In The Heart Of The Father

A few years ago, I had a dream.

In the dream I was standing on a rooftop. I was visible. I was important. I had built something that appeared successful. The rooftop felt symbolic of the “high places” we see in Scripture elevated, seen, known. It was the place of visibility and recognition.

But I was unfulfilled.

As I stood there, I looked over the side of the building and what I saw took my breath away. Below me was a river flowing, deep, powerful. It wasn’t stagnant. It wasn’t decorative. It was alive.

In that moment, I realized why I was unsatisfied.

I was not meant for the rooftop.
I was meant for the river.

I looked back at the roof, second-guessing myself. Everything I had built was there. Everything that made me visible was there. And then, in a moment of boldness, I dove backward off the side of the building into the river.

And here is what marked me:
The freedom came the moment my feet left the ledge.

Not when I hit the water.
Not when I adjusted to the current.

When I let go.

The Rooftop Illusion

For years, I believed ministry was about building something that could be seen.

I thought the title mattered.
News flash it doesn’t.

I thought the connections mattered.
News flash they don’t.

You cannot fake a frequency.
You cannot manufacture spiritual weight.

What I have learned over the last few months has undone me in the best way possible. Much of what I thought ministry was about was undeniably wrong. I chased affirmation. I obsessed over how others perceived me. I measured impact by visibility instead of by love.

And if I’m honest, when I look back over the last six years, my heart breaks a little.

I think about co-workers.
I think about brothers and sisters who walked into church hungry.
I think about speakers and their teams.
I think about my family, my children, my own mother.

All of them often received the leftovers of me, while the best of me chased a platform.

That realization is not comfortable.

But it is holy.

The Grain Must Fall

Jesus said, “Unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.”

We love the fruit part.
We rarely volunteer for the falling.

I could stay on the rooftop. I could build a platform. I could invite the “who’s who” to visit and make it look impressive. But the truth is this:

I am called to die.

Not physically.
But egoically.
Ambitionally.
Publicly.

To father and mother a generation is not glamorous. It means you will die to your importance. You will allow yourself to become the foundation — unseen, trampled, carrying weight so others can stand. You will lift your voice in praise when your heart is heavy. You will show up in rooms where no one has any idea what you have done.

Leadership is not about standing above.
It is about holding from beneath.

When Paul described the apostles as “last,” he was not performing false humility. He was painting a picture of seed willing to be buried so something else could grow.

Until we are ready to be the bottom pillar of the house Yeshua is building, we are not ready for leadership in the church or in the world.

The Ordination Question

Almost two years ago, when I was ordained, the Lord asked me something that has never left me:

“Would you still say yes if no one ever knew your name?”

At the time, I shouted yes.

But if I’m honest?
Back then, the real answer was no.

I’m not ashamed of that. It was the truth of where I was. But He has changed my heart. I no longer desire the spotlight. In fact, I would much rather give it away.

What changed?

I saw tears in the faces of others.
I felt the pain of the world around me.
I watched people break under the weight of systems, trauma, and rejection.

And I realized something sobering: while we chase platforms, the world is begging for presence.

Jesus said there is no greater love than to lay down your life for your brother.

He was not talking about livestreams.
He was not talking about visibility.

He was talking about sitting with the broken.
Loving the least.
Becoming seed.

The River Is the Body

The rooftop isolates.

The river connects.

To live in the river is to move, live, and breathe within the Body of Christ. It is to lay down the need to be the loudest voice and instead amplify His voice through surrender.

The river carries what the rooftop cannot.

And here is what I now understand:

God is not looking for those who want to stand on top of the roof.
He is looking for those willing to be carried by the river.

Those who will say yes to hiddenness.
Yes to foundation work.
Yes to loving without applause.

Lord, Send Me

The question echoes again:

“Who will go for us, and whom shall we send?”

He is not recruiting influencers.
He is not assembling stages.

He is asking: Who will sit with the broken?
Who will lay down their life for the least of these?
Who will become seed?

Years ago, in a dream, I jumped.

Today, I understand why.

I am saying, “Lord, send me.”

