Where the Strong Finally Rest

“I can no longer be the strong one in rooms where others refuse to use their own power.
This isn’t reinvention. It’s clarity.”




“I can no longer be the strong one in rooms where others refuse to use their own power.
This isn’t reinvention. It’s clarity.”

For the first time in my life, I find myself with all of my emotional wounds wide open.

For forty-four years, I have tried to understand why my introverted self still needed the charge of community. At times, I believed that longing came from a lack of acceptance. At other moments, I buried myself in productivity—believing usefulness might substitute for belonging.

Now I know better.

The deepest need I have carried is not recognition, affirmation, or achievement. It is community.

Achievement feels good. Being seen for giftedness is affirming. But what happens when you don’t have your tribe? What happens when the community that once anchored you begins to disappear?

Over the last seven years, one by one, the bedrocks of my development have faded—for many reasons. Each loss required just enough grieving to remain functional. I could not afford to mourn too long. Responsibility demanded movement. Ministry required output. People needed strength.

For a long time, I was better at being a machine than being human.

I did not know how to lean into my humanity.

After three long weeks marked by emergency room visits, relentless physical pain, internal turmoil, misplaced blame, and a fatigue unfamiliar to my spirit, I now understand something I can no longer ignore: community is not optional. It is necessary. And it is not accidental. It is intentional.

This coming year requires a reassessment of our circles.

I can no longer accept being the “strong one” in rooms where others defer rather than step into their own power. My capacity for friendship, kinship, and even surface connection can no longer sustain relationships unwilling to reciprocate the act of pouring.

This is not a “new year, new me” statement.

It is clarity.

It is the recognition that my life has requirements if it is to continue with integrity. I must reinvest in what actually matters. I cannot afford to run out of gas anymore. I have a purpose and a charge to keep.

This is the stop where stowaways must get off the train.

The journey ahead requires willing participants—people who see the God-sized picture over my life and who are brave enough to acknowledge the God-sized calling over their own.

If you find yourself in the same place, perhaps this is the moment to pause—not to abandon the journey, but to assess it. Are we carrying unnecessary weight, or are we finally prepared to go further?

This is where the strong finally rest—not because the work is finished, but because strength was never meant to be carried alone.

No Slogans This Year

Normally, this is the moment when someone like me comes up with a clever way to describe the year. A phrase. A theme. A spiritual headline that makes the last twelve months feel organized and intentional. I suppose it’s the occupational hazard of preaching—to feel responsible for making meaning out of seasons that were never meant to be tidy.

But honestly, I have nothing like that this year.

I’ve reached the end of a twelve-month stretch and don’t have sufficient words for what this season has been. I have ideas. I have concepts. I have lessons. I just don’t have language that can fully hold it all. And for the first time, I’ve made peace with that. That, too, is part of the work.

What I can say is this: I have found myself moving from one realm of responsibility to another—sometimes intentionally, sometimes by necessity. Along the way, I’ve discovered that God has made me of some unreal stuff. Not invincible stuff. Not untouched stuff. But resilient enough to navigate pain, grief, and change without disappearing.

Still, I wonder what all of this will mean as the calendar turns.

Sure, I could stand up and declare that it’s my season for promotion, elevation, or breakthrough. I could borrow the language we’re all familiar with. But this year stripped away the last bit of cliché theology my spirit was still holding. I can no longer live in a world of spiritual absolutes built on sinking sand. I’ve learned—again—that faith is not strengthened by pretending struggle doesn’t exist.

We live in a culture constantly chasing “greater,” often without pausing to examine the cost of getting there. This year forced that examination. It tested every part of me—mind, body, soul, and spirit. And while I’ve come out on the other side, I didn’t emerge untouched.

I’m wounded.
I’m scarred.
I’m still wrestling.
But I am standing.

That alone is testimony.

It affirms the truth that God will never leave nor forsake us. But it also offers a sobering reminder: going through the fire does not mean you won’t smell like smoke. Survival does not erase evidence. Endurance still leaves marks.

