. Makes perfect sense.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I I was looking on on your your website and Christian Ghostwriting.com. Let's get that in there one more time. But it you've kind of got three ways to go about it. The the first one is basically ghostwriting, where you know someone comes to you with an idea, a concept, and then in essence, you and or your team write the book, and then obviously the person is signing off on it and so forth. But and then there's a second one we you you phrase it uh writing with you. And and I'm guessing that's kind of a partnership type thing, because then the the third one is written by you, and I I would say that's probably more coaching, where you're helping refine as they write, maybe calling them saying, Hey, it's been two weeks, why haven't you done anything? Get off your lazy butt, Jason. It's time. But I mean, you know, like are those am I right? Is that three kind of distinct ways you would engage with an author?
SPEAKER_05Yes. Although I would say for the most part, it's sort of morphed into two. Okay. The right the writing with, the writing for, and the it has become more the writing with. I got started on Fiverr, which was which was a platform where I really didn't meet the, I didn't really meet the client. They would send me material and I would turn it into a book. That never happens anymore. And some of that's just because the price that we chart now demands a relationship. And so once we get to get to that, it's almost always writing with, even if I'm still gonna do all the work. There's almost never a job now that someone is not highly engaged in some way. You know, it's at least at some point in the process. Sometimes they they they back off for a couple of months and then come back in. And then the coaching is I have a Substack newsletter for Christian writers called uh the Christian Writers Newsletter. The paid version of that, this is what it's morphed into. The coaching is morphed into this. The paid version of that allows access to a weekly Zoom call where we talk for maybe 30 minutes. My team and I will talk about some process of book writing. And then another hour and a half is feedback. And then um we will off and on do a coaching cohort out of that or even separate from that. Maybe we'll take like three or four writers and then just go through a 12-week process of putting a book together and and then stick with them, let them move into the Tuesday so we can stick with them through the writing process if they haven't written it in 12 weeks. You technically could, but almost nobody does. And I mean, I met my assistant, Roxanne, because she was, she reached out before I was coaching anybody. She reached out to ask if I was, if I would coach. And so I coached her just one-on-one. And because of that, I was like, oh, this is kind of fun. Let's do, let's do like a group kind of thing. And then so, so it that's we're that's kind of we move that around a lot. Like, okay, what what's the demand right now? Did I just meet, you know, when I first decided to do it, I met three or four people in one week who I was like, I could write it for this price or for a tenth of that. I could coach you to write it. And then a lot of those people needed a place to publish. A lot of my ghostwriting clients needed a place to publish. Some of them, you know, if they're more, they have more of a platform already, they may come. I have a publishing deal, I just need help. But 90% of the people that come to me, that's not the case. They, they, they don't have a publisher, they don't know how they're going to publish. So we're trying to build a publishing platform. Right now, I'd say we're a good vanity publisher, but I want to build more of a platform for our clients because we work really hard to make sure their books are as good as they can be. But it's very difficult to sell a book. It's very, very difficult to get people to read your book in this day and age when I think I read the other day in the 90s there would be 200 and something thousand books published a year. And right now it's like two to four million per year. Um, in part because of how easy it is to write in self-published books these days. So it's a very, very, very crowded market.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, for sure. That's uh go ahead, Jason. You guys.
SPEAKER_03I well, I'm just curious, because you kind of you mentioned cost, and and I am totally clueless about a lot of this. I mean, one of our friends who's been on the podcast several times has written a book, a couple books now, and whatever. And and you know, even he I think was self published. And I've got another one, another friend who published with like David C. Cook. And they're just different structures and all, but no one gets rich off writing books, is what I'm hearing. But you know, I'm just curious, like is Let's say me as a, you know, low level nobody writes a book. Let's assume it's an amazing book. Like, let's just assume it's quality, okay? And, you know, I work with you. You know, my first question is, should I expect to sell more than a hundred copies? Or is this just, you know, you kind of said a vanity publishing company, which basically means I published a book because I wanted to say I published a book. I don't know. What what's the thought?
