Think those me centered scripts really become loud, especially when you are alone.

You You know the enemy really corners us sometimes, and for us to remember no, your hope is exactly the same as Peter's, which is to not look down, don't look back, don't look inward, look up to him.

Hello and welcome to the shifting culture podcast in which we have conversations about the culture we create and the impact we can make.

We long to see the body of Christ look like Jesus.

I'm your host.

Joshua Johnson, today I'm joined again by Sharon Hoddy Miller.

Sharon has spent years helping people name this hidden insecurities and comparisons that weigh us down and steal our joy.

Her first book free of me, explore the gift of self forgetfulness.

What happens when we stop making ourselves the center of the story and now in our new devotional gazing at God, she takes that invitation further, showing us how to lift our eyes from the endless cycle of self preoccupation and set our gaze on the one who defines our worth and calls us beloved.

In this conversation, Sharon and I talk about the lies that keep us locked in self doubt, what it looks like to do the hard interior work of healing without getting stuck there, and how worship becomes the practice that reorients us toward God and neighbor.

We explore what real freedom in Christ looks like in the everyday realities of ministry, leadership and family life, and why abiding in Christ, not achievement or recognition, is the true measure of success.

Sharon's honesty, humility and wisdom shine through in this conversation, I think you'll find her insights challenging and freeing, especially if you've ever felt crushed by expectations, whether from others or from yourself.

This is a conversation about freedom, healing and the joy that comes when our eyes are lifted up.

So join us.

Here is my conversation with Sharon.

Hoddy Miller, Sharon, welcome back to shifting culture.

Excited to have you back

on I know I was excited when I saw this on my calendar today, getting to catch up with you again.

Last time we actually, we talked about the cost of control.

And I think something that that does to us is actually does what we're talking about today, is that it makes us turn in on ourselves.

And so, I mean, you're building that from free of me, your first book, and now in this devotional you have that's come out with free of me, your RE release, gazing at God.

Yes, it is good.

We're talking about the movements of going in to figure out who we are and who God says we are, and then going and gazing back out at God and other people figuring out how to love God and love others.

Take me on the journey with you.

Where did this come from?

And what were you struggling with when we're trying to figure out how you could get maybe a little more confident?

They were battling some self esteem, figuring out who you were in the midst of your life and your faith.

Yeah, well, if I can back up a little bit and share kind of the backstory first with my first book free of me that released, I believe it was in 2017 now, I was pregnant with my daughter when it released, and now she's in second grade.

So that's how long ago that released, which is kind of crazy, but back then, what led to that book on self forgetfulness, essentially is what that book is about.

Was that I had been in ministry for probably about a decade at that point, and at first, when I was first called to ministry, I found it to be inherently meaningful, like just, you know, writing, speaking, teaching, all of that.

I really just enjoyed it for the calling itself, the ways that I learned about Scripture and Jesus.

But somewhere along the way, my focus shifted, and the best way I can describe what was sort of happening in my interior world, and it's so honestly humbling to admit, because ministry is, you know, fundamentally about Jesus, but what was happening inside of me is I started looking at my peers who are kind of doing the same work I was and comparing myself to them, or I was looking at people just a few steps ahead of me in Ministry, and needing their acknowledgement or their affirmation.

And, yeah, and so if I if I wasn't comparing well to my peers, or if I wasn't getting acknowledgement from people that I looked up to, it was really shattering.

And I remember putting things online, putting things out into.

World and sort of expecting a particular response, and if I didn't get that feeling really insecure, feeling like a failure, feeling like, what's wrong with me?

And I remember having this sort of bottom moment where I was just sobbing one night, and my husband was holding me, and I was like, why am I so insecure about ministry, this work that I'm doing, like, why am I comparing myself?

And so that sent me on a journey of trying to understand my insecurity.

And I did it the way I approached it, the way I think our self esteem culture sort of teaches us to which is through affirmation, you know, looking at what does the Bible say about me and how God loves me and thinks about me and created me with a purpose, and reading books that were kind of to that end as well.

And at the end of that journey, it was probably like six months of just research and working on myself and trying to internalize these truths.

I realized that it had not helped me at all.

It had not touched what whatever was underneath that insecurity, really.

And that's when I sort of backed up and re approached and realized there's something else going on here.