What are you saying?

By

Jennifer M McPherson

I believe there is a deep and undeniable intersection between mental health and spirituality. In fact, I believe some of the most powerful explanations for the mental health challenges that plague our society are found right within Scripture itself.

Much of our difficulty lies in our misunderstanding of the soul—our mind, will, and emotions—and how these work in union with both the spirit and the body. We tend to compartmentalize the human person, separating what was never meant to be divided. Yet when Christ speaks in Isaiah 61 about why He came and why the Spirit of the Lord was upon Him, He is revealing something far more comprehensive than we often acknowledge. He speaks about the whole person being made well.

We love to quote Scriptures about physical healing. We celebrate stories of bodies being restored. But what I have noticed—both in my own life and within the church—is that we often shy away from the mental and emotional dimensions of healing. We avoid the soul.

And yet, when Christ came to make our spirit alive, He also made provision for our soul to be healed. This is not an optional add-on to salvation; it is part of the invitation.

WHY THE CHURCH HAS AVOIDED THE SOUL

As sons and daughters of God, we were never meant to outsource humanity’s deepest questions to the world alone. We were created to carry answers, rooted in divine truth and embodied in lived experience. But because the soul cannot be managed by religious formulas or controlled by dogma, we often retreat from engaging it fully.

Instead, we swing to extremes.

On one side, we leave mental and emotional health entirely to logic-based frameworks, valuable in many ways but often disconnected from spiritual identity and meaning. On the other side, we choose a hyper-spiritual approach that is so vague and idealistic that it becomes impossible to apply. We can talk about it endlessly, but people leave unchanged, still fragmented, still searching.

Neither extreme brings life.

When Jesus said, “To those who received Him, He gave the right to become children of God,” He was not offering religious language as a hiding place. Yet we often use that very language to stay comfortable. Vague symbolism allows us to avoid weight, responsibility, and honest self-examination.

HEALING IS RELATIONAL, NOT MAGICAL

One of the most damaging ideas we have absorbed is that healing should be instantaneous. As though walking into a room automatically resolves years of trauma and fragmentation.

For those who have experienced deep trauma, the soul is often shattered or segmented. Participation in life and connection with others can feel unsafe. Yet we tell people to simply show up and expect healing.

But the Spirit of God heals us by walking with us.

Psalm 23 tells us that He leads us beside still waters, where the soul is restored. Healing unfolds in safety, intimacy, and time.

This is why people can attend church for decades and still feel unchanged. Healing is available, but it requires participation. The door is open, but we must be willing to sit with the Lord in uncomfortable places and allow Him to speak truth where coping once lived.

THE HEALING THAT CHANGED EVERYTHING

I have been in rooms filled with spiritual weight and power. Those moments mattered. But the deepest healing of my life did not come from spectacle.

It came from intimacy.

As I walked with the Lord, He revealed Himself to me—and in doing so, He revealed who I am and how I was created to function. He showed me that the soul is not an enemy to be conquered or suppressed. It is not separate from the spirit, nor is it evil.

He liberated me from internal warfare.

I now live from the place of knowing I am wholly loved—not partially loved, not conditionally loved, but fully and completely loved.

This revelation does not produce better rule-followers. It produces life.

Rules do not heal the soul. Love does.

By

Jennifer M McPherson

Mental health has been part of my story for as long as I can remember.

I grew up around addiction and mental illness. My mother struggled with both, and other family members carried what I now recognize as likely undiagnosed mental health disorders. Even in my own life, there were clear signs—especially during my adolescent years—that I was dealing with internal battles long before I had language for them. Brokenness wasn’t theoretical for me; it was the environment I learned to navigate.

But while I had lived around the effects of mental illness my entire life, my heart for healing didn’t fully awaken until my 30s.

One ordinary day, sitting alone at home, something extraordinary happened. Without warning, a passage of Scripture came alive in me in a way I can only describe as divine. Isaiah 61—specifically verses 1 through 3—was placed in my heart, not as inspiration, but as a blueprint. I knew instinctively that this was not just a verse to quote, but a map for how my life would unfold in bringing healing and transformation.