SPEAKER_05That's not a great term, but that's just kind of what the what any any publishing company where you pay to publish. It doesn't, it doesn't speak to your motive. I gotcha. They just call it a vanity publisher. And I'm not trying to pretend that we're something beyond that yet, you know. Right. You pay to publish. I have a couple of deals right now where some of our payment is going to come on revenue, and and that's a risk that I that I haven't taken a lot of yet. Um, but so if you were to if you were to go to a publisher with a book idea, they one thing they want to know is what kind of audience do you have? If you came and said, well, 100,000 people listen to my podcast, they'd be like, okay. At which point you actually don't need them because you you can sell, you would be able to sell your book without them. And then you would have the freedom, you know, to do with it what you want. You would have way higher royalties, you wouldn't have the stamp of gatekeeper approval that the traditional publishers give, and that that does matter sometimes, but you wouldn't need it because you've built an audience. And so so if you haven't built an audience, then it's hard to get them to take a chance unless they have a reason to think they're gonna be able to make the money back that they're gonna pay you or that they're gonna that's gonna cost them to distribute it. So it's expensive to get to get a good ghostwriting team. We we'll charge anywhere from$40,000 to$50,000 if we're gonna do everything for you based on depending on how long the book is.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_05So if your book is if it's at least like 35,000 words, that's uh 150 pages or so, I'm gonna charge you forty thousand dollars to write it and publish it. And if you come and you say, well, I just need it published, right now are we we charge about$10,000 to do that. And there's some pre pre-launch marketing that goes with that. And I'm hoping more, you know, like I've got 27,000 subscribers to my newsletter, and I've if I publish a book, I say, hey, I this is a great book. But I don't, I don't have metrics to say I know what the ROI is gonna be. So what I tell everybody now is assume you're not going to sell enough books to pay to pay back, to make back what you're gonna pay me. Assume that.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_05And decide if you still feel called to write this book. Most people will say, if I could reach one person with this message, it would be worth it. And that's if they have the money. And so most of my clients, they're not getting a second mortgage to do it. They they actually had the money. Okay. And so, and the reason I do the class is because I want to be able to help people that can't afford to do stuff like that. And there's a lot we can do for somebody if they just stay in our orbit, you know. And many of them come for the coaching. It's, I mean, it's 80 bucks a year for the Substack subscription, and they get as much coaching as they can possibly stand from us. You know, we'll get we'll we'll do whatever we can for them. And then they'll and then and then that's a pretty deep discount on publishing for those people. If they, if they say, okay, I want you to publish, then you know, we're gonna give them, we're gonna do the best we can for as for as little as possible because just we have a relationship.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_05And but I would say, but uh, what keeps the lights on for all of us is my ghostwriting, premium ghostwriting package people. I mean, they might be somebody that, yeah, I sold a company, uh, you know, I sold a company for$500 million. It money's no object, you know. So that's interesting to work with somebody like that because you know, it's like, okay, well, what can money do for an audience? What can we do? But other people, they don't have that much, but they have enough. They've they're they're retired, they've they've got enough, you know, to live on. It's worth it to them. They've always wanted to do it. The average client that I have, they they probably will say, I've been, I felt like God told me to do this 10 years ago and I haven't done it. And I've got this money, or you know, I got this inheritance, or I sold this house, or, or whatever. But my longing would be to get myself to a place where I can look at somebody and go, I can calculate the ROI for you, and whatever you pay doesn't matter because we're gonna, we're definitely gonna make that back. You know, I'm just not not that's not what I can promise. What I can promise is we're gonna write an amazing book and we're gonna tell you everything we know about how to get it out there. But most of my clients, what they're trying to do is not necessarily make money selling books. They're actually trying to they're looking, they need something, they need an authority builder for a ministry or a business.
SPEAKER_02Yep.
