May 27, 2025 • 20 mins
🎯 In This Episode, You’ll Discover:
- The hidden lie behind the “holy hustle” myth
- Why burnout is not proof of faithfulness
- 3 biblical mindset shifts that protect your creativity and calling
- How to recover from spiritual exhaustion without losing your edge
📝 Episode Summary
You’ve been told that hustle is holy. That if you’re tired, you’re doing something right. That burnout is a badge of faith.
But what if that’s a lie wrapped in spiritual language?
In this raw episode, Jim exposes the toxic mindset behind the “holy hustle” — a false gospel that glorifies burnout and shames rest. He shares his own story of crashing under pressure and the years-long journey to rebuild from a place of biblical rest.
If you’re a faith-driven creative who’s tired, drained, and wondering why the grind feels godless… this one’s for you.
✝️ Faith Connection
Jesus modeled rhythm, not burnout (Luke 5:16). He withdrew to rest and reconnect — not because He was weak, but because He was wise. Rest isn’t rebellion. It’s spiritual maturity.
💡 Key Takeaways
- Burnout Isn’t a Badge – Exhaustion isn’t proof of obedience.
- Productivity Without Presence = Performance – Just because you’re doing a lot doesn’t mean God’s in it.
- Obedience > Outcomes – Let God define success. Your job is to stay aligned.
❓ Reflection Question
Where have you confused hustle for holiness in your own life?
📱 Connect With Us
Instagram: @leadwithjim
Facebook: facebook.com/leadwithjim
Website: www.leadwithjim.com
Youtube: www.youtube.com/leadwithjim
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Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to Online Business forChristian Creatives, the show that
helps you build a businessthat honors God, fuels your creativity
and actually pays the bills.
I'm your host, Jim Burgoon,leadership coach, Faith first entrepreneur,
and a guy who's made justabout every mistake so you don't
(00:21):
have to let's get into it.
Somewhere along the line, themodern Christian creative has equated
a exhaustion with obedience orexhaust serving.
But we're going to talk aboutthat today on the show.
Welcome to Online Christianwelcome to Online Business for Christian
Creatives.
I'm your host, Jim Ragoon.
(00:41):
And we're here to dive intosomething, honestly that has wrecked
me and is probably havewrecked you somewhere along the line.
And that's burnout.
And I'm not talking about thetype of burnout that comes after
a hard week, because after ahard week you're tired, you want
to lay down, you don't feellike you have enough energy to do
anything.
That's not what I'm talking about.
I'm talking about the type ofexhaustion that creeps in over time
(01:04):
where if you take a rest oryou try to sleep, it doesn't go away.
And it just feels like it'sgetting worse.
It feels like it's gettingdeeper, that something is off.
And I coined the term this waya long time ago.
I don't know if it wasoriginally for me, but I remember
writing a blog about this andI called it functional burnout.
And it's not a biblical concept.
And even though we've beenmade to feel like it's biblical,
(01:26):
it's not.
It's actually far away fromthe Bible.
Because you and I, if you'veread the Bible, you and I know that
the Bible says we have to comefrom a place of rest.
And if you're going intoministry, into business, and you're
chasing every time the dooropens, you're at church serving every
time the light goes on, you'reat your business trying to do something,
trying to build something, andyou find this, this feeling creeping
(01:47):
in.
You're not in alignment.
And I'm going to tell you thatyou're not building your calling
from a place of rest.
So let's get into it today tounpack this whole concept of functional
burnout and the biblicalnature of it.
We've got to start with theculture of Christianity and hustle.
Now, many of us grew up in ahousehold that taught hustle.
(02:10):
You had a parent if you,especially if you're older, you had
a parent that really focusedon what you can do what you can produce.
And that said, if I can do andproduce this and I can keep doing
it, then I'm going to be rewarded.
And then if you didn'tproduce, produced, you were shamed,
you were guilted and all those things.
We saw that in our grades, wesaw that in our.
If you built, like, businessesas a kid, I built two or three trying
(02:33):
to, as I was growing up.
And you saw that good thingsproduced good rewards.
And if you somehow missed themark or the expectation, you were
shame and guilted.
Now, Christianity and actuallycultural entrepreneurship has not
changed that.
If you're an entrepreneur, andmaybe you're a Christian, maybe you're
not, but if you're anentrepreneur, what does it taught?
What does it teach you?
(02:53):
You're.
You gotta wake up, you gottahustle, you gotta grind.
And this is the culture welive in.
Hustle and grind, hustle andgrind until you cannot go anymore.
And then you go more, right?
Because you have to build thebusiness, you have to build the six
figures, you got to build theseven figures, you got to do the
thing.
And then we get this toxicculture out there that says, if you're
not hustling like me, thenyou're not good enough or you're
(03:14):
not going to be at a placewhere you can do the things that
you're supposed to do.
And then we get into thechurch, and this is a soapbox I have.
Because with the church thatwe say, hey, don't hustle, rest.