And then there was the next line:

“They will be called oaks of righteousness.”

That phrase has stayed with me ever since.

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO BE AN OAK OF RIGHTEOUSNESS?

An oak of righteousness is not someone who performs well spiritually. It is someone who has been stabilized—formed, strengthened, and made whole by the inner work of the Spirit.

Not just in the spirit, but in the soul.

Scripture tells us, “I pray that you would prosper and be in good health, even as your soul prospers.” This reveals something critical: our spiritual vitality, our physical health, and our emotional well-being are not separate realities. They are interconnected.

Yet one of the greatest struggles of humanity—and of the church—is our tendency toward division.

We divide spirit from soul.
We divide theology from psychology.
We divide doctrine from lived experience.
We divide people by race, identity, and culture.

But union was always the design.

WHY PERCEPTION MATTERS

Our ability to perceive spiritual reality is directly connected to the health of our soul.

If the soul is fragmented—wounded, splintered, or defensive—our perception becomes distorted. We may be sincere, even passionate, but sincerity does not equal clarity. Scripture emphasizes trained senses, not just practiced gifts.

This helps explain why Scripture repeatedly asks, “Do you not see?” or “Can you perceive it?”

The gospel itself begins with a call out of distorted perception. Good news is preached to the poor because poverty—material, emotional, or spiritual—often comes with deception about identity, worth, and possibility.

MENTAL HEALTH AND SPIRITUAL BYPASS

In counseling, we talk about spiritual bypassing—using spiritual language to avoid addressing psychological and emotional wounds.

Fragmented soul behaviors include isolation, paranoia, chronic judgment, and relational instability. These are not signs of spiritual depth. They are indicators of inner fracture.

Too often, we reward gifting while ignoring wholeness. Platforms are given while souls remain unattended.

You can only give what you possess.

LEAVING EGYPT IS NOT ENTERING REST

Scripture tells us the Israelites physically left Egypt but failed to enter the rest of God.

They left bondage—but they did not enter rest.

Rest is the one thing we are told to labor for.

Rest is integration.
Rest is trust.
Rest is wholeness.

BECOMING OAKS

An oak does not grow overnight. It is rooted, weathered, and resilient.

This is the righteousness Isaiah describes—not performative, but formed.

When our souls are made whole, perception clears.
When perception clears, love flows accurately.
And only then can we truly become agents of healing for others.

By

Jennifer M McPherson

I love the prophetic.
A significant part of my healing and deliverance came through prophetic environments where the Spirit of God was moving powerfully and purely. Because of that, I’ve learned something that didn’t come from books or theory it came through lived encounter.

When the prophetic flows through a vessel consumed by the love of God, there are no limits to what it can do.

But when the prophetic flows through a vessel that is unhealed, still operating from trauma wounds, spiritual influence, or unresolved strongholds it becomes distorted. Not because the prophetic is wrong, but because the lens is.

Somewhere along the way, we stopped talking about the prophetic. We stopped trusting it. We stopped making space for it. And we were led to believe that something must be inherently wrong with it.

But the prophetic isn’t the problem.

The problem is unhealed vessels hiding behind gifts.

Hiding Behind Gifts Does Not Make the Gift Evil

The Lord spoke something to me recently that landed with weight:

“You can hide behind anything you want.”

Adam and Eve hid behind fig leaves.
The fig leaves weren’t evil.
They were simply never meant to be used as covering.

In the same way, we can hide behind anything:
– gifts
– callings
– leadership
– theology
– even what we call discernment

Using something as a hiding place does not make the thing itself wrong, outdated, or dangerous. It simply means we’ve turned a gift into a shield.

And the prophetic because it is expressive, authoritative, and revelatory can become one of the easiest places to hide.

When the Prophetic Is Filtered Through the Martyr Narrative

There is a particular distortion that happens when the prophetic flows through a veiled belief system—the belief that “I am the martyr.”

This mindset sounds like:
– “Everyone is against me.”
– “Someone is trying to stop me.”
– “I’m about to be replaced.”
– “I have to fight to stay positioned.”