SPEAKER_05Like my book. I haven't sold a lot of copies of my book, which I've self-published before I even knew how to do that. But it's how to write a book. It's how to write a Christian, it's it's called From Heart to Page, a short book about how to write a Christian book. And I've made a lot of money on the book because I give it to people when they want to see a sample or they want to know how I write books. Like, well, read this. And if somebody reads that and says, okay, that's exactly what I want, you know. And that's what my wisest clients are doing with their books, is like, I'm trying to build something. And a book is it it really does help, you know, when you're when you're trying to establish authority. And also to have a place where your knowledge is aggregated. This is like my best stuff in the best order that I could possibly think of for a transformational hero's journey, which is 95% of the books we write. Yeah. Um, and so that's the long answer to the question. Like, no, that's hard to say. It's really hard to say what you're gonna make from it. You have to just know this is something I need for what God's called me to do.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Well, I mean, that that actually it really answers the question in some way, because my my follow-up to that is why in the world should a pastor write a book? And and what I hear you saying is you don't write the book so that you can make money off selling the book. I mean, if that happens, that's wonderful. Like I we're not saying don't do it.
SPEAKER_04Unless your name's Stephen King or Tom Clancy, it's probably not the game. Right.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_03But but you write the book so that you have it it's a door opener in some ways, right? It Yeah. And I can see that even in yeah, you know, with the the Church Talk Project company that I I operate with, is if I had a book that, you know, talked about church and growth and health and all that stuff, right? It would, like you said, it would take, you know, Rob and I have sixty plus years of ministry experience and knowledge. You know, if we aggregate that into something, then it becomes something I can, when I'm out and doing my travels and meeting with other churches and pastors and conferences, I handle a book and say, if this helps, call me type stuff. You know, and and if you know, if we wanted to generate business and and as a pastor though, I don't maybe this is crazy, but I know pastors who've written a book and honestly, it it doesn't sell beyond their congregation necessarily, but man, the congregation is so proud to have a pastor who wrote a book. And it just generates excitement and even momentum in a way. Like I I don't know, is that completely self-serving, or is that actually a good way, or have you seen that?
SPEAKER_05I mean, if you're a good pastor, you want anything that you can do to help your people grow, you know, anything that you can do to help them, because we all we know what it always sometimes feels like being a pastor is like knowing what people should do, but not knowing how to get them to do it. And so I I yeah, I think anybody that has an important truth to share has a reason to write a book. Now, do they have a reason to pay forty thousand dollars to do it? Maybe not yet, but but but it's it's definitely worth it, you know. And a pastor signs up to spread the message of Jesus Christ. And so how do you do that, you know? And and and and what I like about it, I mean, you have a podcast, you have to keep making it, you know.
SPEAKER_03But once you've got a book, stinking week.
SPEAKER_05Right. Once you've got a book, you know, that thing lives, you know, and and it and it can it can be out there for a long time.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_05And have a big, big impact. Yeah, for sure.
SPEAKER_04Jeff, you uh when you said the number, I'm sure like a lot of people listening in, like they weren't expecting maybe forty thousand dollars. But you know, I remember years ago and it's higher now, um, but somebody told me they were reading that the average price, not the high price, the average price of a new pickup truck was eighty-two thousand dollars, right? And and actually, I mean, nowadays, especially if you're like, I need a little more toying, so I'll get the diesel. I think those are like 103, like starting, you know. Yeah, and so it's it's crazy how much things cost nowadays. And like you were saying, you know, you have you have people that work for you, editors and graphic designers, and and there's printing cost like there's just all the things, right? So I just say that to can maybe help get a little perspective there.