But yet we allow every singleperson to be in six different ministries
every time the door is open,they're there serving, they're there
(03:34):
at the service, they're therein their ministries or they're doing,
and they're pouring out andpouring out.
And because the name Christianhas been attached to it, it's somehow
different than the culture hustle.
And I'm going to tell you it's not.
Both sides of the house aregoing to burn you out.
Because it's not a place of rest.
It's not an access of your gifts.
It's you obsessively trying tochase what you believe God is calling
(03:59):
you to, whether it be thesuccessful business, the successful
ministry.
And we're chasing these thingsbecause somewhere along the line,
we shame and guilt ourselvesinto believing the more we do, the
more we'll be rewarded and thebetter we are.
And somehow, if we miss it,we're not going to be able to do
all that God's called us to.
And this is just a lie,because God even The Bible says we
(04:19):
come from a place of rest, right?
We have the sabb.
God rests on the seventh day.
And we.
What we're doing is we'reattaching the name of Jesus to overworking.
But it doesn't make it holy.
It just makes it unbiblical.
And we just feel spiritual.
And we're romanticizing grindculture with spiritual language,
which is causing more burnout.
(04:41):
And we have to step back andsee what we're really doing.
Because God doesn't want tired saints.
God is looking for a cultureto step up and step out that counterculture
that Peter talks about inorder to build the kingdom, advance
the kingdom.
And he doesn't do that withtired soldiers.
Jesus says, come all you wearyand heavy burden, I will give you
(05:03):
rest.
This is not something that stops.
We're supposed to do all thisstuff from a continual place of rest,
not fighting for rest.
And Jesus didn't call us to do more.
He called us to be led to.
To do what God's showing us.
He called us to obey.
And just because that's onearea doesn't mean we have to do everything.
(05:23):
Even in Acts, I believe it wasActs chapter 6, where the apostles
were like, we weren't calledto serve tables.
So let's find people who can.
They delegate it.
But yet we, in the culture ofChristian entrepreneurship somehow
think that we have to doeverything, every section, every
bit.
And it comes down to the factthat we're burning ourselves out.
We don't trust the process, wedon't trust God.
(05:44):
And we've grown up in aculture from our house that says,
says, if you hustle, you'll be rewarded.
If you don't, you're worthless.
And that is somehow shifted tothe church that says, if you show
up, if you pray, if you do allof these things all the time, every
day, 24 7, you're holy, you're great.
And if you don't, you're backsliding.
(06:06):
And I think the culture andChristianity share the heart of what
it is, except they change thelanguage to where when you're in
the Christian entrepreneurspace or you're in the church and
now you feel somehow likeyou're doing okay, like this is somehow
spiritual.
And that's not what it is.
That's not what Jesus wantedus to do.
And everybody hits a breaking point.
(06:26):
Like I hit a breaking point awhile ago, and I'm still recovering
from the breaking point.
Like I was.
There was a portion, like my wife.
I have chronic illness.
My wife has some mental health issues.
And when we were first gettingdiagnosed, I was planning a church.
I started a business, I wasfreelancing because we needed the
extra money.
So I was writing, I had a blogand I was coaching.
(06:48):
And then, then I also was ateacher and a fifth grade teacher
at the time.
And so I'm doing all of these things.
Then we just got our firstchild at this time.
And with all of this going on,trying to be a church planner, trying
to work at a school, blogging,coaching, parenting, brand new parent,
by the way, and then having awife have her conditions, me having
my conditions, let's just saythat I had no energy, I was completely
(07:11):
burnt out, and I was almost tothe point where I just gave up completely.
And I'm still fighting theremnants of that 15, 20 years later.
But it felt spiritual.
Why?
Because I was pastoring, I wasdoing all the things, I was taking
care of my family.
I was starting the business soI can reach more people and have
greater impact and greaterthings that I'm.
(07:31):
We're all supposed to be doing.
But I was spiritually dry andI was emotionally spent.
Every message I was doing,sure, people got saved, but I felt
empty on the inside.
Every message was never for me.
It was always for them.
Everything I was doing on myblog was more a cry for help.
The blog's name was Soul Carefor the Misfits.
(07:52):
Because I was like, man, Ineed some soul care and I'm a misfit,
so let's do this.
And.
But I was emotionallycompletely spent, like I had nothing.
So I was pouring out in abusiness, at school, at a ministry
in my family from an empty cup.
I never allowed the cup to beopen because I shrouded all of that
in spiritual terms.
And it was like I was tryingto earn grace, but it was the fast
(08:15):
track to completelyfunctionally burning out and amping
up the chronic illnesses thatI have to.
Now I have autoimmune.
And there was a moment ofhonesty where I was like, I was hustling
for God instead of walkingwith God.
And did you, have you ever hadthat experience where you're just
sitting there trying to just,you're working for God, you're hustling,
(08:38):
you're in your ministry, youthink you're calling, you're writing
the book, you're doing thepodcast, you're doing the business,
you're helping the family,you're working the job, you're at
the church every time andyou're doing all the spiritual things,
but then you're like, wait aMinute of all of this stuff, where
does God want me?