When this belief governs the lens, everything becomes warfare.

But what we end up battling is not darkness we battle alignment.
We fight the very people we were meant to walk with.

That isn’t spiritual warfare.
That is identity warfare.

I had to ask myself a hard question recently:
How many times have I lived from that posture?

The answer was uncomfortable.

Most of my life.

Calling the Stronghold What It Is

This wasn’t discernment.
This wasn’t humility.
This wasn’t wisdom.

It was a demonic stronghold of rejection.

A lie that whispers:
– “You don’t really belong.”
– “You got in through the back door.”
– “Once someone better comes along, you’ll be discarded.”
– “You must prove your worth to stay.”

That voice is not the Holy Spirit.

Rejection masquerades as discernment when it goes unnamed.

And when rejection fuels the prophetic, it will always turn sons and daughters into soldiers fighting to survive rather than resting in belonging.

What God Is Actually Restoring

This isn’t a call to shut down the prophetic.

It’s a call to heal the vessel.

To remove the fig leaves.
To lay down the martyr narrative.
To allow love to become the governing atmosphere again.

The prophetic was never meant to be a weapon for survival.
It was meant to be an invitation into Christ.

When the prophetic flows from union instead of insecurity, it doesn’t fracture the body it reveals the Bride.

I was sitting and thinking about something recently: knowledge comes with a kind of power. What’s striking to me is not simply that knowledge is powerful, but that what we choose to do with it reveals the kind of power we actually desire. Knowledge can be stewarded in a way that gives life, or it can be wielded in a way that takes life. The actions that flow from knowledge expose the true posture of the heart far more clearly than intentions or language ever could.

Over time, I’ve come to believe that much of humanity’s brokenness is rooted in a desire to enslave to control, dominate, or place one another in bondage. This impulse doesn’t always look overtly violent. More often, it hides beneath systems, authority structures, and even moral certainty. It shows up whenever knowledge is used as leverage rather than as a gift.

A striking example of this can be seen in the splitting of the atom. The same scientific breakthrough led to radiation therapy, which has saved countless lives, and to the atomic bomb, which has taken countless lives and instilled fear on a global scale. The act of splitting the atom was not evil in itself. The knowledge uncovered was not inherently corrupt. What mattered what changed everything was how that knowledge was used.

That realization leads me into a deeper reflection, especially when it comes to spiritual understanding and revelation. When we are entrusted with spiritual truths, what do we do with them? Do we allow them to soften us, to expand compassion, to bring healing and freedom to others? Or do we use them—subtly or overtly as tools for control, as justification for authority, or as a means of elevating ourselves above others?

Spiritual knowledge, like all knowledge, carries power. And power always comes with a choice. It can be expressed as life-giving presence, or as dominance masked in certainty. It can invite freedom, or quietly reinforce hierarchy and fear. The danger is not in revelation itself, but in the heart that seeks to possess it.

This leaves us with an uncomfortable but necessary question: when we gain understanding especially spiritual understanding are we becoming more loving, more free, and more generous toward others? Or are we becoming more rigid, more defensive, and more invested in being right?

In the end, the question is not what we know.

The question is who we become because of what we know and whether the power we seek is the power to give life, or the power to hold it over others.

By Jennifer McPherson

The duality we face in the Church today is not the same duality faced in previous generations.

In earlier times, the tension was often between belief and unbelief, obedience and rebellion, faithfulness and compromise. But today, the conflict has shifted. The dominant duality of our time looks like this:

We want to be free from the chains and shackles of the religious system—while still maintaining the perks and benefits of that same system.

This is an impossible contradiction.

You cannot remain inside a prison and yet leave it at the same time.

Much of our conversation around strongholds focuses on the obvious negatives control, shame, fear-based obedience, suppression, limitation. What we talk about far less are the benefits we receive from the systems we claim to want to dismantle.

Because the truth is uncomfortable:
There are advantages within religious structures that many of us are unwilling to let go of.

I began to see this clearly in myself.

With one hand, I genuinely desired liberation for myself and for others from systems that distort the heart of God. But with the other hand, there were moments, seconds, even seasons where I still wanted to build a structure that granted me religious authority authority that did not flow from love, but from position.