And one person who whose voice really helped me identify that was actually Tim Keller.

He has this little book called the freedom of self forgetfulness.

You can read it in like 45 minutes, really easy read, but he helped me name something that I really unpack more of and free of me, which is that there are actually two causes of insecurity, but our culture has really only identified one or equipped us to deal with that, and that is low self esteem, which is is real.

I would define that as not seeing yourself the way God sees you.

And the gospel of Jesus, Christ is our answer to low self esteem, absolutely but there's a second cause of insecurity that most of us never even think about our culture is not equipped to address, and that is self preoccupation.

When we make ourselves the center of our story, the center of whatever it is we're doing, or make something about us that is not about us, it means that thing then becomes a referendum on our worth and our value in some way.

And realizing that was actually what had happened to my ministry, is I had had made it about me.

It was a referendum on me, the job I was doing, the quality of my work, whatever it is, and that is why it had become so heavy and was stealing all of my joy.

And so that was the birthplace of free of me, and I've continued to walk that out.

It's been really that book was really helpful for me when we planted a church, actually, shortly after that book released, because I don't know if you know this, but church planting is also there's many opportunities for humiliation and loneliness, and so it was a really great message that I could continue to preach to myself.

But, and I know this is like the longest answer to your question, but gazing at God, part of the reason I wrote this follow up devotional is I realized I still had more to say.

And one of the things that I discovered since releasing free of me and one person that actually another voice that helped me to identify this was Chuck DeGroat and his book when narcissism comes to church, because he and that book talks about how people who struggle with narcissism that self focus underneath it is actually shame, like usually it's a wound.

And I was seeing that even in my own ministry, like in our church, where we're at very often, when someone is running everything that's happening to them through a filter of self.

There's actually like a wound there.

And so to just invite people to you need to just raise your gaze.

Love God and love others.

While that is important, it will also be very difficult if we never name Why are you focusing on yourself?

Because sometimes it is just sin, sometimes it's just pride, it's just vanity, but sometimes there's actually a wound that needs tending to.

And so that is the the arc of gazing at God is for a book called gazing at God.

I think people will be surprised by how much time I devote to the self, but it's you have to understand what is happening in your interior world, and once you can name it and tame it, then you have this, this freedom to focus on God and others as well.

You need to just focus on God.

Yeah, I think the the things that have really helped me in this area is really.

Realizing, from a lot of different voices and from God that our identity and who we are is received rather than coming from inside of ourselves.

And I think when we start to focus on who we are, I mean the self esteem movement, it's we're trying to come up with who we are by ourselves.

We're trying to figure out, like our identity, our worth, our value, all from me, it's still a focus on myself.

And while that can be good, some of those affirmations, a lot of times that when we're not receiving something from God from the outside and knowing who we are from him, it's going to eat at us.

We're going to continue to say, Am I really this?

Am I just telling myself this?

What is that shift for us to look that it's not just about turning in or like focusing just ourselves by ourselves, but it's something that we need to receive, and it comes from the outside.

Yeah, I mean that that conversation around identity is, gosh, that is a that's a huge conversation.

And I know that we I just mentioned Tim Keller, and I thought you were about to say this, because Tim Keller talks about how the good news of Jesus Christ is that identity is not achieved, but is, in fact, received.

One thing that I think the self esteem movement.

So when I was researching free of me, I researched the self esteem movement and why it ultimately failed, because it didn't yield the generation of confident young people that it essentially promised.

And what it did yield was not more confident young people.

They were just as insecure as ever, but they were more self absorbed.

And I think ultimately the reason why it failed is that, on the one hand, it got right the importance of these messages of of truth and speaking affirmation of building like.

You know, in some ways, what it is attempting to harness is showing our kids unconditional love like, I think that's at the end of the day, what the self esteem movement is trying to do, where I think it ultimately failed, is that the ceiling was too low.

Of like, what it was hoping to achieve, that we are created for more than ourselves, that the the human, you know, the reason God invented humanity was ultimately to point back to him.

We are made in His image.

And so we have this, this purpose, this this meaning that has these echoes of the infinite and these echoes of eternity.

And what the self esteem movement is basically doing is saying no, like your highest purpose is for you to like yourself.

And when we lower that ceiling of of human purpose, I think that creates its own sort of sickness.

