A few of the bloggers I read regularly have been reposting old articles — as have I. Some of us are posting less often. Many have abandoned blogging altogether.

For some of us, health concerns and schedule changes have played a major role in this decreased productivity. That’s largely why I’ve been less active in the last few years. Like it or not (and I definitely don’t like it), we’re getting older and slowing down, therefore we just don’t have the energy we had a few years ago. As a result, we see how much energy maintaining a blog really takes. In our younger days, we may not have realized how hard we worked, but now we understand the toll of cranking out posts five to seven days a week. For several of us, our poor bodies can’t handle the workload anymore.

In my case, however, the fatigue has another layer that I wonder if my fellow bloggers also feel. I began this blog with a zeal for hunting out false teachers and exposing them. That purpose has merit, certainly, and I still see a need for that type of ministry. But that type of ministry takes a lot of time and effort, especially if a blogger wants to report with integrity.

A few days ago, as I scrolled through Facebook, my heart sank as a friend excitedly reported having gone to hear Joyce Meyer preach. It made me start mentally planning a blog post comparing one of Joyce Meyer’s better-known teachings to Scripture in a way that would help readers evaluate teaching for themselves. Sounds good, right?

I thought about simply stating what she teaches, but quickly rejected that idea because I have been arguing on Twitter about people judging John MacArthur over matters of which they only know what his detractors say (and even then, his detractors give secondhand accounts). Consequently, I realized that addressing the teaching of Joyce Meyer obligates me to find audios or videos of her teaching that specific doctrine in the context of her entire sermon before I critique her. Although I know Meyer teaches a very serious heresy, I dare not expect anyone to accept my findings unless I produce clear and indisputable evidence.

Such research, of course, would not only take time, but my poor husband would be subjected to listening to those sermons (wearing earphones would be complicated for me). Just thinking about putting together a blog post like that exhausts me! It’s an important topic, to be sure, and I could approach it by demonstrating how Meyer deviates from Scripture to promote her heresy. Indeed, writing about Joyce Meyer would provide an excellent opportunity to show how sound doctrine protects us against false teaching. But at my age, in my physical condition, tackling a subject of that magnitude overwhelms me.

Things like this matter wouldn’t have fazed me five years ago. Back then, I would have relished the challenge (and I would have been less considerate of John). Actually, it would have been kinda fun. But that was five years ago, when typing was easier and I could stay in my wheelchair much longer with a lot less pain.

Additionally, I seem to have more trouble finding fresh topics. The Joyce Meyer post appealed to me precisely because I haven’t written much about her in the past and because I was going to use her false teaching as a basis for teaching discernment skills. I’d been struggling for days to come up with an idea for a post, only to have my mind go blank. I’m tempted to think that I’ve written everything I have to write, and it’s time to just relax and devote my life to playing Scrabble on the computer.

Could it be that other bloggers feel similar weariness?

It doesn’t help that many of us have noticed a decline in views over the past three years. Tom of excatholic4christ actually blogged about this discouraging trend recently, with comments from other bloggers that he was not alone! Although all of us realize that we blog for the Lord rather than to amass huge followings, we do wonder if it’s worth the effort when fewer and fewer people read our articles. Sometimes we wonder why we invest so much time, energy and emotion into something that most of our subscribers don’t bother to read.

We’ve learned that controversy attracts more readers. Part of the reason I wanted to do the Joyce Meyer post was that I knew her name would get more people to click on the article. If I wrote an article about discerning false teaching on Christ’s deity without using her name, I would have made the same points, but to a considerably smaller audience.

Yet many of us have seen less reputable bloggers exploit controversial people and topics in the name of discernment ministry. Their bad example makes us reluctant to write anything that might resemble their tabloid journalism. And in many respects, I believe we do the right thing by trying to avoid using false teachers as click bait. Gossip never glorifies the Lord.

So again, coming up with creative ideas poses a challenge to bloggers. What do our readers want to read? Can we give them what they want without violating our integrity? Much of my blogging fatigue comes from trying to answer these questions.

Having said all these things, I still believe Christian blogs are important. Despite feeling tired enough to retreat into endless Scrabble games, I stand on the conviction that God blessed me with writing abilities and with discernment skills for a purpose. As the world grows darker and deception permeates more and more churches. Christian bloggers must proclaim truth until Big Tech finds us and shuts us down. Maybe only a handful of people will read our blogs and out of that handful only a fraction will turn to God’s Word and be changed. But if God uses us to reach that small fraction of a handful, He will receive glory.

Yes, Christian bloggers get weary of blogging. I get weary of blogging. I think I’ve shown some of the reasons for my weariness in this post, and I suspect other Christian bloggers share a few of those reasons. So, fellow bloggers, let me close with a word of encouragement from Scripture:

⁹ Let us not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we will reap if we do not grow weary. ¹⁰ So then, while we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, and especially to those who are of the household of the faith. ~~Galatians 6:9 (NASB95)