SPEAKER_05I mean, I I I've the first book I wrote for$80. I mean, I told you I got started on Fiverr, and and what happened was my son, uh, who was 14 at the time, was just kind of industrious and artistic, and he was he was freelancing on Fiverr as an artist and as a writer. He was writing a blog for a woman who was older, and it was a blog about aging women, and he was ghostwriting as this woman. Why your hair turns why your hair turns gray, what you could do about it, and why you're you don't need to worry about it because you're beautiful just the way you are. Well, somebody tried to hire him to write something about Christian marriage. And he was like, Well, I don't know anything about that. And so he said, Dad, you should do it. And I'm just a chronic early riser, especially in those days. This was about 2019, and I just had a couple hours every morning before I had to get ready for work as a full-time pastor. And so I was like, Yeah, sure, I'll I'll do that. And I I calculated in the first year, I was making about$2 an hour to write, and it was fun enough and interesting enough that it was just I was tickled to get paid to do a hobby.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_05But as Fiverr ranks you up, you get better and better offers, and then you have to either turn people away or raise prices. So I remember, I can remember some of those jumps from three cents a word to five cents to seven cents to ten cents. And then oh my gosh, I went to 25 cents from 10. And it was like, are people still gonna? Yep, people are still reaching out. Went to 45 cents, and that's about when I topped out on Fiverr. I don't get a lot. People don't go there to pay a lot, you know, they go there to get a deal. But then we started Christian Ghostwriting.com, and I didn't know it was a smart thing to title the web, the URL, the thing that people are searching.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_05And so, you know, within a year, I was starting to get hired on there. And again, I would raise prices as I would get too busy. And it just so happens that I've sort of kind of stuck around that range. I've tried to raise above that a little bit and it and and had to come come back down to there. And I've been there for about three years, which is I mean I'm starting to get repeat business. I'd used to not get repeat business because by the time somebody would come back, I've doubled prices, you know. And so there I would say the average going rate for a for a successful ghostwriter is fifty to a hundred thousand dollars. Um and could be more, you know, like but uh but yeah, I mean that that's like sixty to eighty cents a word. I mean, if you think about, yeah, you can write a it's kind of cool. You can write a sentence and make enough for lunch, you know. But there's just a lot of also words you're you're you're not gonna use and you're gonna toss them out. And so, but yeah, so it's kind of all been market driven for me, economics of like, okay, what's and and and what kind of clients do you get, you know, seriousness wise, you know, like you know, I mean obviously there's some people that I'm very serious, I could never come up with that, you know. But um, but yeah, so if I can, if I can crack, if I can crack some of the marketing codes to help people sell books, I'll I'll be able to do a lot more more traditional publishing things, like where I'm maybe I'm paying you in advance. You know, you know, I I actually really want to get to get into that realm, but I think we're gonna inch inch into it like we've done everything else.
SPEAKER_03I volunteer to be the first person you pay to write a book. I mean, if you need it.
SPEAKER_04Or Jason and I'll even do it together.
SPEAKER_03We'll co-write it.
SPEAKER_05Uh you know, well, when you've got a million subscribers to your podcast, let me know and we'll we'll give it a try.
SPEAKER_03All right. Well, to our listeners, you just heard, if you can get us a million followers, we're in. So should be that I'll give you a couple of thousand per. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05It wouldn't even need to be a million. But but yeah, so so yeah, so you're telling me there is a chance. Hey, I'm saying there's a chance.
