Share. The Newsletter

About Share. The Newsletter

Testimonies of Faith and the beautiful truth of being Trusted, Accepted and Known! wehavetoshare.substack.com (https://wehavetoshare.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast)

Publisher

Joel Barnes SHAREing

Category

health & fitness · religion & spirituality

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

7 Nov 2021

Latest episode

14 Oct 2026

Latest episodes

78 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   14 Oct 2026

   Allow Me to Reintroduce Myself...

   Allow me to reintroduce myself…. My name is Joel. Joel David Barnes, first of his name. I want to reintroduce myself because it’s time. It’s time for me to explain what the future of my life will be. My mission in life. My purpose in life. I’m a pastor. And I wasn’t made a pastor in the traditional way. I didn’t go to school. I didn’t get chosen by anybody. Well, not anybody human, at least. In 2018, at the end of a long mission trip, we sat underneath a gondola in El Salvador and reflected on our trip. And in that moment, God called me a pastor for the first time. Everybody was brought to tears. The moment was marked. I came back, and someone I didn’t even know came up behind me and said, “Make sure you mark that moment that happened in El Salvador.” He had no idea who I was. I had no idea who he was. Still don’t, to this day. He told me to frame my journal entry from that day, and then he gave me $100. So I framed it. That journal entry recorded what I was taking back to the United States with me. I was a pastor. I’ve never seen that man again. But I remember exactly what that moment looked like. It took me a little while to believe it, if I’m being honest. I went back and forth with it. Eventually, I would quit the nightclub I was running. Actually, it was kind of done for me, in only-God fashion. The venue was sold right out from underneath us, and in one swoop, I was done with my nightclub general manager days. I was still able to make money in the service industry. I was getting plenty of offers to do other things. But I decided, you know what? I’m kind of tired of running from this calling thing. I knew God had called me a pastor. I didn’t know exactly what that meant, but I figured I’d go to the place where I could begin to figure it out. My local church. I’d been attending Soul City for years. By 2019, it had been about eight years. So I started working at my church. And guess what, guys? There’s no lateral move from nightclub GM to ministry. There wasn’t a comparable-paying job waiting for me after spending the better part of 15 to 20 years in Chicago’s service industry, working my way to the top. I didn’t know exactly what I was supposed to do. But I knew where I could start figuring it out. And I knew what I wasn’t supposed to do anymore. Run nightclubs. So I started stacking chairs at my local church. Setting up rooms. Tearing down rooms. And I was happy to do it. At first, I was part-time. Then summer rolled around, summer camp started, and I became full-time. That’s when I got the opportunity to teach some of the kids. My first ministry job was dressing up like a fake superhero, wearing a cape and a mask, pretending my name was Captain AwesomeR, rolling around on a scooter, and teaching children about Jesus. One of my favorite lessons was getting to teach kindergarteners about how Jesus’s yoke is easy and His burden is light. Now, try explaining what a yoke is to a room full of five-year-olds. But somehow, in that moment, God gave me this visual. I was sitting on the edge of the stage, and I asked one of the little girls to come up. I said, “You guys want to see what it’s like to walk with Jesus? You want to see how easy it is to walk with Jesus?” I told her to put her little arm around my neck. I put my arm around hers. And I said, “You want to see what it means when Jesus says His yoke is easy and His burden is light?” Then I stood up. Her little feet were dangling. She was busting out laughing. All the kids were laughing. But God had given me a visual for how light partnering with Jesus can be, and how much of the burden He would carry for us. I knew I was in the right place. Even if that meant getting there at eight in the morning, working summer camp until five, going home to shower, coming back at six to close the building, and leaving at eleven. Two part-time jobs, basically back-to-back, all summer long. I didn’t realize that during that time, I was injuring myself. I was lifting too much. I was going too hard. We were short-staffed sometimes, and we had to pick up the pace. So we did. I ended up hurting myself in a couple of different places. Three slipped discs in my back. A torn meniscus in my knee. But man, I knew I was in the right place. And at the time, working through the pain seemed okay because I believed I was doing what I was supposed to be doing. I didn’t know how I was going to sort out this calling on my life. But I knew I was in the right place. By the end of the year, the pain had gotten pretty bad. Once we got through Thanksgiving and Christmas, things slowed down. We had a couple of weeks off around New Year’s. But when I came back, I was too banged up. I started seeing doctors and trying to figure out what was going on. They found the three slipped discs and the torn meniscus, injuries that had developed through repetitive motion, lifting heavy things, and running around that building all day. The plan was to treat my back, potentially with surgery. But first, they wanted to fix my knee. Just a quick scope. Something simple. The idea was to get my knee fixed so I wouldn’t have to be on crutches while we worked on my back. Then COVID hit. March 2020. About a week or two before I was scheduled for surgery, everything got canceled. Elective procedures were being postponed, and a knee scope wasn’t exactly high on the priority list. I understood. But it would take about nine more months before I could finally have that surgery. On November 3, 2020, I had my first knee surgery. By that point, I’d been injured for roughly a year and a half. It was long overdue, to say the least. But I didn’t come out of surgery the way I was supposed to. Actually, let me back up. In October of 2020, I knew it was time to start my ministry. Share. I had pitched a few ideas to people, but nothing seemed to be working out. I didn’t know what it was supposed to look like or how to move forward. I just knew it was time. And I knew I wanted to create community for people. I wanted to start on a one-on-one level. I wanted to take this wide net that ministry and church sometimes cast and bring it all the way down to one person sitting