And I think we saw like the results of that, and so I think we have to be careful.

And I'm realizing just now, I'm not really answering your question about identity at all, but I think that it had, you know, benefits, like, I want to be really careful not to just say it's all garbage.

Like, I think it was addressed, trying to address a real problem, but the ceiling was just too low, and ultimately bore that out.

So I know that didn't

Okay.

I want to stick on that we'll get back to identity and we'll come back to it, because there's a lot in there that I want to talk about, but if I think of our culture today, so it feels like now, if there is something that I don't like in maybe political administrations, or if there's something I don't like in my community that is happening that is outside of myself, outside of my control, if my highest value is to like myself, if I don't like What is happening, I don't just say, hey, maybe in our community, we just have to work for, you know, a greater the greater good for our community.

We have to actually see where the problems are and actually go and be with other people in the midst of it, it actually starts to cultivate a lie to ourselves, that what is happening now is just not good for me, right?

It is.

It is a bad thing for me.

So I feel bad about the state of the world.

I feel bad then about myself, and then there is nothing that I could do about it.

And so I just wallow in this, you know, self pity, that because something.

Is happening outside of myself, without my control.

I really don't know what to do with it, because now I don't like the world, and because of that, I don't like myself.

How do we reorient ourselves in the midst of even even that?

And we could take it as a microcosm level of like people around you doing things that you don't like and you end up being Hey, it's really about me.

So this isn't working.

That is one of the big limitations when we make things about us that are ultimately not about us, whether that is our children, you know, or some issue that is happening in the world when we are treating like our political party, for example, when we're treating these things as if they are an extension of us, as if they are a reflection of us, We are not actually going to see that thing clearly anymore.

We're no longer going to, for example, with our children.

We're no longer seeing them for who they are.

We're just saddling them with more of our own insecurities.

We're not going to be able to see our political party clearly because we feel the need to defend it, because it is an extension of ourselves, and so ultimately, when we make things about us that are not about us, it is inhibiting our ability to see the world clearly.

It is inhibiting our ability to be honest about what is happening in front of us.

It's all just being run through this filter of self, and so that's why it is.

It's really important as a Christian discipline for us to be able to identify.

I have attached this thing to my identity, going back to that topic of identity, because as soon as that happens, we are no longer going to be dealing honestly with whatever that thing is.

I think that's helpful.

So then what is?

Then this balance between like looking outward, gazing at God, gazing at others, and loving our neighbors well, and then working on our shame and our scripts and naming where we are and actually doing the hard work of healing so that we could look out, what is that balance?

Because sometimes we focus too much on one side or the other and we forget both of those sides.

Yeah, exactly so on the one end, I would say.

And another thing that our culture does really well is this self awareness, you know, interior examination, understanding the self.

We have all these different tools now.

We have the Enneagram.

We've got Strengths Finder.

We have all these different ways of understanding ourselves and understanding our trauma from our childhood, whatever it is.

And those things are all valuable, but within the right context.

And so being able to say, you do need to understand these things, I think it was, I can't remember if it's John Calvin.

I quoted him in gazing at God.

It says, There is no knowledge of God without knowledge of self and so that interior work is essential.

It's very, very important.

But where Christians would diverge from maybe a secular understanding of self examination is, why are we doing this?

That the point is not just self actualization.

The point is not just liking yourself.

One kind of metaphor I think about often is, you know, Scripture uses this metaphor of running a race, like we have this race of faith.

You can't run that, that race if you have a broken foot, and so if you're hobbling along, if you're distracted because of the pain of this foot, you need to take some time to sit down and give that foot an opportunity to heal.

But if you were to make your entire life about that foot, if you were to move into the hospital and just live there, that is its own kind of sickness.

And so for us to remember that, no, you were actually intended to run like that.

That is the point of your healing.

So that's that's one end that I think Christianity offers a correction to why we do this interior work, that it does matter.

It is an important part of this process, so that you're not just losing the self, but you need to heal the self in order to be free of the self.

On the other side of it, I would say there is a tendency, kind of on the back end, to think I am practicing self forgetfulness.

I am practicing self denial, when what you are actually doing is self neglect.

You are practicing.

It self rejection or a loss of the self.

And ironically, that happens because you are finding your identity in something other than Jesus.