One of the hardest things forme to actually admit foot in church.
(08:58):
And that's okay because I camefrom a witchcraft and atheist background
and.
And I want to reach people whomay never darken the door of church
because I want them to have arelationship with Jesus Christ.
And it was the hardest thingfor me to realize that I was.
I was doing all the work forGod and never working with God or
never walking with God.
(09:18):
And it was very hard.
This was like 10 years ago, 13 maybe.
That revelation hit me and ittook me a number of years to even
change it, and then a numberof more years to recover from the
stuff that I did that causedme to functionally burn out.
And then we get into the scriptures.
And Luke 5:15 says, Jesusoften would withdraw to pray.
(09:40):
So he modeled intentional restand intentional relationship.
He would withdraw in order tothe solitude, the quiet places, in
order to pray.
Genesis, God had a rhythm.
He worked six days and herested on the seventh.
And maybe you heard this.
It wasn't like God needed to rest.
It was God.
But God rested to give us themodel that says we can rest knowing
(10:03):
the work of the week has beendone and the reality of the new week
will start and the work willbegin again.
But we don't need to worryabout that.
We need to take those momentsof rest, those Sabbath moments.
You don't need a whole Sabbathday, but you do need Sabbath moments
that fill you up.
Fill your cup up.
Matthew 11:28 30.
Jesus invites the weary to rest.
Come, all you heavy burden labored.
(10:25):
I will give you rest.
My yoke is easy and light.
My burden is light.
So we understand likeScripture like that says, hey, you're
being wrecked.
You're functioning burnout.
Come with me and I'll makesure that you don't experience that,
that you can work from a placeof rest while I help you carry, or
I'll actually carry the burdens.
You ever see that?
That one?
That one, what was it?
(10:45):
The poem, the footprints inthe stands where you only saw one.
One set of footprints is whereI carried you.
That's what you get from that.
Because we're called to workfrom overflow, not gas fumes.
Let me say that one more time.
We're called to work from theoverflow, not the gas fumes.
But the problem is work hasbecome our idols.
And we work work until we havenothing left to do our devotion time,
(11:09):
which is our building, ourrelationship with Jesus, worship,
prayer, journal, all that.
We have nothing left to giveor devote to that.
And we work so hard to buildthe things for God that we forget
to spend time with God.
And we're working from a placeof depletion, not a place of overflow.
And because rest was nevermeant to be a punishment.
And there's a lot of us whohave a lot of trauma that feel like
(11:31):
rest equates to shame.
If I rest, it's shameful andtherefore there's punishment.
No, rest was a gift.
It was a rhythm.
Not a sign of weakness, but asign of maturity.
And the more you're able torest, the more you're going to be
showing maturity and trust inthe Lord and what he's done and what
he's put aside.
And I'll give you three shiftsthat really change everything.
(11:53):
The way you're thinking, theway I thought.
Number one, burnout isn't a badge.
Somehow we take it as a badgeof honor.
Like, I've burnt out, I'mexhausted, I've worked for the Lord.
Exhaustion isn't proof of faithfulness.
It's not.
Jesus said we're to be knownby our love, not our output.
Just because you built a sixfigure business doesn't mean you
(12:16):
have built fruit.
The Bible says go after fruit.
Love, patience, kindness, allseven fruits are found in Galatians.
And your business is not oneof them.
Now your business is a blessing.
You should definitely work onthe blessing because you heard it
said broke people can't help people.
Sure enough, if you want togive to ministries, build.
What is it, schools,orphanages, things like that.
You need money, okay, go builda business.
(12:38):
Allow God to show you whatbusiness to build, pray and all those
things.
And then build the business.
Create the income to be thegiver that God has called you to
be.
But burnout is not a badge of honor.
And somewhere along the line,culture has snuck into the church,
has been drilled in our heads.
We have trauma from it, thatif we're burnt out, we've done our
job.
So we need to burn out more.
(12:59):
No, that's not how it works.
The second thing isproductivity without presence is
only performance.
And you've seen these people,the charismatic leaders from the
stages, the charismaticleaders on social media.
They have so much performanceabout them.
But you wonder, where aretheir relationships with God?
Just because I get a lot donedoesn't mean God's presence is on
(13:19):
it.
It just means I'm good at whatI do.
And I'm going to tell you thelie of the enemy and the lie that
you have Made have toldyourself the lie.
I told myself that if Icontinually and consistently show
up and do the thing, then it'sgoing to all work out.
That's a big lie in entrepreneurship.
Keep going, consistently showup, and that's it.
And that's not what God's saying.
(13:40):
God's saying, if you're goingto go with my presence.
You mean even Moses was like,if you're not going, God, I'm not
going.
And we need that tension tosay, God, I'm not doing this.
I'm calling to be an entrepreneur.
Guys like, this is mepersonally at Jim.