across from another person. Walking with them through life. I didn’t know the strategy. I didn’t know the plan. But I knew that facilitating intentional, one-on-one connection was the first way God was teaching me to help people share. I told my manager that. And the same day, I got approved for surgery. Eight days later, I was on the operating table. My plan was simple. I was going to get healthy. Get my knee fixed. Get my back fixed. And then I was going to start my ministry. Well… It’s been nearly six years since that surgery. And I have suffered more than I could ever have imagined a human being could suffer. That first surgery quickly became three surgeries before the end of the year, trying to figure out what had gone wrong. We couldn’t figure it out. I was riddled with pain. I couldn’t walk. I could barely get out of bed for much of that first year, year and a half. I was confused. I was depressed. Eventually, I was diagnosed with CRPS, Complex Regional Pain Syndrome. Essentially, it’s a condition where your nervous system is producing extraordinary pain that isn’t proportional to a typical injury or stimulus. The pain is real. And it can be absolutely debilitating. I’ve had more surgeries. I’ve had nerves cut out of my leg in an attempt to stop the pain. It didn’t work. I’ve had half of my knee replaced. Things got worse. And now, nearly six years later, I can look back and begin to see what God was doing during that time. He was developing my ministry. He was teaching me how to share the bad parts. He was teaching me what suffering looked like. He was showing me what His kids deal with every single day. Mentally. Physically. Financially. Emotionally. He was helping me understand this pandemic of isolation and loneliness that is upon us. And I understand it now. I thought I was equipped before all of this. I thought the story of my life up to that point had given me enough experience to really empathize with people. And I think it had, to a certain degree. But there’s only so much you can understand if you haven’t suffered. There’s only so deeply your heart can grieve with someone if you haven’t grieved yourself. There’s only so far your compassion can go if you’ve never needed that same compassion and empathy. And in the middle of this valley season, something emerged. A friendship. A friendship that had actually begun before the valley. We had already established intentionality in our relationship before all hell broke loose in both of our lives. My suffering season began. And eventually, her husband of 54 years would pass away. There were weeks when she was the only person I talked to. There were weeks when she was the only person, aside from my mom, who I knew cared that I even existed. And like clockwork, if I was a mess, she would somehow show up with just enough strength. We’d spend hours on the phone and get off the phone better. And if she didn’t have it in her that day, I would somehow show up with just enough strength for her. In over seven years of that relationship, I can count on less than one hand how many times we got on the phone and both of us were a complete mess. But that happened, too. And nobody had to solve anything. We started establishing rules for this friendship. You just have to come as you are. You don’t have to put on a mask. You don’t have to pretend. We have to be committed to each other. Committed to the intentionality of the relationship. If we need to reschedule, then rescheduling needs to matter. We have to treat this friendship like something important. Something sacred. We developed little songs for when we were in a funk, things that would help us get out of it. We shared our days. Our weeks. Our blessings. Our bruises. And we developed this relationship that I started calling SHAREapy. Something we both benefited from. We both walked away better. We both revealed parts of ourselves in this safe, intentional, faith-based friendship. And I learned something about myself that I didn’t even realize I needed to learn. I was in a deep deficit of mercy and grace for myself. I was so hard on myself. My life had fallen apart, and I was blaming myself for things that weren’t even my fault. And my friend reminded me of that. However many times it took for it to finally stick. I walked away from that friendship with mercy having been imparted into my soul. I’m the annoying friend now who won’t let other people talk badly about themselves. I’m that friend. And when I catch myself doing it, when I start self-deprecating, I try to stop it. I don’t align with that anymore. Because the world is already kicking my ass. I don’t need to do it to myself, too. But I was able to receive this gift of mercy for myself through that friendship. And I believe she would testify that she received gifts in return. There were things in her prayer life that she told me had grown and improved. And I was just so blessed to be part of that relationship in the first place. The more I experienced it, the more I knew… This is what I want to teach people. If I can take people through the process of learning to love themselves the way God loves them… If I can help them discover the gifts God has entrusted to them… And then teach them how to use those gifts to bless one another through intentional, faith-based friendship… And then help them find a like-minded community where those gifts can be brought into the Kingdom… That’s it. That’s the model of my ministry. From self and identity, to intentional one-on-one friendship, to community. Helping people find the resources they need to find their way back to each other. To become important to each other again. To realize how important God thinks they are. How vital they are to creation. To the world around them. To the people God has placed in proximity to them. That’s who I am. My name is Joel Barnes. And my deepest desire is to teach people to share their blessings and bruises, to connect with love and empathy. I do that at the intersection of faith and science. I believe in therapy. I’ve partnered with a licensed therapist to help develop some of my resources, because I believe in doing things the right way. I believe God has given us these tools to use. SHAREapy is not a replacement for therapy. It’s something we can all practice together. Just like Scripture talks about. Being each other’s keeper. Iron sharpening iron. Lifting one another up. Two being better than one. A cord of three strands not being easily broken. These are biblical concepts. I didn’t create any of this. I’m just incredibly passionate about it because it saved my life. It gave me hope. It pulled me out of isolation. It shone light in the darkness. And now I know