One of the clearest lessons this year has taught me is the necessity of community. Going through the fire alone is unnecessary suffering. Going through it with others doesn’t remove the heat, but it does redistribute the weight. I understand now—more deeply than ever—that leaders need community, not as a luxury, but as lifeline. Strength without support is unsustainable.

I’ve also learned some harder truths. Everyone is not meant to occupy your inner space. You can’t help everyone. Desire cannot be gifted—it must already live within someone. And the “great cloud of witnesses” is not just a theological idea; it’s the living, breathing reminder that we are shaped by who walks with us, cheers for us, and tells us the truth.

This year unveiled a lot.

So if you’re looking for a polished conclusion or a prophetic bow to wrap things up neatly, I don’t have one. What I do have is solidarity.

For those who have been addressing challenge after challenge all year long—who didn’t get relief, just resolve—this is for you. For those who are ending the year tired but present, unsure but faithful, changed but still committed—we stand together.

We move forward not because everything is clear, but because we are still here.
Scarred, yes.
Wiser, hopefully.
Ready—not with certainty, but with courage—for whatever the next phase requires.

And for now, that is enough.

When the Meltdown Finally Comes

I had a meltdown.
Not any ordinary flame-out or burnout moment — but an honest-to-God, my-being-can’t-take-no-more kind of meltdown.

Saying that out loud might cause some to look at me through the lens of my profession and assume I’ve become unfit. But the truth is, this moment was long overdue. I was forty-four years past due for a crash-out. Apparently, 2025 was the appointed time to finally pour out my humanity.

For years, I lived in a personal prison of high expectations. The bar was never too high. The challenge was never too great. But the lack of acknowledgment — that’s what broke my heart. Nothing I did seemed good enough to be seen.

Most people think my entire existence has always been rooted in being a pastor or a leader. Truth is, at 13, I dreamed of being rich — owning houses in every direction with a car to match. Ministry wasn’t my plan; it was my call. A divine interruption that pulled me from what I wanted toward my purpose.

Yet every turn seemed to come with someone trying to deter me.
When I wanted to play basketball — too big.
When I applied to Kentucky State — stay and take the sure thing.
When I pursued my first master’s — your grades won’t get you in.
When I was too nice as a teenager, too qualified for a job, too ambitious for new dreams — the story was always the same: stay in your lane.

For forty-four years, I questioned the God in me.
For forty-four years, I wondered if being me was enough.
For forty-four years, I lived with mixed messages about my life.
For forty-four years, I was good enough to care for others but not worthy of care myself.

But Friday came — and it all came out.
The pain of rejection.
The hurt of dismissal.
The agony of disrespect.
The exhaustion from caretaking and the longing to be cared for.

It all came out.

My meltdown was my release — from horrible treatment, from hidden burdens, from the quiet acceptance of pain I never deserved to carry. It was the burning away of the veneer, the unmasking of my own soul.

I am no longer interested in being “the one.”
I have purpose to fulfill, and it cannot include lazy spirits or parasitic energies that leech the life out of what God is building in me.

There is too much to do — too much purpose to live — to keep serving as a host for those who only show up to feed off your strength.

This is the charge: to keep and to glorify God.
That’s the rhythm of my life now — not dictated by those who drain, but by the One who restores.

If you’ve read this far, maybe you’re assessing your own world too.
Sometimes we surround ourselves with crowds, believing they’ll cheer us forward, when in truth, they just want proximity to our light. They offer no aid to our growth. They belittle our pace. They drop us when we no longer serve their purpose.

They forget us in drought but show up begging in our harvest.
They lean on our strength but never return the favor.

So maybe — just maybe — this is your season for a meltdown.

Not to lose your mind.
Not to lose your faith.
Not to lose yourself.

But to reclaim the sanctity of your being.

You and I are created in the image and likeness of God. We are not objects of idol worship. We are flesh and blood — sacred and divine. We have more to us than titles, positions, and connections.

Our lives are holy.
Our existence is sacred.
And sometimes, it takes a meltdown to remember that.