So one way this plays out a lot is for mothers, where we think that I'm called to be this, this martyr, and really it's because of this expectation that this is what a good mother does.

This is how I assert my identity as a good mother is by neglecting myself, essentially.

But it also plays out for pastors.

I see this temptation in pastors a lot, where they are, the first ones to arrive and the last ones to leave, and they're always on call, and they're, you know, they look like the greatest servant leader.

You know, they're so humble, and they're so self sacrificing, and they're just a hero of the faith.

And really, what it is is they have over identified with this job, that this being a pastor, there's kind of a loss of self where they're trying to find themselves in this job, in this role, in this calling, and because of that, they are actually neglecting themselves.

They are not taking care of themselves.

They're not practicing like healthy rhythms and so on, on both ends, just this front end of like healing but but also in the ways that that loss of self sort of drives us, they reinforce the importance of being healthy and affirming the goodness of of yourself, and also that you find yourself ultimately in Jesus and none of these other roles.

Those are all really important pre prerequisites to freedom from the self.

All right,

so you just named a really important thing for us that I don't want to miss, but I want to get back into some of this identity and receiving identity, but before we do that, so then you just talk about somebody as a pastor, as a leader, saying everything's going to be about me.

I'm going to be the greatest servant leader, most humble man alive, woman alive, like I am, the most humble I'm going to go and serve.

What it seems to me is that what they're doing is that, instead of trying to be an authoritarian, hierarchical leader with lots of control, what they do that's a pyramid with them at the top, it seems to me like they invert the pyramid and then they put everything on their shoulders, so it's still All about them and and, but they're trying to hold everything up by themselves, right?

And so it's going to crush them, and it'll crush the church and everyone around them.

So what is health in that look like, especially in leadership and pastoral leadership with congregations and churches and ministry, how do we reorient into a healthy dynamic when with what you're talking about?

Yeah, that's such a that's a really interesting way of framing it.

And I'm gonna process this sort of verbally with you for a moment, because I'm having, like, a new I'm having a new thought in real time.

But what's interesting to me about it is almost like, you know, I talked about over identifying with your work, but people who do that also over identify with Jesus, which you wouldn't think is like a thing, but it is in the sense that you receive your identity from Christ ultimately, but you are not Christ.

You know you are called to be Jesus to people, but not for people.

And I think that is, it's such a temptation in ministry to be Jesus for people, primarily because people want you to be Jesus for them, and when you are not, when you are found to have flaws, when you make mistakes, people are so disappointed in you, as if you have failed to be who you are supposed to be, when that isn't true, you've just failed to be Jesus, who you're never called to be.

And so I do think there is kind of like a distinction there where we are called to be like Jesus.

We are not called to be Jesus, for him, for other people.

So that's my real time processing of what you just named.

Well, it's so hard to reorient the body of Christ into a position like that and not a.

Elevating someone that's not Jesus to the position of Jesus, and so if anything actually then, then fails and hurts, all accusation is going to go on you, right?

If, if I view you, Sharon as my pastor, you're, you're Jesus to me, and you fail in some sort which we will, because we're not Jesus, we're human.

I'm going to look at you and go, Okay, you failed me.

I'm going to just rail against you, and then I'm going to maybe leave or, you know, cause some dissension, because it's not right.

It's not good.

And so that's a reorientation work for a culture with people and I mean, and it starts, you know, it starts with with us, who are actually doing some of this, leading that we have to reorient ourselves to something different.

Yeah.

So what does that start to look like, reorienting an entire culture through making sure that we are okay, and not saying I am Jesus.

Yeah, I think for me personally, I can speak for me personally, that reorientation, it's really painful, because I think there are the narcissists, there are the power hungry leaders, that's their own thing, but for those of us who our heart genuinely and truly is to serve our people, to create, to build, churches that are like a taste of the kingdom, that are safe, that are life giving for the sheep when we fail, or especially when we are misunderstood, like when we are accused of things that we didn't do we didn't say, like, Isn't our heart?