this is what I’m going to do for the rest of my life. I know it. I can feel it in my bones. “We have to share” isn’t just a mantra. It’s vital. We have to share. We have to share. We have to share our blessings and our bruises. We’re so good at sharing the good stuff. But we have to get better at sharing the rough stuff, too. Because that’s where connection is formed. That’s where people heal. That’s where people feel seen. That’s where authenticity and genuine human connection can happen. Studies are showing it. And I believe the Bible has been showing us the way all along. All I want to do is take what I’ve been learning in Scripture, and what I will continue learning in Scripture, and put it in the path of people who are lonely and isolated. People who need to find their way back to themselves. Back to their relationship with Jesus. Back to connection. Back to one person at a time. And then back into community. That’s what I’ll do for the rest of my life. Everything I do, as sporadic as it may seem… This idea. That idea. This project. That project. All of it answers the same calling. All of it is a response to the same purpose on my life. To teach people to share their blessings and bruises, to connect with love and empathy. I had no idea we were about to do all of this. I’ve just been walking around my apartment for the last hour, talking out loud, and all these things have been coming out of me. And eventually I thought, “Why aren’t I recording any of this?” Reintroduce yourself to the world. Because even though you’re not out of suffering right now, you will be soon, in the name of Jesus. I still have another surgery to go. I’m in pain right now. I’m at an eight out of ten right now. But over the years, God has slowly and surely developed this capacity in me to somehow still think, even within my limitations. I used to not be able to think at all when I was in this much pain. Now, somehow, I can create. I can write. I can pray. I am powerful now. Because where I’m weak, He’s strong. And I never understood that Scripture before. I thought it was stupid. It didn’t make sense to me. But I understand it now. I understand it now. It took me years in this valley to understand that just because I’m physically limited doesn’t mean He’s done with me. It doesn’t mean He can’t use me in exactly that moment. Now my question is simply… God, do You want to use me, or do You want me to rest? Which is it? Because I’ll do whatever You tell me to do. If this isn’t the time for me to work, if I’m supposed to rest, then tell me. And I’ll rest. Because I trust You. I don’t know how the bills are getting paid. I don’t know how all of this is going to work. But I haven’t known for years. And somehow, it keeps happening. And I’m getting closer. I can feel it. I’m as close as I’ve ever been. Even though I have to have a full knee replacement on November 2. I’m as close as I’ve ever been. I’ve never been more sure that I’m doing what He wants me to do. I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life. I’ve never been more sure that exploring your spiritual gifts can bring so much purpose into your life. Because it’s not a personality test. This is about what God has entrusted to you. What He’s placed inside you. It’s a gift He’s given you. Not me. Not my assessment. God. And He’s placed something inside you that is so important, so unique, that no one else in the world has it quite the way you do. No one else has it the way you have it. At the time you have it. With the people around you. That’s for you. So yeah, I’m passionate about spiritual gifts. Because it’s one of the most important purpose-finding tools I’ve ever encountered in my life. And I don’t understand why more people aren’t talking about it. I honestly don’t. Maybe God was just letting me discover it and be changed by it first. Because now I can’t wait to keep writing about it. To finish the book. To teach about it. To encourage people to get into Scripture. I’ve created a tool that I genuinely believe is one of the best things He’s ever allowed me to co-write or co-produce with Him. It’s full of page after page of scripturally grounded material about each spiritual gift. What it looks like. How others might recognize it in you. What someone might have said about you over the years that could point toward a gift. What the weight of that gift looks like. Where you can see it in Scripture. Examples of people in Scripture who demonstrated those gifts. All these different tools to help someone say… “Huh. Maybe there’s something here.” And maybe there isn’t. Or maybe there is. That’s between you and God. One of the things I love about the assessment is that it isn’t designed to limit you. I’m not going to hand you your top three gifts and say, “Okay, that’s it. God only gave you three.” I think God can give you as many gifts as He wants. So I built the assessment to leave room for that. Your top three gifts will be highlighted. But if there are other gifts showing up in your responses, I don’t want you to miss those. Maybe your fifth gift is the one you actually feel God developing in you right now. Maybe there’s a gift further down the list that He’s preparing you to use for such a time as this. I don’t know. That’s between you and God. That’s the beauty of co-writing with God. I get to do what I do. I get to try to make it technically sound. I get to consult with a professional therapist to help develop the questionnaire, build the scoring logic, and create the systems that run it. And God gets to do what only God can do. He gets to speak to the person taking it. So far, every person who’s taken the assessment has found something that stirred curiosity. Something they could take back to God and explore. And I love that. I can’t wait to keep developing SHAREapy. I can’t wait to develop faith coaching. I can’t wait to develop executive faith coaching, which I can’t believe I’m already beginning to do. Getting to come alongside executives who are wrestling with their faith. People who seem to have everything on paper but still have questions. People who want someone they can talk to personally. Someone to bounce things off of. Someone to ask for prayer before a difficult meeting or an important decision. I can’t believe I get to do this for the rest of my life. I can’t believe I get to write all the things God is giving me to write. I can’t believe He made me a writer. Who knew that? I’ve been writing for years, but it took me so long to realize that I was creative. That I was a writer. That all these different things I’ve spent my life learning were actually coming together. I’ve been creative-directing my whole life. I’ve been directing