I'm called to be an entrepreneur.
But if God's not going withme, I'm not going.
I don't care if you're goingto give me a calling that I want
(14:01):
presence.
Why?
Because I don't want performance.
I want impact.
And busyness is not the sameas fruitfulness.
I heard it said, and I thinkit was even Paul Harvey one time,
if you ever want to look thisup from the 60s, he said it wrote,
if Satan was saying to the church.
And then another really goodone is screwtape, screwtape letters
from C.S.
lewis.
And one of the things that yousee, I think, is in Paul Harvey's
(14:24):
one is busyness.
The devil.
The devil is written from the devil.
It says, if I can't break themor I can't take them away, I'm going
to make them busy.
Why?
Because busyness is a distraction.
It's not a fruit.
And so we have to pull backand understand that we're not to
be distracted, we're not to be busy.
We're to be fruitful and multiply.
We're being impactful andwe're to be present and with the
(14:45):
presence.
So if God's present isn't withyou, stop what you're doing and just
say, God, where are you?
And what do I need to change?
Because true growth comes fromabiding in Christ, not constant activity.
Constant activity were the Pharisees.
They were in the streets praying.
They were doing all the things.
That's constant activity.
But the ones who were in thepresence were the disciples who walked
(15:08):
with Jesus.
They lived with all.
So I'm going to tell you,growth, true growth in whatever area,
your business, your ministry,your life, comes from abiding in
Christ, not constant activity.
And the last one is obedienceis greater than outcomes.
And I think what we've done iswe have so much tied to the results
that our identity is in the results.
So the results have become an Idol.
(15:30):
So therefore what happens iswe say, if I'm not getting the results,
then I'm not doing what God'scalled me to, then that's not the
case.
You're called to be inrelationship, you're called to be
his son or his.
His daughter.
But what you're going to do isyou're going to be obedient and let
God deal with the outcomes.
The plans of many are theProverbs says, the plans of many
(15:51):
are.
The plans of men are many, butthe outcomes belong to the Lord.
I messed up a little bit onthat, but I.
We bought it back, we're backto it.
So you.
So we follow Jesus, we pick upour cross, we don't follow trends,
we crucify ourselves.
We're not on the culturealgorithm, we're on the algorithm
of God.
And even good coaches, we haveto find the right ones who are connected
(16:13):
to the Holy Spirit andspeaking into our lives, because
we're not on the culture'salgorithms, we're on God's algorithm.
Remember that obedience isbetter than outcomes because obedience
to Jesus flows from love, right?
And from that love comessurrender and service.
So if you want to be a personwho's building a business, who isn't
desperate, who isn't fearful,who isn't anxious, we have to submit
(16:36):
to Christ and the obediencethat he asks of us so that we come
from a place of love.
And everything that we do,like Colossians, we are doing from
a place of worship, becauseour work is worship.
And so here's, as we closedown this episode, you're not lazy,
you're not weak, you're just exhausted.
I want you to understand thatyou're not lazy, you're not weak,
(16:58):
you're just exhausted becauseyou've been in a place where culture
and trauma has driven you tobe completely pouring out whatever
without ever being poured intoand feeling shame when you rest.
But we're going to change thatbecause God asks us where.
Actually, let's ask God.
God, where do you want us torest today?
(17:20):
Start the day with that.
Every day.
God, where do you want us torest now?
I will give you a warning.
Don't already think what Godis going to say.
Don't have that.
Leave it open for the HolySpirit to say whatever he may tell
you at lunch, take an extra hour.
He may tell you, cut off worka little early, matter of fact, sleep
(17:40):
in a little bit.
He may tell you today, don'tdo anything, go out fishing.
We want to be open to the HolySpirit and what he's saying.
So at the end of the day, whenGod, when we say, God, what do you
want me to do to rest?
Today we're open to say, whatis it, Lord, that you'll have me
do that will fill me up, bringme closer to you.
Because everything we do isabout being close to Christ.
(18:00):
Bring closer to you and beable to sharpen my ax for the next
day when I'm ready, or thenext hour, whenever you want me to
go back to work, the ax is nowsharp and that I can do more in shorter
amounts of time.
Because here's the deal.
Grace is greater than burnout.
And if you're in a place offunctional burnout, if you're in
place of fighting throughthese things again, you're not weak,
(18:24):
you're not lost, you're just exhausted.
You made some decisions andit's time to make the right decisions.
Now we're going to go back toa place where we repent.
Lord, I've gone in the wrong direction.
I've really focused onoutcomes and my work has become my
work or ministry family havebecome an idol.
Lord, we repent of that.
But now I'm going to do thethings you've called me to do.
So show me where that is andshow me how to find the rhythm of
(18:45):
rest inside of that.
And it's a process.
So this is not going to be aone time thing.
This is going to be prettymuch the rest of your life.
Learning how to do this,overcoming mistakes when you falter
or fail and do it again.
Because you're looking for rest.
Because.
Because the kingdom was nevermeant to be burnt out.