It is so painful because we know, like, my heart for you is is good, and I want to, I want to defend myself in this moment, so that you understand, like my intentions were pure, or, you know, I know this was a mistake, but it was a well intentioned one, like whatever it was, that has been a struggle for me, but to recognize that, that even in those moments where people think poorly of me, are disappointed in me, is actually the invitation for a correction to occur in both their heart and in my own That is an open door to remember, hey, if they leave my church and they're disappointed in me, but they still love Jesus, that's a win like, like, I'm not trying to win them to me, I will disappoint them, but if I can still respond in a way that holds on to, points to, you know, whatever it is their relationship to Jesus, that that is still a win.

And so those opportunities for me of humiliation have have actually been some of the most important moments, where, in my own heart, I am reminded, like, what I have been called to, and what this work ultimately is, but we tend to fight them in those moments.

We tend to want to, like, sit down with the person and explain, like, if I can just tell them this way to explain and to maybe just reframe it as maybe this was actually for me to remember that this is I'm not building this church on my shoulders.

That's really good.

So take me to the process of finding out, what are the lies that we're believing, rejecting those lies, receiving truth from God, and the truth that all of us are a beloved child of God.

We're in Christ, and we have then purpose in the world, right?

We have something that we get to do.

So there are some some gifts.

So what is receiving that true identity, who we really are, really like, by rejecting some of the lies that we have believed in ourselves?

Yeah, this goes back to why I wrote gazing at God again, is those lies, ultimately, are the things that keep us focused on ourselves.

I think as long as the enemy can feed us these lies about, you know, you aren't good enough.

You were excluded.

You, you, you, it's, it's fascinating to me.

There's studies done on one of the tells of people struggling with depression is that their language becomes very me centered.

And so people struggling with depression use a lot more me use a lot more.

I mine all of that.

And so there's this link.

Between self focus and just overall spiritual, mental, emotional unhealth.

And so being able to do that into your work, and it's not a I have finished, and now I'm healed, you know, kind of a thing, but for me, like one of the things, one of the days, is about just noticing your scripts, like, am I using a lot of me language right now?

And usually that's like a clue to me, that I have turned the narrative inward, and that I need to not only see that, but but one of the things for me that has actually set me free from those me centered narratives is remembering I am, my identity like the most important thing about me is that I am loved by God, and I don't have to prove myself.

I don't have to defend myself, I don't have to explain to anyone who I am, because he already knows.

And that's, that's the beautiful thing about the gospel, that I think there has been a way of talking about self denial, that is the obliteration of self, that your self is bad, and for us to remember, no, the resurrection is total like it is all of you.

And so that means that God has a vested interest in redeeming every ounce of who you are, and everything that God created is good, and that also includes you.

And so for us to use that as sort of a home base that I am not operating out of, a place where I have to prove myself, where I need to earn my worth, my standing, whatever it is I am free of having to do all of that, that posturing type work, so that I can instead focus on loving God and loving others and so a lot of that for me, I never would have thought like when I first became a Christian, the love of God was not a difficult concept for me to understand, because I have really great parents and I've always experienced unconditional love, but It was in ministry that was when I really needed to return to this very simple but very profound truth that I am loved, and it is only out of that place that I can operate in health and ministry.

It's so hard to operate in health because it is a barrage of false expectations put upon you by yourself and by other people, and then trying to figure out, what are the real expectations God has for you, which you know God is like, Hey, I love you, and you don't have to do anything, but I have called you to a purpose, to actually live in in such a way and actually be faithful.

And that's that's hard.

So in the midst of of this and denying ourselves and seeing what God is up to and receiving things, what does success look like in the kingdom of God?

Like, one of the things that we think is, I don't know, flashy ministry, and then it ends up being, look at what I've done or like, Hey, I'm counting, you know, whatever we're counting.

We like to count a lot in Christian work, but what really is success in the kingdom of God when we're actually then we've worked on our lives and our scripts, we've received our true identity, and we're starting to deny ourself so that we can gaze at God and others.

What does success look like?

That is such a great question.

So for me, I It's funny, like thinking about it, like, I don't know why I am, like, weepy all of a sudden, I think it's because, I don't know about you, but the grace of God, the more I understand it, the richer and like more beautiful it becomes.

And I think that when I first started out in ministry, and this was the pressure, was thinking, I need to do, like, great things, you know, I need to see this many people, like, understand, come to, know, find and follow Jesus, you know, I that is what like success in the kingdom means, or getting a kind of the kingdom, getting momentum In our culture, you know, whatever it is, and what I have shifted on throughout my life, throughout my leadership, is I've continued to like scale down the size of what I think success actually looks like, to the point, yeah.