videos my whole life. I’ve been creating content since content started. I love it. I’ve kept my finger on the pulse of social media all these years. And now all of those skills get to become tools in my tool belt for teaching people how to share their blessings and bruises, to connect with love and empathy. Man. You know what? I’m about to upload this, and someone’s going to listen. And a lot of people aren’t going to listen yet. But I cannot wait. I cannot wait for the things I’m saying to change the world. To save lives. To help keep people from the edge. To help people step into their callings and feel empowered to do so. To help people find their purpose. Find their connections. Find their people. Find their communities. And learn how to form communities of their own. It’s going to change the world. Watch. Watch. Watch. This may not have a whole lot of listeners right now. But hey, if you’re here, type “I was there” in the chat. Because one day, this is going to be another holy “I told you so.” He’s given me those moments over the years. Those holy moments with Him that I get to capture and put into a time capsule. For when God starts doing the things He told me He was going to do. And all I’ve got to do now is get my knee replaced, recover, and get cleared to work. You know, a couple little things. But then it’s on. Actually, it’s already on. That’s the beauty of it. It’s already on. It’s already been on. The moment I realized I had to stop waiting to be healed and allow God to use me while I was still broken… Oh man. That changed everything. For years, I kept waiting. I’d have another surgery on the horizon. And I’d think, “Okay, I’ll have the surgery, I’ll get healed, and then I’ll get back to it.” Then another surgery. And another delay. And another setback. And it just kept not happening. But about two years ago, something started to click. Before my partial knee replacement. Before the bone marrow edema. Before all this other craziness. It was like God was saying… “I’m ready to use you now.” September 8, 2024. I know that date. I actually have the Uber receipt from my ride home. That morning, I woke up planning to watch Soul City online, just like I’d been doing. But I felt God telling me to walk to church. And if you know me, walking hasn’t exactly been my forte for the last six years. So that meant I was going to have to waddle my way to church on a crutch, with my bad left leg. And I did. I thought it would take about 25 minutes. It took 33. I walked in with so much anxiety. It had been a long time since I’d gone back on my own. I’d visited with a friend a couple of times, but walking into that building by myself was different. I had all this anxiety about people seeing me. People saying, “Oh, I missed you.” And me not knowing how to receive it, or whether it would feel genuine. I just didn’t want to deal with all of that. But because I was late, I didn’t really see anybody. It was beautiful. I walked into what was one of the only full worship services I’d ever experienced there without any preaching whatsoever. Just worship. And I poured my heart out. When it ended, I wanted to get out of there before I saw anybody. So I left. I crossed over toward Adams Street, and on the Soul City side there’s this double curb. As I stepped off it, with my cane and my bad left leg, I almost fell. And I heard the Holy Spirit say… “In order for them to see Me heal you, they need to see you.” And I was like… “That’s b******t.” I don’t want that, God. I don’t want to be made an example of. I don’t want to be a cripple. I don’t want to be on a cane. I don’t want to be here. I don’t want any of this. I just want to be okay. I want to be normal. And He said it again. I sobbed a little. Pouted. And then He said it again. Three times. “In order for them to see Me heal you, they need to see you.” By the time I made it across the street and stepped up onto the next sidewalk, I said… “Okay.” I pouted for a little bit longer. But I said okay. Okay, God. I’ll start coming back. And I’ve been the guy with a cane at Soul City for the last two years. I’ve been the guy who deals with pain. The guy who’s waiting on surgery. The guy who doesn’t have enough money to support himself. The guy people gather around and pray for. I’ve been the guy believing God for healing. And I believe that healing is upon us. I believe this surgery is going to be part of that. I will recover, and I will march onward. And no matter what, I’m never going to let my circumstances stop me from being used by God again. I’m never going to let my circumstances curb… Pardon the pun… My willingness to be used by God. I’m going to show up broken. Honest. Sharing my blessings and my bruises. Connecting with love and empathy. That’s what I get to do. And I believe God was saying… “You’ve got to go first.” If you’re going to teach anybody to do this, guess what? You’ve got to go first. You’ve got to share your blessings. Your burdens. Your bruises. You have to tell people you’re suffering. Gosh. What a terrible training program. And it’s also brilliant. It’s brilliant, God. Look, I’m not saying I need it to last much longer. But it is brilliant. It is only God that I’m sitting here calling it a blessing to have suffered. Calling it a blessing while I’m sitting here in eight-out-of-ten pain. I’ve got to be crazy. I’ve got to be one of those crazy Christians. But yeah. I guess I am. I’ve always kind of seen myself like a personal trainer. You know what I’m saying? If you’ve ever been to physical therapy or worked with a personal trainer, those people have to be a little bit nuts. They’ve got to be a little over the top. They’ve got to really believe in what they’re talking about. Otherwise, why would anybody ever do leg day? You know what I’m saying? Well, I believe in this. I’ve been trained in the valley. And I’m still in the valley. Isn’t that crazy? I’m still in the valley. I still have this momentous thing ahead of me with my knee surgery. So pray for your boy. Pray for provision. Pray against the pain. Pray for recovery. Pray for the mission of this ministry. I have so many ideas. And they’re all happening. Period. Because every single one of them serves the same God. They all point in the same direction. They all contribute to eradicating isolation. This whole ecosystem of Share. that God has given me… It’s wild. And I can’t wait. But that’s the end of my babbling. I apologize. Actually, I’m not sorry at all. If you made it this far, man, you’re a real one. Love you. Peace. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit wehavetoshare.substack.com/subscribe (https://wehavetoshare.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2)

