In The Heart Of The Father

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.

“Yahweh is my best friend and my shepherd. I always have more than enough” Psalm 23:1, TPT

The first scripture I ever learned was Psalm 23. And as I sit in a strange season of my life, I keep hearing it echo in my heart: “The Lord is my Shepherd; I shall not want.”

Over the years, I’ve heard this scripture interpreted in many different ways. But today—right here, right now—it has taken on a new and profound meaning for me.

To give a little context, I am a creature of habit. I get very used to the way things are. I notice even the slightest of changes, and if I’m honest, I usually hate any form of change. My natural instinct is to try, with all my might, to get things back to how they were.

This makes me the opposite of easygoing.

I frequently need to be reminded by the Lord to go with the flow and not fight the current.

This season of my life has been marked by change on many levels—relationships shifting, career changes, parental changes, body changes, and so much more. I’ve had to learn how to be okay with adjusting to a new way of doing things, a new rhythm, a new normal.

So when Psalm 23 says, “The Lord is my Shepherd,” and follows it with, “I shall not want,” here’s how I’m hearing it in this season.

If I truly believe He is a good Shepherd, then I have to believe that everything I actually need will be brought to me. If that’s true, then there is no need to live from a place of wanting—striving, grasping, chasing—because what is required for my life will be supplied.

That realization reframes everything.

So take a moment and think about the thing you “want.”

Now consider this: if you truly needed it, you’d have it. And every step you’re taking right now is bringing you closer—not to the wants of a former version of yourself—but to the wants of the healed you, the transformed you, the matured you.

I’ve been seeing this play out lately in my relationships and in other areas of my life. Sometimes I want what a former version of me needed, simply because I don’t like change. But God doesn’t shepherd us backward. He leads us forward—into wholeness.

So here’s a question worth sitting with:

Are you chasing what served you in prior seasons?

Written By Jennifer McPherson

This truth came to me in the most unexpected—and honestly, the silliest—way. I was watching a movie. Jesus Revolution, to be exact. There’s a scene where a young man is baptized, and something about it gripped me. He didn’t come to the Lord with clenched fists full of assumptions or self-protection. He came with hands wide open.

For weeks, I couldn’t shake that image. Why did it stay with me?
Because what I was seeing was the essence of how we must come to the Lord if we ever hope to live in peace.

Open hands.
Letting go of what doesn’t align with His heart.
Postured to receive everything He longs to pour out.
This—this—is humility.

When we come to Him open-handed, He can use us in ways we could never imagine. We are no longer tethered to the weight of this world because we’ve stopped clinging to anything but Him.

When I reflect on my life these past 42 years, I realize something:
I have always been a holder.
Growing up in chaos, instability, and uncertainty taught me to grip whatever felt safe, even if it wasn’t. I was always searching for stable ground—never realizing the whole time that He was the stable ground I had been seeking.

The truth is, as long as my hands were clenched around something temporal, I was never fully positioned to receive what He had for me in the moment.

This idea pulled my heart back to Isaiah 43:18–19—“Forget the former things; do not remember the things of old.”
It doesn’t mean we discard the past. It means we hold it loosely.
We keep an open-handed posture that allows God to give and God to take as He leads.

Because the moments I have felt most content, most free, most aligned with Him, were the moments I finally released my grip—and embraced the reality that I am the one being held.

This entire year has been a season of transition for me. A crossing over. A shifting from this to that. And if I’m honest, there were still parts of me that wanted to hold on—to people, to places, to dreams, to familiar rhythms that felt comfortable.

But today…
Today I release all of it back to Him.

All the things.
All the people.
All the places I’ve seen.
Every dream. Every joy. Every seed He ever planted in me—
Lord, it all goes back to You.

And so I stand here now—
On ground You’ve already cultivated,
Ground not yet built upon,
Ground that is holy because You are in it—

And I say:

Lord, my hands are open, and so is my heart.
Here I am, Lord—send me.