And this is where the Spirit began to confront me.

If I must tell someone to listen to me,
If I must leverage authority to be heard,
Then they cannot truly hear the life or wisdom in what I am speaking.

And so I was forced to ask myself a question that is both sacred and terrifying:

Do I want them to hear me because I desire their freedom?
Or do I want them to hear me because I want to be seen as a spiritual authority?

This is not an easy question to sit with because it requires us to confront the sacred cows we benefit from.

If the system collapses, so do the advantages we gained within it.

That realization brought me back to the issue of duality.

I found myself wondering:
What would happen if the entire structure of religious hierarchy imploded tomorrow?

What would happen to the Church?

How many people who show up every Sunday would still show up?
How many would still pursue holiness when no one was watching?
How many would still choose what they believe is right if fear were removed?
How many would still choose Jesus simply because He is Jesus?

Not out of fear of eternal damnation.
Not out of fear of judgment, rejection, or loss of belonging.
But because He is their choice.

Here is the sobering truth:

If someone would not choose Christ for who He is—
If their loyalty disappears when fear is removed
Then they have not been made a disciple.

They have been made a church member.
A churchgoer.
Or a follower of a personality.

Disciples follow Christ.

Yes, disciples may follow leaders but only insofar as those leaders are pointing them to Christ, not replacing Him. We were never meant to live in constant dependence on other people to provide answers that the Spirit of God longs to reveal within us.

So what do we do about the duality?

How do we escape the contradiction of wanting freedom while still clinging to control?

I believe the answer is simple but costly.

We lay down the pursuit of being known.
We lay down the demand to be heard.
We lay down the need to be deferred to, agreed with, or followed.

And instead, we lean fully into the inward reality of our union with Christ.

Not performing authority but living from intimacy.
Not demanding allegiance but embodying love.

When our words come from union rather than position, duality collapses.

And what remains is not a system but a people who have chosen Jesus for Jesus Himself.

By Jennifer McPherson

I want to begin by saying Merry Christmas.

But when I think about Christmas now, I realize I see it very differently than I ever have before. This year, more than any other, I have spent time learning the beautiful and expansive reality of who Jesus is to me—not simply as a doctrine to be affirmed or a story to be remembered, but as a living presence who reveals Himself in ways that continue to unfold. Christmas no longer feels like a single moment in history; it feels like the doorway into an entirely new way of living.

For a long time, I believed there were those who valued theology and those who valued experience, and that the two were not meant to intersect. One belonged to the mind, the other to the heart. But this year has quietly dismantled that false divide for me. I no longer feel the need to dissect Christ into manageable categories. I don’t want fragments of Him. I want the whole Lamb. I want the fullness of who He is—revealed in Scripture, encountered in silence, and known through the power and nearness of His Spirit.

What I’ve come to realize is that these encounters are not in competition with one another. The moments where He reveals Himself through Scripture do not cancel out the moments of quiet solitude, nor do they replace the moments when His Spirit moves in power. They are all expressions of the same Christ, unveiling Himself in different ways. And Christmas—the incarnation—holds all of that together.

Because this is what we are celebrating today: a moment that changed everything.

When the Word became flesh, heaven did not merely visit earth. Heaven entered earth’s structure and permanently altered reality. Emmanuel—God with us—reveals the heart of God’s desire, and that desire was never distance. It was dwelling. The incarnation was not symbolic, temporary, or conditional. It was God choosing embodiment, choosing nearness, choosing union. Salvation was not the end goal; union was. The reconciliation of Creator and creation was set into motion the moment heaven and earth collided in the person of Jesus.

That collision did not happen in only one dimension. It reshaped the cosmos, redefined community, and transformed the individual. Reality itself was reordered. Relationships and systems were invited into new alignment. And the human being—once separated from the Presence—became a dwelling place for God. Creation, like a song that had drifted out of tune, began to find its harmony again. Christ became the tuning fork, restoring resonance between heaven and earth.