2. 

   23 Sept 2026

   What If Your Purpose Is Already Inside of You?

   It’s almost one o’clock in the morning, and I’m sitting here simply in awe of what we get to bring into the world. If you listened to my last brain dump... testimony... whatever we’re calling these things... you heard a little bit of the origin story behind why spiritual gifts matter so much to me. Why being clear about your spiritual gifts... or at the very least becoming more informed about the possibility of what God may have placed inside of you... matters. Because honestly, even if this whole thing does nothing more than spark curiosity... It’s worth it. Every sleepless night. Every moment working through pain and exhaustion. Every time I stressed over whether I calculated something correctly, whether I represented a gift well enough, whether there were enough questions, enough options, enough Scripture, enough nuance. If one person walks away with a little more understanding of why God put them here with the rest of us in this crazy thing called life... It was worth it. Because everybody is searching for purpose. Maybe not everybody uses that language, but underneath so many of our questions is some version of: Why am I here? What am I supposed to contribute? What am I uniquely equipped to do? God... what do You want to do with me while I’m here? Purpose can become an almost insatiable question until we begin to find it. And I wonder if sometimes we start looking in the wrong direction. We look at jobs. Titles. Platforms. Careers. Opportunities. Success. Influence. And maybe one of the places we should start is much closer. Maybe we should start by asking: God... what have You already put inside of me? Not because discovering your spiritual gifts suddenly gives you a five-step map for the rest of your life. It doesn’t. An assessment cannot tell you your calling. A score cannot tell you exactly what God wants to do with your life. But it might give you clues. It might give you language. It might help you notice something that has been there for years. And sometimes a little direction is enough to stop a tailspin. I know that because it happened to me. For a long time, I was confused about spiritual gifting because my clearest model of someone who was spiritually gifted was also someone I watched use those gifts to serve himself. And I watched that destroy things around him. So for years I was trying to untangle it. What is the gift? What is the person? What does it look like when someone uses something God gave them for themselves instead of for others? And honestly... I ran from ministry because of it. But eventually I started asking God different questions. What did You put in me? How do You want to use it? Who is it for? And that changed everything. I began to understand that, by His grace, God had put gifts inside of me. Not trophies. Not proof that I was important. Gifts. Things meant to be used in the Kingdom. Things meant to be used in other people’s lives. Of course those gifts bless me too. There is joy in using something God has given you. There is fulfillment in realizing, Oh... I was made for this. But the gift was never supposed to terminate with me. It was meant to become fruit somebody else could eat. And once I began realizing that I was made a certain way... with a certain combination of gifting, experiences, wounds, relationships, personality, opportunities and history that nobody else possesses in exactly the same configuration... something changed. I began to understand that I belonged. I still don’t always know where I belong in a room. I’m still learning belonging in relationships. But I know that I belong to God. And I know that when God looks at me, He does not see an unnecessary part. He sees something He intentionally made. A little of this. A little of that. A little of something else. And somehow all of it becomes Joel. That understanding started bringing my purpose into focus. Not perfect focus. Soft focus. But sometimes soft focus is enough to know which direction to walk. I began noticing the things that made my spirit come alive. I started listening differently when people pointed something out in me. Somebody once told me I had the gift of faith. And I remember thinking... Really? Because I never thought about it as a gift. I just thought I had a lot of faith. I thought I was good at faith. But looking back over the last six years of my life... the pain, the losses, the uncertainty, the valleys... there has been a level of faith carrying me that I know I did not manufacture. Maybe I have that gift forever. God, I hope so. Maybe there are seasons when God gives us an extraordinary measure of something we desperately need. I don’t know. But I know this: That faith has saved my life. And then something else happened. In one of the hardest seasons of my life, God gave me an intentional, safe, faith-based friendship with my friend Diana. She was going through her own storm. I was going through mine. And somehow we kept showing up. We brought whatever we had into the room. Even when we didn’t feel like our gifts were working. Even when we didn’t feel strong enough to help ourselves. We brought them anyway. And looking back now, I can so clearly see mercy in her. I had become unbelievably hard on myself. My life had fallen apart. I was living in pain. I couldn’t right the ship. And week after week, mercy met me through another person. Maybe some of my faith rubbed off on her too. I hope it did. But what I know is that somehow, week after week, we left those conversations a little better. Not because we were brilliant. Not because we had all the answers. But because God had placed things inside each of us that the other person needed. And that is what I cannot stop thinking about. What if your gift is connected to somebody else’s survival? What if something God placed in you becomes encouragement for somebody who is ready to quit? What if your mercy makes somebody feel human again? What if your teaching helps somebody finally understand something that has confused them for years? What if your generosity changes the trajectory of a family? What if your hospitality gives somebody somewhere to belong? What if your faith helps somebody borrow hope until they can believe again? What if the thing that feels ordinary to you is extraordinary to the person who needs it? That is why we built this. Today, I’m releasing the Share. Your Spiritual Gifts Assessment. And I need you to understand what I believe this thing is... and what I absolutely do not believe it is. It is not a Christian