It was meant to be.
I think John Wesley said it.
He says, I'm going to lightmyself on fire and let the world
watch.
And you, my friend, werecalled to be lit on fire by the Holy
(19:09):
Spirit so that the world maybe impacted by what you're building
and who you are and who Christis in your life.
So with that being said,wherever you are, listening, wherever
you're watching, I would lovefor you to hit the subscribe or Follow
button, leave a review, acomment and then share this episode
with somebody you think itthat would benefit because we want
(19:29):
to build a community wherepeople are benefiting from building
the business, building theministry, building the thing God's
called you to in a healthy way.
And we want to build acommunity where we're supporting
one another.
And with that all being said,I'm so grateful you're here.
I'm so grateful you're listening.
And I will see you on the next episode.
Welcome to Online Business forChristian Creatives, the show that
helps you build a businessthat honors God, fuels your creativity
and actually pays the bills.
I'm your host, Jim Burgoon,leadership coach, Faith first entrepreneur,
and a guy who's made justabout every mistake so you don't
(00:21):
have to let's get into it.
Somewhere along the line, themodern Christian creative has equated
a exhaustion with obedience orexhaust serving.
But we're going to talk aboutthat today on the show.
Welcome to Online Christianwelcome to Online Business for Christian
Creatives.
I'm your host, Jim Ragoon.
(00:41):
And we're here to dive intosomething, honestly that has wrecked
me and is probably havewrecked you somewhere along the line.
And that's burnout.
And I'm not talking about thetype of burnout that comes after
a hard week, because after ahard week you're tired, you want
to lay down, you don't feellike you have enough energy to do
anything.
That's not what I'm talking about.
I'm talking about the type ofexhaustion that creeps in over time
(01:04):
where if you take a rest oryou try to sleep, it doesn't go away.
And it just feels like it'sgetting worse.
It feels like it's gettingdeeper, that something is off.
And I coined the term this waya long time ago.
I don't know if it wasoriginally for me, but I remember
writing a blog about this andI called it functional burnout.
And it's not a biblical concept.
And even though we've beenmade to feel like it's biblical,
(01:26):
it's not.
It's actually far away fromthe Bible.
Because you and I, if you'veread the Bible, you and I know that
the Bible says we have to comefrom a place of rest.
And if you're going intoministry, into business, and you're
chasing every time the dooropens, you're at church serving every
time the light goes on, you'reat your business trying to do something,
trying to build something, andyou find this, this feeling creeping
(01:47):
in.
You're not in alignment.
And I'm going to tell you thatyou're not building your calling
from a place of rest.
So let's get into it today tounpack this whole concept of functional
burnout and the biblicalnature of it.
We've got to start with theculture of Christianity and hustle.
Now, many of us grew up in ahousehold that taught hustle.
(02:10):
You had a parent if you,especially if you're older, you had
a parent that really focusedon what you can do what you can produce.
And that said, if I can do andproduce this and I can keep doing
it, then I'm going to be rewarded.
And then if you didn'tproduce, produced, you were shamed,
you were guilted and all those things.
We saw that in our grades, wesaw that in our.
If you built, like, businessesas a kid, I built two or three trying
(02:33):
to, as I was growing up.
And you saw that good thingsproduced good rewards.
And if you somehow missed themark or the expectation, you were
shame and guilted.
Now, Christianity and actuallycultural entrepreneurship has not
changed that.
If you're an entrepreneur, andmaybe you're a Christian, maybe you're
not, but if you're anentrepreneur, what does it taught?
What does it teach you?
(02:53):
You're.
You gotta wake up, you gottahustle, you gotta grind.
And this is the culture welive in.
Hustle and grind, hustle andgrind until you cannot go anymore.
And then you go more, right?
Because you have to build thebusiness, you have to build the six
figures, you got to build theseven figures, you got to do the
thing.
And then we get this toxicculture out there that says, if you're
not hustling like me, thenyou're not good enough or you're
(03:14):
not going to be at a placewhere you can do the things that
you're supposed to do.
And then we get into thechurch, and this is a soapbox I have.
Because with the church thatwe say, hey, don't hustle, rest.
But yet we allow every singleperson to be in six different ministries
every time the door is open,they're there serving, they're there
(03:34):
at the service, they're therein their ministries or they're doing,
and they're pouring out andpouring out.
And because the name Christianhas been attached to it, it's somehow
different than the culture hustle.
And I'm going to tell you it's not.
Both sides of the house aregoing to burn you out.
Because it's not a place of rest.
It's not an access of your gifts.
It's you obsessively trying tochase what you believe God is calling
(03:59):
you to, whether it be thesuccessful business, the successful
ministry.
And we're chasing these thingsbecause somewhere along the line,
we shame and guilt ourselvesinto believing the more we do, the
more we'll be rewarded and thebetter we are.
And somehow, if we miss it,we're not going to be able to do
all that God's called us to.
And this is just a lie,because God even The Bible says we
(04:19):
come from a place of rest, right?