Jesus later revealed the fullness of this shift when He said that the Kingdom of God is not here or there, but within you. With those words, He relocated the Presence—from a place to a people. The old pattern waited for God to arrive. The new reality lives from the truth that God already indwells. The Spirit no longer falls occasionally; He flows continually from within. This is the shift from visitation to habitation, and it changes everything we thought we knew about ministry, holiness, and intimacy with God.

When Presence lives within the people, the one-man show comes to an end. The Kingdom no longer revolves around personalities, platforms, or singular “anointed vessels.” Instead, it releases corporate sonship—every believer carrying glory, every part of the Body alive with divine flow. The ark is no longer carried by a few. The ark is the people themselves.

This collision is not only external; it is deeply internal. The incarnation didn’t just redeem our spirits—it reconnected the entire human ecosystem. In Christ, the spirit awakens to divine flow. The soul—mind, will, and emotions—realigns with truth. The body becomes a living temple of indwelling glory. Union restores harmony from the inside out, not through striving, but through receiving what has already been given.

And when we live from that place of union, even our language changes. Words shaped by religion tend to repeat what has already been said. Words shaped by union carry life. They transform atmospheres, relationships, and even cities—not through force or performance, but through presence. Life flows naturally when the Source is no longer external.

Many of us find ourselves standing in a hallway right now—between what was and what is emerging. Some cling to past moves of God. Some stand still, unsure. Others are stepping forward into something unfamiliar but undeniably alive. The hallway is the in-between, and the danger is not uncertainty—it is nostalgia. If we cling too tightly to what was, we may miss what is. Maturity is not remembering; it is manifesting.

God is not looking for spectators or sign-seekers. He is inviting partners. Even Thomas’s desire to touch Jesus’ scars was not unbelief—it was hunger for real encounter. God does not shame our questions. He responds with invitation. He responds with union.

This is the beauty of Emmanuel. It is not a moment we look back on once a year. It is a movement within us. Christ in you—the hope of glory. Heaven and earth are no longer separate realities. They meet here. They meet now. They meet in you.

So I’ll end with this reflection: what would change if you truly believed that every place you stand is holy ground—not because heaven might come, but because heaven and earth have already collided within you?

That is Emmanuel.

By Jennifer McPherson

For a long time, I believed something about myself that quietly shaped my choices, my finances, and my sense of worth.

I believed that being administrative—being organized, detailed, financially minded, structured—somehow made me less prophetic.

I didn’t say it out loud like that, but it lived under the surface of my decisions. I carried a quiet assumption that if I leaned into accounting, administration, or infrastructure, I was choosing “king” over “priest.” And in my distorted understanding of spirituality, priest always felt holier.

So I resisted parts of myself.

The Hidden Cost of a Fragmented Theology

Over the years, I’ve worked in spaces where my heart was deeply connected to the mission. I still believe in that work. But I have been financially unstable in every recovery role I’ve ever held—not because I’m lazy or unskilled, but because I was trying to serve from only part of who I am while silencing the rest.

At the same time, when I worked in accounting or administrative roles, I didn’t show up fully there either. I tucked away my prophetic, visionary, relational side like it didn’t belong. No matter where I was, I was fragmented.

The Lie I Didn’t Know I Believed

That administration is less spiritual than encounter.
That provision is suspicious.
That structure quenches the Spirit.
That struggle proves faithfulness.

That lie taught me to distrust parts of myself God intentionally designed.

Integration Is the Invitation

God was never asking me to choose between priest and king. He was inviting me to become whole.

The prophetic doesn’t disappear when you build infrastructure—it matures. Administration doesn’t silence the Spirit—it gives the Spirit somewhere to rest. Provision isn’t proof of compromise—it’s often proof of alignment.

Grieving What I Rejected

There’s grief in realizing how much I rejected parts of myself God called good. But there’s also relief. I no longer have to hate the parts of me God created.

I don’t have to choose between compassion and competence. I don’t have to choose between intimacy and infrastructure.

A Quiet Resolution

I don’t have every vocational answer yet, but I am done fragmenting myself to fit a spiritual prototype that was never God’s design.