SPEAKER_04Okay, Jeff, so since I knew we were gonna have this conversation with you, there was there's a question I was dying to ask, and I don't even know if you're gonna have an answer for me. So we've already even talked about this. You know, a lot of times the people who can write books and sell books have a platform. They they already have a bunch of followers, they pastor a megachurch, they speak at you know, conferences with tens of thousands of people, whatever. Um, but a lot of times those people, you know, may have an audience that would buy a book, but you know, maybe may not have the time or even the skill to sit down and write a book, which is where ghostwriters come in. So I remember this would be years ago now, and uh we were coming back uh from a conference, and there was my staff and some other people from my church, and uh, and I only know like a little bit of this just because, you know, I mean, heck, you look at John Maxwell's books, a lot of them. Um, and I've you know, you hear him talk, he's like, Oh, I went on a cruise with Margaret, and I took my legal pad out and scribbled my next book down, but like his next book says John Maxwell with and has the ghostwriter's name, who then took his scribbled legal pad and organized it and illustrated, did all the things, right? And so I just I said, Hey, you know, and I got a buddy, like I said, who's worked for Max Ocato. And so my comment was, you know, well, I mean, a lot of these megachurch pastors, they don't have the time or the skill to write those books. So, so they're they're they're ghostwritten for them in a significant percentage of cases. And actually, one of my staff guys' wives, who like is, and they both love this one famous mega church pastor, she looked at me with such offense in her eyes, and she's like, Well, I know for sure that so-and-so doesn't have his books ghostwritten. And I mean, she had she had no idea whether he does or doesn't, but it was more just like it was offensive to think that there would kind of cause like I trust that those are his words, that he has written every single one of them. Do you have any insight into which one of those leanings is true? Like, would you say that most of those types of people who have a big speaking kind of you know thing probably have a team of people writing and ghostwriters taking some of their sermon material and sort of turning it into that? Or do you think most of them are literally just sitting at their computer banging away, making that happen?
SPEAKER_05Yeah, I think a lot of a lot more than you would think are are are using ghostwriters. And that's why I think there's no reason not to be transparent about it because it's their ideas, you know. There's like, you know, but I think I think I do think it feels a little funny when somebody finds out like there's somebody helping that that even maybe even did did most of the work and they're not even credited. It feels but you know what's crazy is when I started requiring it, I never had anybody push back. I never had one time anybody say, Oh, I don't want anybody to know. Everyone just says, Oh, yeah, of course. I just didn't know how it worked. And so I don't think anybody really wants to be deceptive. It's just kind of the way the industry is right now, and I would just like to see that change. I just don't see why not. Because your friend, you know, will be shocked and and hurt, will feel like she's deceived, but there's really no reason because it's it it definitely is. I've not had anybody, especially anybody noteworthy, come and say, make something up and give me credit. You know, it's usually like, you know, they know what they want the book to say.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Well, yeah.
SPEAKER_03Okay, so we got to talking, and now we're running out of time. And I definitely want I need to ask you, because you we started talking before we hit record, and um, you know, you are a church planter, which Rob and I both are have planted churches, and so but you you were talking about the church that you are currently leading in, you know, central Illinois, wherever, and how it is made up of a lot of people who have come out of I hate the word church hurt, but let's just say trauma from bad experiences in churches. This is total left turn from our conversation, okay? So that that's fine. But I gotta ask, like, as you're leading this group of people, like tell me about what that's like. I mean, you you work with people out there writing for them, helping them, whatever, but then you've got this group of people that you're shepherding that have some probably some pretty deep wounds. How do you manage that? And what what do you how do you you know shepherd them in the midst of all that?
SPEAKER_05Well, I think it helps them to know that I have deep wounds. And so to make a long story short, we planted a church in 2002 here in Bloomington out of the out of the vineyard movement, and then five vineyard churches left the vineyard to start a new church planting network. And following all of us following our mentor, who had been the one usually to either lead us to Jesus, but definitely to identify us as church planters and and coach us up. And uh 10 years, our our church here grew to five or six hundred people, and then we felt called to leave and go to another church in the same network when the when the planter uh had had decided to to step down. And while we were there, after 15 or 16 years of being in the network, I became convinced that there was there was one major problem with the way we were shepherding people and the way we were leading people, and that was that the scope of leadership was greater than what the Bible allowed for. So we had drifted into an authoritarian pastoral style where it seemed like we didn't we didn't give the people we were le pastoring enough agency and you know, in in their life. And so, and where that really the canary in the coal mine for me and my family was around the issue, this is gonna be more than you wanted, probably, but was around the issue of was around the issue of homeschooling. We we had always homeschooled our kids because my mostly because my wife really felt called to do it and was really good at it. But for some reason, in this group of churches, the leader of the network did not want anybody to do that. They wanted all everybody to put their kids in public school. And so everybody did, except for us, all the other lead pastors of the network, which were now like 20-something churches. We had planted churches. Um and we just wrestled about that for about 11 years, and then I finally decided I'm just rebellious. I need to just do what he says, and we just need to put our kids in school. And also, this will be a chance for me to learn to lead my wife on something that she so desperately does not want to do. But, you know, I'm in charge and it'll be great.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, all men have foolishly thought that thought, at least at one point, right?