personality test. It is not a prophecy machine. It is not a mathematical formula for your calling. It cannot tell you with absolute certainty what God has placed inside of you. Only God gets to be God. This is a tool. A starting point. A conversation starter. A curiosity generator. Maybe you take it and get your results and simply think: Huh. Interesting. Seed planted. Maybe you read the deeper descriptions in your results email and notice a gift you had never considered. Another seed. Maybe you see one of the additional strong signals and start watching for it in your life. Seed. Maybe you open one of the Scripture stories connected to a gift and suddenly see yourself in somebody’s story in a way you never have before. Seed. Maybe you completely disagree with something the assessment gives you. Good. Ask God about it. Ask people who know you. Pay attention. Maybe that result isn’t telling you something about yourself at all. Maybe it causes you to recognize a gift in your spouse. Your friend. Your child. Your pastor. Your coworker. I don’t know what God is going to do with it. And that might be my favorite part. Because right now, this whole thing feels like freshly tilled soil. You know that smell? Dark soil turned over. Moist. Aerated. Ready. All it needs is seed. And every person who takes this assessment becomes another opportunity for something to be planted. Maybe you discover something about yourself. Maybe you remember something someone told you years ago. Maybe you realize the thing you’ve always loved doing actually has Kingdom significance. Maybe you become a little more willing to bring it into your church. Your family. Your friendships. Your neighborhood. Your work. Maybe somebody who loves teaching realizes they could help people in their church understand finances. Maybe somebody gifted in hospitality realizes that opening their table could become ministry. Maybe somebody with mercy realizes that the person everybody else is frustrated with is exactly the person they were equipped to sit beside. Maybe somebody finally realizes: I have something to contribute. And I think that matters more than we understand. Because there is not a single person who will take this assessment that the world does not need. Not one. There is nobody God accidentally included in the Body of Christ. Nobody sitting on the bench because He ran out of positions. Nobody whose presence is irrelevant. Paul’s picture of the Church as a body means exactly what it sounds like: Different parts. Different functions. Different gifts. One body. We need each other. And I wonder what could happen if more people actually believed that. Not became arrogant. Not became obsessed with their gifting. Not walked around announcing their spiritual-gift résumé. Just became comfortable in the skin God gave them. Because I don’t think confidence is exactly what the world is missing. Confidence can be performed. I’ve known plenty of people who looked incredibly confident and were deeply uncomfortable with themselves. What I pray for is something deeper. Comfort in your God-given skin. Confidence from the inside out. Confidence that God loves you. Confidence that you belong. Confidence that He made you intentionally. Confidence that there is something inside of you worth giving away. Confidence that your presence matters. Confidence that the world... your community... your family... the Body... is better when you faithfully bring what God entrusted to you. And maybe that is where purpose starts. Maybe discovering your purpose doesn’t begin with asking: What am I supposed to do? Maybe it begins with asking: God... what have You entrusted to me? And then: Who needs me to use it? That question could change a life. I believe it could change a community. I believe enough people asking that question and actually living the answer could change the world. So as I sit here tonight getting ready to release this thing, my prayer is incredibly simple. God... Use it. Take the pressure off people to get it exactly right. Take the pressure off me to have gotten it exactly right. Let this become a journey of curiosity. Let somebody see themselves a little more like You see them. Let someone realize they belong. Let someone realize they matter. Let someone recognize something You put inside of them. And then let them give it away. I’ve spent somewhere around 175 to 200 hours holding onto this thing while it became what it is. Idea. Question. Answer. Revision. Scripture. Another idea. Another revision. Another question. Another answer. Again and again. For months. Really, in some ways, for years. And I can genuinely say it is one of the most meaningful things I have ever had the opportunity to co-create with God. I have no idea what happens next. Maybe twenty people eventually have their lives changed because they understand a little more clearly what God placed inside of them. And maybe those twenty people change entire communities. Maybe I never know. That’s okay. Maybe one day in Heaven God says: Remember that spiritual gifts thing we worked on? Let me show you what I did with those seeds. That would be enough for me. More than enough. For now... The field is ready. The seeds are ready. And I cannot wait to see what God grows. If you are here for this moment, I want you to have this Spiritual Gifts Assessment for FREE!! If you are listening to this, you can go to wehavetoshare.com/spiritualgifts to take the assessment. Make sure that when you are done with the assessment, you spend some time exploring some of the resources that we’ve developed for you. The email will have a lot of feedback, and there will be live links to a dedicated gifts page on the website for EACH spiritual gift. You’ll be able to learn more about what he gift is, what others may have observed in you and even read scripture about the gift, including a section that includes a story of someone in the Bible that displays that gift. Take your time, come back, ask questions... I know He’s listening and I know He’ll answer! God Bless!! Click HERE for your free “Share. Your Spiritual Gifts Assessment” (http://wehavetoshare.com/spiritualgifts) Thank you for Liking, SHAREing and Supporting (http://buymeacoffee.com/joeldavidbarnes)! 🫶🏽 buymeacoffee.com/joeldavidbarnes (http://buymeacoffee.com/joeldavidbarnes) Joel’s GoFundMe Page → https://gofund.me/58b8a14d1 (https://gofund.me/58b8a14d1) This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit wehavetoshare.substack.com/subscribe (https://wehavetoshare.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2)