Sense of believing that, at the end of the day, success is really just abiding in Christ, like, that's what it is.

You know, it's, it's not any bigger than that, like we, we replicate who we are.

And so in terms of like, our influence, God will will take care of that.

And so our, you know, the size of what we're called to is, is rather modest, but incredibly important.

Because when we are trying to do these great things, I think that is when we ultimately lose the essential things, when we lose ourselves.

And so it's just the the lightness of knowing what, what God has called me to at the end of the day is just to enjoy him, you know.

And the more that I rest in that, the more freedom I experience in that, that that's ultimately like his heart, and then just let him do the rest

in this world of self esteem, some of this thing of like resting in Jesus and Resting in God means I don't have to do anything.

I just have to, you know, which, at one point is really true.

But what I love in John 15, the abide in me passage is like, if you're going to abide in My love, you will obey my commands.

If you obey my commands, you will abide in My love.

It's actually they go hand in hand.

We think of commands as being tough and heavy and hard, but it's really for the flourishing of our lives as you know what he is talking to us.

And is the greatest command is to love God, and the second is like it, to love our neighbor as ourselves.

And so this abiding and this loving towards God and other people go hand in hand, talk a little bit about, then, the commands of Jesus, and because in this culture that we live in, command seems to be a bad thing, because you're putting something hard on me, and I don't want to be controlled.

I don't want you to do anything.

But what?

Why should we follow the commands of Christ?

Yeah, this, this journey, really reframed those first and second greatest commands for me, because you're exactly right when we think of the 10 Commandments, when we think of the law, when we think of any instruction from God, it seems like these are the rules.

This is how you be a good Christian, and that there is no life in that you know that is a really heavy yoke.

But what this journey taught me is that when Jesus says the first commandment is to love God, what he was saying is, because this will set you free like this.

This is the path.

This is the way out of this, this pit of smallness and self focus and living for lesser, unworthy purposes this.

This is the way.

And so it really helped me to reframe these.

These are two sort of ropes out of that pit, in a sense, like the path to rescue, which is just such a different way than I had ever thought about those two commands.

How does this path to rescue work?

Then, like, is it?

How do we get out of that pit by actually loving God.

So I I tease this out more actually, in free of me and for me, some of this actually, I came to it by way ironically of my counselor.

She was talking about how our thoughts, our trains of thoughts, are almost like these locomotives, and we've got to figure out how to stop the train.

And so when you're in these me spirals of, you know, what are people going to think of me?

Why didn't they applaud me?

Thank me.

Include me.

You know, whatever is your me centered train of thought, like, how do you stop the train?

And what I eventually stumbled upon, and it's interesting, because since writing free of me, I discovered there's a lot of research on this.

Isn't something that I invented, there's actually, this is like a legitimate practice.

But I thought, okay, if I am struggling with me center thoughts, then I need to, like, physically redirect my brain to God.

And so I went through, I combed through, especially the Psalms.

And just looked for descriptions of his character.

And then I created a Notes app in my phone where I listed them all out.

And when I noticed myself just spiraling with those thoughts, I would go and I would just read through that list about how he is kind, he is patient, he is long suffering.

He is slow to anger.

He is our rock, our refuge, you know, all those different things.

And it redirected my my brain off of myself and back onto him.

And initially, when I first started doing this, I would put my notes up away, and then my brain would go, like, immediately back to that thing.

And so I'd have to pull my notes up again and just like, read through it.

But eventually it became like a second nature, where I didn't even need my notes app.

I could just, you know, rehearse it by heart.

But what I realized I was doing at the end of the day is just what Peter was doing when he was in the ocean.

You know, it's just redirecting my gaze off of the waves, you know, onto Jesus.

That's what worship is, in a nutshell.

And I think that also redefined for me, what worship is that what we're doing is directing our gaze onto the actual source of life and security and peace and and hope.

That's what worship is.

And so what, what walked me out of it, in a nutshell, was worship, which sounds like very Christian, but I'm telling you like it also it worked.

It worked.

So because

we're thinking, we're putting our gaze on God, what I love about that story of Jesus walking on water.