Wholeness is not compromise. Integration is not betrayal. And building, when done in love, is worship.

By Jennifer McPherson

Please understand that when I say this, it’s coming from a place of care. I know it may sound judgmental at first, but it truly isn’t.

I’m an older millennial, and I do understand the value of social media. I understand its usefulness for business, for building a brand, for advancing initiatives, and even for sharing the gospel. I’m not anti–social media. I see its value.

But I keep coming back to this question:

Is there still such a thing as intimate moments that are meant to remain intimate moments?

It feels to me like, as a society, we’ve become increasingly voyeuristic because of social media. We’re living in a constant state of evaluating our lives through the lens of what would make “good content.” Instead of being fully present in our lives, we observe ourselves as we live them—asking, How will this look to others?

I believe there are real consequences to this.

One of the biggest is that we’ve become far more concerned with how we are seen than with how we actually are. Many people would rather be perceived as healthy, aware, healed, or spiritually mature than do the quiet, unseen work of cultivating environments where they actually become those things.

I think this is part of why you hear people—especially younger generations—talk almost nostalgically or euphorically about a society without social media. There’s a growing discomfort now, a sense of overexposure, as though nothing is sacred anymore.

I’ll be honest: some of what I see on social media genuinely makes me uncomfortable. I see videos of people sharing deeply intimate moments—lying in bed with their spouse, private interactions that feel profoundly personal—posted publicly for content. Watching this feels invasive. Not because intimacy itself is wrong, but because some intimacy was never meant to be broadcast.

Those moments belong between two people. If someone wants to share a thought or insight that came from that space, that’s one thing. But showing it feels unnecessary—and honestly, voyeuristic.

So yes, these are my thoughts.

And I’ve made a decision.

I only have one New Year’s resolution this year:

To spend less time on social media.

Not because social media is evil.
Not because it has no value.

But because I want to live my life, not curate it.

This morning, after praying myself to sleep last night, I woke up reflecting on the last five—maybe six—years of my life.

And as I sat with the Lord, two things became unmistakably clear to me.

First: leading and serving the people of God is the greatest privilege one can ever be entrusted with.
Second: it is also the greatest responsibility.

Those two truths cannot be separated.

Crossing the Threshold of Influence

When you step into any form of leadership—whether in your home, your workplace, your ministry, or the church—you cross an invisible threshold. Your behavior, heart posture, words, emotional maturity, and discernment begin to affect people around you, often more than you realize.

Sometimes we are oblivious to that reality. Sometimes we are not.

It takes a level of selfishness that is contrary to the very nature of Christ for a leader to believe that how they feel is more important than what God is doing in the hearts of people.

God Does Not Call Lone Voices

God will never call you to be the lone voice in someone’s life.

That is not how God functions. That is not how the ekklesia was designed. And that is not how the Church flourishes.

Any structure built on singular authority—where one person becomes the unquestioned interpreter of God’s will for others—is not something God is building. At best, it reflects unhealed places. At worst, it opens the door to spiritual abuse.

True apostolic foundations distribute life; they do not centralize power.

Fruit Tells the Truth

Here is the measure I have learned to trust.

If leadership consistently produces depression, confusion, emotional harm, loss of identity, fear, dependency, or fragmentation, something is deeply wrong—regardless of gifting.

If that is the fruit, stepping down from leadership is not failure; it is obedience.

Shepherds Do Not Build Audiences

God’s leaders are not called to gather audiences; they are called to tend flocks.

A shepherd asks whether people are safe, growing, and becoming more alive in Christ—not whether the moment was powerful.

If what you are building requires you to remain central for it to survive, you are not building the Church—you are building dependency.

God Does Not Send Lone Rangers

God does not anoint isolation, unchecked authority, or spiritual independence.

The Body of Christ only functions when every part is supplied. Any belief that one person alone can embody the fullness of Christ for others is deception.

A Final Word

The people of God are not props for your calling. They are His inheritance.

Leadership that forgets this—no matter how gifted—is not something heaven endorses.

This is not about perfection. It is about humility, love, fruit, and responsibility.