SPEAKER_05So we did put him in for just a little bit, and it went really badly, actually. Um, and and and I've had good experiences with public schools since. But this particular case, it just really got me thinking, okay, well, do we we have to do this thing just because you say? And at the same time, they were starting to say things like, you know, we feel like we're supposed to be a network of churches all over the world, hundreds of churches that are unified on all things, great and small. So it's not really that homeschool is a big deal, it's that anything's a big deal if you can't agree with your leader. And I said, Okay, well, I I need to think about this. So I after deciding I didn't agree with it, either one of those two things, that one about that scope of leadership, and two, that that you could get that kind of unity and that in that many churches on tertiary issues, I had I said, Okay, that's stuff, this is the conversation that I need to have. So I had the and the leader was my mentor, and we're we're very close. Said, if 999 times out of a thousand I'm inclined to obey leadership, but one time out of a thousand, my conscience won't allow it, especially on An issue that has nothing to do with how we're doing church, but for my family, for the kids, the five kids that God has given me to raise, shouldn't I obey my conscience? He said, I don't understand. Why don't you think it because I think it? And I said, Well, normally I do. I just said, But if I don't, shouldn't I obey my conscience? Because I've been reading about this and I see what happens when you don't obey your conscience. Even if you're wrong, I think you have to do what it says. He said, That'd be like if you told your kids to go to bed and they said, No, my conscience won't allow it, or Jesus is telling me to stay up. And I said, Well, I don't agree with that anymore. And so after a while, it was clear that we couldn't stay. And then when when we went to leave, our church board narrowly agreed with us and left the network with us, which is how I ended up talking to different groups, including Chris and Danny and those guys about what you guys are doing at Converge. And just we looked at them, we talked, we talked a lot with the Southern Baptists, the Evangelical Free. Some of those movements looked even our old roots in the vineyard. And in some ways, we're still doing that. We're still trying to figure out is there is there a home for us? So as then we pro were processing, okay, so that our church came out, and that was amazing to not have to leave alone, but to have the supportive people, we restructured our church, we restructured our board, the church nominated elders and became an elder-led church instead of a top-down church in a denomination that was top-down. And then as we were processing things like moving there in the first place is not something my wife wanted to do. The way leadership worked in a marriage, and and it was actually because we were listening. This is now after leaving, we were listening to the Rise and Fall of Mars Hill podcast. And she was getting very triggered by some of the things some of the women were saying. And it was so then it was, okay, we need to go back to one of the things we need to do is undo this St. Louis thing, which we loved our church there. So that was really hard, but but it was like, let's go back to Bloomington, even though I've still got this church here that's disowned me now because they're still part of that old network.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_05And then we started to say to the church, I don't, it's not that God showed up and called me and said, Hey, I'm calling you to go back to Bloomington to plant a church. It's that we feel that the best, the right thing to do right now is to go back to Bloomington. And I just don't think I could be anywhere and not plant a church. And there were dozens of people that used to go to our church who had been hurt by that system after we left and were not going to church anywhere. Now, I thought a lot of them, a lot more of them than have, were gonna come. And so if we said we're gonna plant a church, they're gonna say, Oh, great. That's not been the case. But there have been some really awesome churches in our area that have taken care of a lot of those people as they've left. And that church actually shut down, our old church shut down this past year. And there's church, and a lot of people are plugging into some really great churches. So that, and then some things would happen in another church, and those people would say, Well, we know these guys, we know what they've been through. Maybe they can they can help us. And so that's kind of how that happened. And and like I said, I think now that's not what we're talking about anymore. Right. It used to be all we talked about, and now we're talking about other things and and ready to move forward. And so it's like 35 people on a Sunday. And um, and it it it will probably grow, probably not ever fast, in part because of how we're doing it. I don't think I don't think we're really just I've done that. I, you know, there's certain things that we we really love about the way we do church, but it's not probably in our city, in our context, it's probably not going to while we're while we're in the some of church growth is competition with other churches for Christians, that's probably not going to work for us because we have too many great churches. That why would you go to a new church when this established church is doing so many amazing things? But we are going to be the church for the people that find us and say, Where have you been all my life? You know, this is this is what I've been waiting for. And my experience is if you just hang around long enough, you know, those of people will eventually eventually come.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Yeah. Long, long answer to the question. I don't even remember what it was. Well, I did.