And then Peter said, Hey, can I come out too?

And he says, yes, I've always, you know, in the past, as I was reading that, it struck me recently, just in the last few weeks, I read that story again, and a lot of I always go, man.

He lost his gaze on Jesus, so he fell, but he was the only one who got out of the boat.

He actually was brave enough to say, I'm going to get out on that water.

And he tried, and he went, and he believed in such a way that he actually took a step out of the boat.

And what that does to me is putting my gaze on Jesus helps me put that step out of the boat.

But I know that a I'm not going, it's not going to be perfect the rest of my life.

Right now, I got out of that pit.

I put my gaze on him, and man, well done.

Like, good job, Peter.

Like, none of the other disciples did it.

They didn't say anything.

They're like, they were just freaking out that there's this ghost here.

They were scared, right?

And he was like, Okay, I'm coming.

I'm doing it.

So where is the the actual for us, not just like looking but actually stepping out of the boat and saying, We have to take a step as well.

You say that because I just maybe two nights ago, did devotions with my only one of my kids has been baptized, and he's, like, really hungry to learn about Scripture.

He's 10.

It's funny.

It's just amazing.

And so every night we pick a passage, we pick a story, and he reads it out loud, and then we just talk through it.

And so two nights ago, we read that story, and we just talked through it, and I talked to him about exactly the thing that you said that strikes me so often, especially as a church planter, that Peter was the only one who got out of the boat.

And what that means, I mean, there's a lot it means there's something to be said for you are safer in the waves with Jesus than you are in the comfort of the boat.

But what that also means is that stepping out of the boat is incredibly lonely, and I wonder what the disciples thought about Peter when he was doing that, like if he thought they thought he was crazy, if they thought he was weird, you know, who knows what they thought?

Who knows what they said?

But anytime you step out in faith, it is going to be lonely, and people aren't going to follow you, people that you love, and sometimes they will even criticize you.

They will question your motives.

And that was something I was completely unprepared for, but for us to not look down, not look back, not to ask, Is it me?

You know, did I do something wrong?

Am I?

Did I mishear God, whatever it is, again, I think those me centered scripts really become loud, especially when you are alone.

You You know, the enemy really core.

Honors us sometimes, and for us to remember, no, your hope is exactly the same as Peter's, which is to not look down, don't look back, don't look inward.

Look up to him

when you hear that.

So if you're receiving like, Hey, this is some of your purpose.

This is where you're going.

You feel a call by God somewhere, and saying this is a purpose.

It reminds me something like like Mother Teresa, as she goes in, she starts her ministry, and she feels most of her life that she actually doesn't hear then the voice of God, or the feel the presence of God.

But she stood the course and stuck to it.

And it was not easy.

I was just talking to, you know, I was talking to our pastor as we were in an elder retreat, and he was telling the story of him working with Mother Teresa for as a, as a young kid, like 18 years old, on a YWAM outreach and worked with

Mother Teresa, yeah, like, he actually worked with her.

That's amazing

And so they would, what would they?

They would go down the street, pick up people that had, like, all these sores on them about to die.

They would gather them.

So he would just take people out of trucks, hold them, and then place them in beds.

And they would all that they would do in that place, would just clean the source of people and either prepare them to die or then take care of the dead that wouldn't have been able to take being taken care of.

Like this is hard work, like and and she goes, I'm called to this.

And then doesn't feel the presence of God for a long time.

But she says, I'm going to continue to do this because I heard the call.

That's the most amazing thing to me.

And like, what does it look like to stay the course?

for the Yeah.

In the midst of all of this, we're gazing at God.

Said, I'm I'm looking at you.

But you know, especially for people probably around our age, as we're going through these, these even transitions from from young, young life into to older age, maybe midlife transitions.

There's such a time when we're like, I don't know what I'm doing and where I'm going, am I going to change?

What does it look like to stay the course and continue to say I'm going to gaze at God even if I don't feel it?

Yeah, I would say feeling the presence of God is a grace that we are not constantly promised.

And I think for so many of us, myself included, it's important to know that, because when you first discern that call, very often it is accompanied by really emotional experience of God, like it's very often dramatic.

Maybe you're at a conference, maybe you get a vision like, whatever it is, but it's overwhelming.

It engages, you know, all of your senses like you you feel God on this, like visceral level.