3. 

   19 Sept 2026

   How I Heard HIM this week…

   This is what it looks like to be physically on E while spiritually bursting at the seams. It’s not a flattering video, but it is an honest capture of an important moment in my ministry life. As much as I enjoy polishing a well-crafted written piece, I believe there is tremendous power in the raw, unfiltered testimony of someone simply in awe of what God is doing. That’s what this audio and video capture. I lightly edited the transcript for a cleaner reading experience, but I wanted to preserve the raw moment I recorded shortly after arriving home from an only-God kind of day. The edited transcript is below… with the audio and video also available. You know, I imagine that, for some people, it has to be kind of weird to hear me say, “God told me,” or “God showed me this,” or “I feel like God was saying…” And I imagine that, for others, it is probably annoying. Maybe that is because hearing from God is something you are craving… something you deeply desire to be able to say about your own communication with Him. Or maybe it is not that easy for you to hear from God, and that is frustrating. So, when you hear someone else say it, you think, Man… I want that. Honestly, I cannot blame you for that. I think the desire to hear from God… and to know that you are hearing from God… is one of the worthiest desires a person can have. I cannot tell you that I hear from God all the time. Even though it may sound that way to some people who know me or spend time around me, I don’t. And as sorry as I am if hearing me talk this way is frustrating or even discouraging, I cannot apologize for the relationship itself. This relationship is holy, and it is only because of God that I get to have it the way I do now. But I cannot tell you that it came easily. I cannot give you four steps to hearing God’s voice. What I can tell you is how it has happened for me. It required coming to the complete end of myself. It required being humiliated and humbled beyond belief. It required submitting myself to God more every day. And when I thought I had finally reached the end of myself… the end of my ego and the end of my pride… I had to reach the end of myself again. When I thought I had become fully submitted to God and His will, I had to become more submitted still. And I had to struggle deeply. I think I have a window into communicating with God because I have suffered a lot. I do not know that this is how everyone’s relationship with Him is cultivated, but it is how mine has been cultivated. Because I have completely lost myself, I get to be more with Him. Sometimes hearing God looks like a nudge. Sometimes it feels like a hunch. Sometimes it feels as though the text glows. Sometimes a word someone says jumps out at me, and I hear it almost louder than everything else. Sometimes it is simply seeing an email I had no reason to see. That happened with an invitation to a retreat today. I had forgotten the retreat was even happening. But when I stumbled across the email, something made me pause. I thought, I don’t know why I came across this today, but I feel like I need to at least pray about going. So I did. I cannot tell you that I heard God overwhelmingly say, “Go.” Sometimes, though, hearing God means there is no answer in the opposite direction. Maybe you do not hear, “Don’t go.” I cannot explain it exactly. I only knew that the email made me pause and that I wanted to pray about it. When I prayed, I did not hear an explicit answer. I heard plenty of worldly reasons not to go. Pain was an issue, and I did not know whether I could mitigate it. Finances were an issue, and I did not know whether I could mitigate that either. But both of those things are submitted to my God. I had not heard my God say no. Pushing Away From the Desk I want to encourage you… I do not think everyone has to lock in with God the same way. I do not think you have to suffer greatly or deeply to hear from God or to observe what He is doing. Sometimes you just have to pause. You have to do what I keep calling “pushing away from the desk.” Picture yourself sitting at a desk, working. You physically push the chair back and step away from whatever has occupied you. Whether I am writing, working on a project, or building this Spiritual Gifts Assessment… the more I push back and create space, the more space He has to work with. Yesterday, I decided to take a day off. I am unemployed. I am unemployable. I am disabled. And I still had to decide to take the day off. I was not going to be accountable to anybody. I was not going to check in. I was not going to make my rounds asking