We have the sabb.
God rests on the seventh day.
And we.
What we're doing is we'reattaching the name of Jesus to overworking.
But it doesn't make it holy.
It just makes it unbiblical.
And we just feel spiritual.
And we're romanticizing grindculture with spiritual language,
which is causing more burnout.
(04:41):
And we have to step back andsee what we're really doing.
Because God doesn't want tired saints.
God is looking for a cultureto step up and step out that counterculture
that Peter talks about inorder to build the kingdom, advance
the kingdom.
And he doesn't do that withtired soldiers.
Jesus says, come all you wearyand heavy burden, I will give you
(05:03):
rest.
This is not something that stops.
We're supposed to do all thisstuff from a continual place of rest,
not fighting for rest.
And Jesus didn't call us to do more.
He called us to be led to.
To do what God's showing us.
He called us to obey.
And just because that's onearea doesn't mean we have to do everything.
(05:23):
Even in Acts, I believe it wasActs chapter 6, where the apostles
were like, we weren't calledto serve tables.
So let's find people who can.
They delegate it.
But yet we, in the culture ofChristian entrepreneurship somehow
think that we have to doeverything, every section, every
bit.
And it comes down to the factthat we're burning ourselves out.
We don't trust the process, wedon't trust God.
(05:44):
And we've grown up in aculture from our house that says,
says, if you hustle, you'll be rewarded.
If you don't, you're worthless.
And that is somehow shifted tothe church that says, if you show
up, if you pray, if you do allof these things all the time, every
day, 24 7, you're holy, you're great.
And if you don't, you're backsliding.
(06:06):
And I think the culture andChristianity share the heart of what
it is, except they change thelanguage to where when you're in
the Christian entrepreneurspace or you're in the church and
now you feel somehow likeyou're doing okay, like this is somehow
spiritual.
And that's not what it is.
That's not what Jesus wantedus to do.
And everybody hits a breaking point.
(06:26):
Like I hit a breaking point awhile ago, and I'm still recovering
from the breaking point.
Like I was.
There was a portion, like my wife.
I have chronic illness.
My wife has some mental health issues.
And when we were first gettingdiagnosed, I was planning a church.
I started a business, I wasfreelancing because we needed the
extra money.
So I was writing, I had a blogand I was coaching.
(06:48):
And then, then I also was ateacher and a fifth grade teacher
at the time.
And so I'm doing all of these things.
Then we just got our firstchild at this time.
And with all of this going on,trying to be a church planner, trying
to work at a school, blogging,coaching, parenting, brand new parent,
by the way, and then having awife have her conditions, me having
my conditions, let's just saythat I had no energy, I was completely
(07:11):
burnt out, and I was almost tothe point where I just gave up completely.
And I'm still fighting theremnants of that 15, 20 years later.
But it felt spiritual.
Why?
Because I was pastoring, I wasdoing all the things, I was taking
care of my family.
I was starting the business soI can reach more people and have
greater impact and greaterthings that I'm.
(07:31):
We're all supposed to be doing.
But I was spiritually dry andI was emotionally spent.
Every message I was doing,sure, people got saved, but I felt
empty on the inside.
Every message was never for me.
It was always for them.
Everything I was doing on myblog was more a cry for help.
The blog's name was Soul Carefor the Misfits.
(07:52):
Because I was like, man, Ineed some soul care and I'm a misfit,
so let's do this.
And.
But I was emotionallycompletely spent, like I had nothing.
So I was pouring out in abusiness, at school, at a ministry
in my family from an empty cup.
I never allowed the cup to beopen because I shrouded all of that
in spiritual terms.
And it was like I was tryingto earn grace, but it was the fast
(08:15):
track to completelyfunctionally burning out and amping
up the chronic illnesses thatI have to.
Now I have autoimmune.
And there was a moment ofhonesty where I was like, I was hustling
for God instead of walkingwith God.
And did you, have you ever hadthat experience where you're just
sitting there trying to just,you're working for God, you're hustling,
(08:38):
you're in your ministry, youthink you're calling, you're writing
the book, you're doing thepodcast, you're doing the business,
you're helping the family,you're working the job, you're at
the church every time andyou're doing all the spiritual things,
but then you're like, wait aMinute of all of this stuff, where
does God want me?
One of the hardest things forme to actually admit foot in church.
(08:58):
And that's okay because I camefrom a witchcraft and atheist background
and.
And I want to reach people whomay never darken the door of church
because I want them to have arelationship with Jesus Christ.
And it was the hardest thingfor me to realize that I was.
I was doing all the work forGod and never working with God or
never walking with God.
(09:18):
And it was very hard.
This was like 10 years ago, 13 maybe.
That revelation hit me and ittook me a number of years to even
change it, and then a numberof more years to recover from the
stuff that I did that causedme to functionally burn out.
And then we get into the scriptures.
And Luke 5:15 says, Jesusoften would withdraw to pray.