And I think a lot of times we can spend the rest of our lives kind of chasing after that feeling when that wasn't really the point.

I think that feeling typically gives us a good bit of clarity that we need for the road ahead, but at the end of the day, just even, like, honestly, knowing, because we are whole people, that things like depression, depression dulls our like physical ability to sense God, it dulls our ability to sense anything.

And so if you are going through a season of depression and you don't feel God, it's not because he's left.

You're just in a season of depression.

That's just what happens during that.

But nothing like has actually changed about his character.

And so for us to remember that gazing at God is not about chasing after an experience of the transcendent.

It is about reminding ourselves what is ultimately fixed, immovable truth, that these are the things that do not change, regardless of our circumstances, regardless of how we feel at any given moment.

And that is what we stand on, that that is what gazing at God is about.

It's good.

So what hope do you have for people pick up this devotional gazing at God and maybe free of me as well.

What do you hope that people can get from this.

My hope is that people would experience actual freedom in Christ, because that is what it gave me.

You know, I think we talk about freedom, sometimes very fi.

Figuratively, metaphorically, like, Yes, I have freedom.

I'll experience it fully, you know, one day in glory.

But honestly, this is, and it's part of the reason why I revisited it with a devotional.

Is this second to finding Christ.

This was the second greatest liberation of my life.

It continues to be a source of freedom, because in a in a role, especially as leading a church, you are constantly evaluated by the people in your church, on the job you're doing as a preacher, as a you know, manager of staff, fundraiser, like all these different things, you're constantly being measured, and that is just death to the soul.

And so this, this toolkit of self forgetfulness, has helped me to put all of that noise, kind of in its proper place, and in some cases, to actually receive it as a tool of my own sanctification, and to remember I don't actually have to win anyone to myself, that if anyone doesn't like me, that is fine, because this isn't this church isn't about me, it is about Jesus.

And so that's my hope, is that if people are realizing that their ministry, their calling, whatever it is, is just a lot heavier than it ever needed to be, because your own identity, your worth is, is bound up in it, that this would be a path that helps you to kind of disentangle those things so you can walk in freedom.

Yes, this is not hyperbole, but this is one of the greatest things to help you in your life, both free of me and gazing at God, is actually to bring about greater freedom.

It is one of the most helpful things that I have read and many years.

And so I would put it on the on the shelf with a few other things that are very similar to this.

But this is a fantastic resource.

It is something that I really believe our culture desperately needs.

I really want people, if they haven't read free of me yet, to go and get it and just pass it out to the your entire church and all the congregation and do this devotional as you're walking with this gazing at God, I I want to emphasize I say how much I enjoy books a lot on this podcast, because I really do love a lot of the books I read, but this is one of the most important things for you in your Life, so go and get this.

It's really, really good.

Sharon, how can people connect with you?

Is there anywhere you'd like to point people to?

I'm most active on Instagram, just Sharon H Miller is where they can find me.

Perfect.

Sounds good.

I'd love to just end with a recommendation from you.

So anything you've been reading or watching lately, you could recommend,

oh, my goodness, how much time do you have?

I just started so I've been reading books about resilience, and so I just finished a book called regenerative performance by James Hewitt, and it's his stuff on sleep.

Was really, really interesting to me, just kind of like habit.

He was debunking a lot of myths that we have about, like, why caffeine is bad, or things like, a lot of it was kind of setting me free, because he also said, like, if you're night owl, like you're biologically designed that way, like, lean into it.

And then I just started a book called shatterproof by Tasha Urich, and it's, it's about resilience as well, but also some of the like myths around resilience that ultimately crush us.

And so both of those books have been if you are someone who is looking for to dig deeper into resiliency and leadership.

I've enjoyed both of them.

Awesome.

That's great.

Well, Sharon, thank you for this conversation.

It took some some tangents and turns, which I didn't expect, but were fantastic.

And I think we really went deep and hopefully helped some people along the way.

And this, this free of me and gazing.

God is a fantastic resource.

Well done.

Thank you for going on the journey yourself.

And these are the best books.

The best resources are ones where people have wrestled deeply with what they are giving to the world, that it's not just out of duty, but is actually about lived experience.

And so thank you for going on that journey to help many, many people.

So thank you.

Applause.