SPEAKER_03That's good to hear that journey. And part of I I this earlier this week I got to spend a day with um Reggie McNeil, uh, who wrote a bunch, you know, some books, whatever. But he made a statement that I thought was really interesting. He talked about how when you're, you know, what what people are looking for and what they're asking when they're coming to a church or really anything, but you know, number one, am I safe? And number two, do I belong here? Like at a base level, that's what people are asking. And what you're providing by the way you're leading is you are saying this is a safe place. You know, you you're not going to be wounded here like you were there, but you also can belong here. There is a place for you. And and I think that's what I don't care if you're leading an old church, a new church, a big church, a small church. I'm sorry, it's not like Dr. Seuss, but you need to Red Church or Blue Church. Yeah, one church, two church. A new church or you church. Exactly. But you need to provide that, you know, those are two things that you can't always control a lot of things, but one thing you can control is I'm gonna build a culture where people can feel safe. That hey, I can hear it. I'm not saying it's always easy or comfortable, but it's safe. And I can belong. I can there's a place for me. And that's what it sounds like you you're starting to, and are building that kind of culture there. And I just think that's amazing. And I got a feeling that when you work with authors, you do the same thing. You create a space for them to be themselves, and that's how you get to know them and draw out of them the story that is obviously somewhere deep down inside them that needs to get out.
SPEAKER_05Yeah. It's very much like pastoring, especially because a lot of my clients have been through a lot of trauma. Right. And that and that's why that's what they've that's what they're trying to write about.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_05Sometimes they don't realize what that's gonna feel like, you know, what that's gonna bring up. And and and I, you know, I've gone from writing as a hobby to writing as a tent making to writing as a calling.
SPEAKER_03Wow.
SPEAKER_05Because I can't I can I couldn't reach ever as many people planting a church one church at a time as I can reach working with authors. I've written 130 books.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_05And if even a few of those find find find an audience, you know, then then I've done things that I won't even I might not even know about until I get to heaven.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_05So it's an interesting life. It's it's a real interesting journey.
SPEAKER_03I love that. Oh, I love that. Well, I I'm so sorry that we're running out of time here, but I just want to thank you for coming and sharing and being, you know, part of our little story that we tell each week. Well, thank you for having me. Yeah, we we enjoy it. We we love our audience, uh, those who listen, uh, we always love to hear from you. If you get a chance, you can always reach out to us through uh the website, yeah, Rob at churchtalkproject.com or Jason at churchtalkproject.com. Uh, we love to hear from you. Uh, we want to hear your story. And if you are interested in you know telling your story in a book form, hey, we got a guy that can uh help you make that happen. We hope you're having an amazing week, and uh we look forward to talking again next week. God bless you, and uh, we're cheering for you.
SPEAKER_00Thanks for joining us today at the Church Talk Podcast. We hope the conversation encouraged and challenged you. We would love to hear from you. Email your questions or comments to Jason at Churchtalkproject.com. The Church Talk Podcast with Rob and Jason is brought to you by the Church Talk Project. We work to engage, equip, and encourage pastors and church leaders around the world. Thanks for listening.
