By Jennifer McPherson

I’ve noticed a pattern in my walk with the Lord that I can no longer ignore — even when part of me tries. Before every new depth of revelation is unearthed in my life, I first experience a deep discomfort with the current state of my being.

And almost always… it begins with me.

It starts with the uneasiness I feel about how I’m showing up in certain areas — my responses, my behavior, my posture, the ways I’m expressing Christ (or not expressing Him). That discomfort usually sends me into pursuit:

Lord, what are You showing me? What is out of alignment? What needs Your light?

He never answers harshly. But He does answer honestly.

The Revelation of Mixture

Recently, the Lord began showing me places in my life where I genuinely thought I had “arrived.” And I had to laugh — because the arrogance of believing I had figured anything out in just five years of whole-heart pursuit is almost comical. There are people who have walked faithfully with Him for 20, 30, 40, even 50 years… some longer than I’ve been alive. Yet I somehow adopted the subtle pride of thinking I had reached maturity in certain areas.

But He showed me something deeper than my misplaced confidence.

He showed me mixture.

There are patterns we live from — learned behaviors, emotional survival mechanisms, spiritual assumptions — that we weave into our Christian walk without even knowing it. These mixtures show up in how we respond, lead, discern, communicate, and interpret the world around us.

Scripture is full of types and shadows that mirror this process. Every wilderness, threshing floor, temple pattern, and pruning season is not just a historical note — it’s a prophetic picture of the formation of the human heart. Yet we often want to bypass the very stages God designed to mature us.

We want resurrection without death.

Authority without refining.

Clarity without discomfort.

Revelation without repentance.

But revelation is born from discomfort.

Sitting in the Discomfort

The more I have chosen to sit in that discomfort — without using it as justification to blame others or react from pain — the more the Lord illuminates the eyes of my understanding. And in that illumination, something sobering and liberating keeps emerging:

I am always externally expressing the internal posture of my heart.

If I don’t like what I see in my expression, there is a deeper place within me that God is inviting into His light. External fruit always reveals internal truth.

This isn’t condemnation.

It’s invitation.

An invitation into honesty.

Into surrender.

Into transformation.

Into the core of who I am becoming in Him.

We Create From Within

What I’ve learned — even in these short years — is that we can’t manifest anything externally that doesn’t exist internally. We can say the right things. Declare the right scriptures. Hold the right theology. But we create and express only from what actually lives in the innermost parts of our being.

If there is mixture inside, there will be mixture outside.

If there is freedom inside, there will be freedom outside.

If there is light inside, there will be light outside.

Which means the discomfort is not a sign of failure — it is a sign of formation.

It is the mercy of God drawing me deeper into truth, purity, and sonship. It is His kindness peeling back the layers of self-protection and self-assurance I didn’t even know I had.

Discomfort is not the enemy.

It is the doorway.

It is the place where revelation begins.

Where illusions break.

Where maturity grows.

Where the inner temple is cleansed.

Where the inward gaze is recalibrated.

Where union becomes clearer and more real than ever before.

The discomfort is not proof that something is wrong.

It is proof that something is being born.