(09:40):
So he modeled intentional restand intentional relationship.
He would withdraw in order tothe solitude, the quiet places, in
order to pray.
Genesis, God had a rhythm.
He worked six days and herested on the seventh.
And maybe you heard this.
It wasn't like God needed to rest.
It was God.
But God rested to give us themodel that says we can rest knowing
(10:03):
the work of the week has beendone and the reality of the new week
will start and the work willbegin again.
But we don't need to worryabout that.
We need to take those momentsof rest, those Sabbath moments.
You don't need a whole Sabbathday, but you do need Sabbath moments
that fill you up.
Fill your cup up.
Matthew 11:28 30.
Jesus invites the weary to rest.
Come, all you heavy burden labored.
(10:25):
I will give you rest.
My yoke is easy and light.
My burden is light.
So we understand likeScripture like that says, hey, you're
being wrecked.
You're functioning burnout.
Come with me and I'll makesure that you don't experience that,
that you can work from a placeof rest while I help you carry, or
I'll actually carry the burdens.
You ever see that?
That one?
That one, what was it?
(10:45):
The poem, the footprints inthe stands where you only saw one.
One set of footprints is whereI carried you.
That's what you get from that.
Because we're called to workfrom overflow, not gas fumes.
Let me say that one more time.
We're called to work from theoverflow, not the gas fumes.
But the problem is work hasbecome our idols.
And we work work until we havenothing left to do our devotion time,
(11:09):
which is our building, ourrelationship with Jesus, worship,
prayer, journal, all that.
We have nothing left to giveor devote to that.
And we work so hard to buildthe things for God that we forget
to spend time with God.
And we're working from a placeof depletion, not a place of overflow.
And because rest was nevermeant to be a punishment.
And there's a lot of us whohave a lot of trauma that feel like
(11:31):
rest equates to shame.
If I rest, it's shameful andtherefore there's punishment.
No, rest was a gift.
It was a rhythm.
Not a sign of weakness, but asign of maturity.
And the more you're able torest, the more you're going to be
showing maturity and trust inthe Lord and what he's done and what
he's put aside.
And I'll give you three shiftsthat really change everything.
(11:53):
The way you're thinking, theway I thought.
Number one, burnout isn't a badge.
Somehow we take it as a badgeof honor.
Like, I've burnt out, I'mexhausted, I've worked for the Lord.
Exhaustion isn't proof of faithfulness.
It's not.
Jesus said we're to be knownby our love, not our output.
Just because you built a sixfigure business doesn't mean you
(12:16):
have built fruit.
The Bible says go after fruit.
Love, patience, kindness, allseven fruits are found in Galatians.
And your business is not oneof them.
Now your business is a blessing.
You should definitely work onthe blessing because you heard it
said broke people can't help people.
Sure enough, if you want togive to ministries, build.
What is it, schools,orphanages, things like that.
You need money, okay, go builda business.
(12:38):
Allow God to show you whatbusiness to build, pray and all those
things.
And then build the business.
Create the income to be thegiver that God has called you to
be.
But burnout is not a badge of honor.
And somewhere along the line,culture has snuck into the church,
has been drilled in our heads.
We have trauma from it, thatif we're burnt out, we've done our
job.
So we need to burn out more.
(12:59):
No, that's not how it works.
The second thing isproductivity without presence is
only performance.
And you've seen these people,the charismatic leaders from the
stages, the charismaticleaders on social media.
They have so much performanceabout them.
But you wonder, where aretheir relationships with God?
Just because I get a lot donedoesn't mean God's presence is on
(13:19):
it.
It just means I'm good at whatI do.
And I'm going to tell you thelie of the enemy and the lie that
you have Made have toldyourself the lie.
I told myself that if Icontinually and consistently show
up and do the thing, then it'sgoing to all work out.
That's a big lie in entrepreneurship.
Keep going, consistently showup, and that's it.
And that's not what God's saying.
(13:40):
God's saying, if you're goingto go with my presence.
You mean even Moses was like,if you're not going, God, I'm not
going.
And we need that tension tosay, God, I'm not doing this.
I'm calling to be an entrepreneur.
Guys like, this is mepersonally at Jim.
I'm called to be an entrepreneur.
But if God's not going withme, I'm not going.
I don't care if you're goingto give me a calling that I want
(14:01):
presence.
Why?
Because I don't want performance.
I want impact.
And busyness is not the sameas fruitfulness.
I heard it said, and I thinkit was even Paul Harvey one time,
if you ever want to look thisup from the 60s, he said it wrote,
if Satan was saying to the church.
And then another really goodone is screwtape, screwtape letters
from C.S.
lewis.
And one of the things that yousee, I think, is in Paul Harvey's
(14:24):
one is busyness.
The devil.
The devil is written from the devil.
It says, if I can't break themor I can't take them away, I'm going
to make them busy.
Why?
Because busyness is a distraction.
It's not a fruit.
And so we have to pull backand understand that we're not to
be distracted, we're not to be busy.
