( ENSPIRE Community Spotlight ) McCormick’s New Book, “Why Didn’t it Work?” Helps Christians Strengthen Their Faith
ENSPIRE Contributor: Alexandra Rivera
Author, Entrepreneur, mother, wife, and child of God, Tiffany McCormick, seeks to help her fellow Christians who may wonder, ‘Why didn’t it work?” Each chapter of her new book goes through what the Holy Spirit worked on through her. The different prayers scriptures, lessons, and practical steps the Holy Spirit used to help her along the way. The goal of the book is to help struggling Christians find their faith and reignite their relationship with God.
Inspired by God and a podcast she began her writing journey. One of her other goals is to help others she otherwise would never get to meet. She urges those questioning their faith that God is not the problem he is the solution. To strengthen your faith you must take the time and meditate.
ENSPIRE recently chatted with McCormick about her book and faith.
How did you become inspired to write your book?
I felt as if I was prompted by God to write a book and it was weird because I hadn’t really thought about writing a book before but I wanted to be obedient so I immediately joined a 21-day write your book challenge and started writing the book a week later. As I was praying about what I was supposed to write and thinking it over, I heard someone on a random podcast say “books can travel miles and go to places we’ll never see” and it just clicked for me. I had the desire to share a part of my testimony to help people I would never meet. I wanted to tell everybody of His wondrous works like in Psalm 105.
Being a devoted Christian, have you ever questioned or lost faith in God before?
Absolutely! I can’t even count the number of times I’ve questioned or lost faith in God. The whole book is about asking God why when my faith was struggling the most. In the book, I talk about questioning God about my finances, relationships, career, and even my looks! For example, Chapter 2 is called “My Heart” and I talk about what happened to my heart when I lost faith and the different times I had a hardened, unwilling, or unclean heart, and how Holy Spirit helped me renew my heart to become more like Jesus.
I feel as if there is a stigma about asking God questions as if it means you don’t believe, but for me, I make every effort to go to God about anything and everything. There’s no point in trying to hide or bottle up my frustrations and eventually losing my faith. God knows my heart and is a discerner of my thoughts! So when I am struggling, I might as well go to Him and say “God, I believe, help me with my unbelief” just like the father in Mark 9. While it’s definitely better to believe the whole way through, even If I have moments of doubt, questioning, or facing the consequences of my actions, I can still run back to God in repentance and ask for help! Then, because I am His child, He will receive me, hold me in the palm of His hand, and help me because He’s a Father who won’t withhold any good thing from me.
People lose faith for many reasons. What is the reason you hear the most?
In my experience with other Christians, people tell me about their faith after seeing or hearing me talk about something in my life and that corresponding thing not working for them in their life so they have lost faith. I actually mention this exact scenario in Chapter 4 of my book where I talk about friends, family, and church family who would ask me about how much faith I have and how I do it.
My reply is that it’s the grace of God and all I have to do is hear, believe, and obey. Which is definitely easier said than done. Even those I speak with say that they “tried” Christianity and it doesn’t work. Then they go on to mention their own experiences and other popular Christians whose lives or lies have been exposed as examples. Many of these conversations led me to write the book “Why Didn’t It Work” because the blood of the lamb overcomes us and by the word of our testimony, so hopefully my testimony helps others overcome.
How do you encourage people to stay faithful?
Great question! There are so many scriptures people can meditate on. From a practical perspective, I often encourage people to inundate themselves with reminders of what they are in faith about. For example, if they want to stay in faith about getting a car, then research the car buying process, read or listen to examples of other people God helped get a car, find scriptures that relate to God’s provision and meditate on them, stay away from or don’t listen to people who are doubting it can happen for you, etc.
It’s just like how we have to guard our hearts, we have to guard our faith too. I encourage people to think about the times when they have lost their faith and look for any triggers and they will likely notice a pattern. In Chapter 5, I talk about temptations and different things that tempt me to lose faith and a few strategies to stay in faith so they can use that chapter to learn ways to stay faithful.
What can readers expect to learn in your book?
There are several scriptures, examples, and practical steps about why despite having faith, things may not be working in their lives that my readers can learn. Overall, there are probably 3 main areas that I truly hope my readers learn. The number one main point I hope they learn is that God is not the problem, He’s the solution.
He’s eternally perfect so no matter what has happened, is happening, or will happen, stay on God’s side. The second point is that they are not alone. I talk about my struggles seeing other people with a lifestyle or family or looks that I wanted and how God helped me through that. Especially in this social media age where so many people’s lives look glamorous and likes/follows/shares are popularity contests we can let comparison come in but 2 Corinthians 10 talks about the ignorance in comparing ourselves with the wrong people when our real standard is Jesus.
The third point I want them to learn is actually the title of chapter 6, we are victorious. Life can be so many things: wonderful, joyous, fun, hard, disappointing, painful, etc. but we have to anchor ourselves in the belief that we are loved with overwhelming love and in the end, we win.
McCormick is giving Christians the ability to strengthen their faith and their relationship with God in her new book. The book was published in June 2022 and can be purchased on Amazon.
Related Articles: Tim Bowman Jr., Faith City Music Release “Welcome to Faith City”, ‘Truth’s Table,’ Refashioning Faith For Black Women