We're to be fruitful and multiply.
We're being impactful andwe're to be present and with the
(14:45):
presence.
So if God's present isn't withyou, stop what you're doing and just
say, God, where are you?
And what do I need to change?
Because true growth comes fromabiding in Christ, not constant activity.
Constant activity were the Pharisees.
They were in the streets praying.
They were doing all the things.
That's constant activity.
But the ones who were in thepresence were the disciples who walked
(15:08):
with Jesus.
They lived with all.
So I'm going to tell you,growth, true growth in whatever area,
your business, your ministry,your life, comes from abiding in
Christ, not constant activity.
And the last one is obedienceis greater than outcomes.
And I think what we've done iswe have so much tied to the results
that our identity is in the results.
So the results have become an Idol.
(15:30):
So therefore what happens iswe say, if I'm not getting the results,
then I'm not doing what God'scalled me to, then that's not the
case.
You're called to be inrelationship, you're called to be
his son or his.
His daughter.
But what you're going to do isyou're going to be obedient and let
God deal with the outcomes.
The plans of many are theProverbs says, the plans of many
(15:51):
are.
The plans of men are many, butthe outcomes belong to the Lord.
I messed up a little bit onthat, but I.
We bought it back, we're backto it.
So you.
So we follow Jesus, we pick upour cross, we don't follow trends,
we crucify ourselves.
We're not on the culturealgorithm, we're on the algorithm
of God.
And even good coaches, we haveto find the right ones who are connected
(16:13):
to the Holy Spirit andspeaking into our lives, because
we're not on the culture'salgorithms, we're on God's algorithm.
Remember that obedience isbetter than outcomes because obedience
to Jesus flows from love, right?
And from that love comessurrender and service.
So if you want to be a personwho's building a business, who isn't
desperate, who isn't fearful,who isn't anxious, we have to submit
(16:36):
to Christ and the obediencethat he asks of us so that we come
from a place of love.
And everything that we do,like Colossians, we are doing from
a place of worship, becauseour work is worship.
And so here's, as we closedown this episode, you're not lazy,
you're not weak, you're just exhausted.
I want you to understand thatyou're not lazy, you're not weak,
(16:58):
you're just exhausted becauseyou've been in a place where culture
and trauma has driven you tobe completely pouring out whatever
without ever being poured intoand feeling shame when you rest.
But we're going to change thatbecause God asks us where.
Actually, let's ask God.
God, where do you want us torest today?
(17:20):
Start the day with that.
Every day.
God, where do you want us torest now?
I will give you a warning.
Don't already think what Godis going to say.
Don't have that.
Leave it open for the HolySpirit to say whatever he may tell
you at lunch, take an extra hour.
He may tell you, cut off worka little early, matter of fact, sleep
(17:40):
in a little bit.
He may tell you today, don'tdo anything, go out fishing.
We want to be open to the HolySpirit and what he's saying.
So at the end of the day, whenGod, when we say, God, what do you
want me to do to rest?
Today we're open to say, whatis it, Lord, that you'll have me
do that will fill me up, bringme closer to you.
Because everything we do isabout being close to Christ.
(18:00):
Bring closer to you and beable to sharpen my ax for the next
day when I'm ready, or thenext hour, whenever you want me to
go back to work, the ax is nowsharp and that I can do more in shorter
amounts of time.
Because here's the deal.
Grace is greater than burnout.
And if you're in a place offunctional burnout, if you're in
place of fighting throughthese things again, you're not weak,
(18:24):
you're not lost, you're just exhausted.
You made some decisions andit's time to make the right decisions.
Now we're going to go back toa place where we repent.
Lord, I've gone in the wrong direction.
I've really focused onoutcomes and my work has become my
work or ministry family havebecome an idol.
Lord, we repent of that.
But now I'm going to do thethings you've called me to do.
So show me where that is andshow me how to find the rhythm of
(18:45):
rest inside of that.
And it's a process.
So this is not going to be aone time thing.
This is going to be prettymuch the rest of your life.
Learning how to do this,overcoming mistakes when you falter
or fail and do it again.
Because you're looking for rest.
Because.
Because the kingdom was nevermeant to be burnt out.
It was meant to be.
I think John Wesley said it.
He says, I'm going to lightmyself on fire and let the world
watch.
And you, my friend, werecalled to be lit on fire by the Holy
(19:09):
Spirit so that the world maybe impacted by what you're building
and who you are and who Christis in your life.
So with that being said,wherever you are, listening, wherever
you're watching, I would lovefor you to hit the subscribe or Follow
button, leave a review, acomment and then share this episode
with somebody you think itthat would benefit because we want
(19:29):
to build a community wherepeople are benefiting from building
the business, building theministry, building the thing God's
called you to in a healthy way.
And we want to build acommunity where we're supporting
one another.
And with that all being said,I'm so grateful you're here.
I'm so grateful you're listening.
And I will see you on the next episode.
Host
Jim Burgoon
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