people how I could pray for them. I just needed to take a minute for Joel. I did not know what would come from it. I just needed space. I felt as though I had been going and going, constantly trying to accomplish something. And it is a worthy cause. I have been working on a Spiritual Gifts Assessment… helping people discover what God has placed inside them that makes them unique, powerful, and important to the Kingdom. I cannot think of anything better to do with my time, including the time I spend working while lying down. But yesterday, I decided not to do even that. I pushed away. I pushed back. I did not engage in much banter. I did not do anything. I just took the day off. Because of that, I was able to notice this email. Because I was not engaged in work, I left it open and prayed about it. I asked my mom to pray about it too. Then, late in the day, I made the decision to go. Saul, David… Bill, and Joel Two or three days ago… Tuesday of this week… I was sitting at my computer when I received a revelation about a connection between the story of David and the story of Saul that I had never seen before. King Saul was anointed by God, through Samuel, to lead the Israelites. That was a gift. It was an anointing from God to lead God’s people. The people requested a king, and God fulfilled that request through Samuel’s anointing of Saul. Saul received this gift from God… and squandered it. He focused on himself and on pleasing himself. He used his gifting to satisfy his own needs. Then came David, Saul’s successor. Once Saul had squandered his gifting and his anointing, God removed the anointing from Saul and instructed Samuel to anoint a new king. Samuel searched and found David. The same gifting… but a different heart posture. David was called a man after God’s own heart. His posture was to chase the heart of God… to be like God. Saul, however, was stubborn in his transgressions. He made mistakes and would not turn back from them. He would not repent, because he was king. The arrogance… the narcissism… the world revolved around Saul. David made mistakes too, but David repented. He chased God’s heart. He did not take his gifting lightly. David was also forced to run for his life from Saul, the current king chasing the newly anointed king. For years, David ran from his ultimate calling… becoming king of Israel. He ran because Saul was trying to kill him. But I began to see symbolism in that story. For a long time, I ran from my calling too. I ran because I witnessed what my predecessor… I said the wrong word earlier… what the person who came before me, my father, did with his calling and anointing. I watched him use it to serve himself. I witnessed the destruction that occurred around him… in my family, in the families that came after mine, and in the lives of people he communicated and had contact with. He destroyed so much around him. And he was once anointed. He was once anointed by God to use those gifts for the Kingdom of Heaven. When I was younger, someone told me, “You are gifted like your father.” Through my own therapy and inner work, I have come to realize that I am gifted in many of the same ways my father was gifted. I am anointed in many of the same ways my father was anointed. David was anointed in the same way Saul was anointed. That was the connection I had never seen. One narcissistic, anointed person squanders it all because he uses the gift to serve himself. The other runs… from death and from his own calling. David ran because literal death was on the other side. I ran because stepping into my calling felt like death. I did not know there was a way to do the calling right. So, for a long time, I stayed in the wilderness. I could not understand… or would not allow myself to understand… how I could use this gift without hurting people, letting people down, or destroying families and lives. It felt like too much pressure. How could I not mess it up? I am human, just like my father is human, and we are gifted in the same ways. Then I began to lock in on spiritual gifts. I began to understand my gifts. I began to understand why my father’s gifting, used to serve himself, blew up in his face… and in all of ours. That is not what God gave us these gifts for. Now, years later, I am creating tools to help people discover their spiritual gifts. And now I am receiving this revelation about the relationship between Saul and David… and Bill Barnes and Joel Barnes. I had never seen any of it before. Don’t Waste a Good Crisis Then I decided to take the day off and push away… simply to give God more room. Honestly, I felt like Joel again. I had been exhausted, tired, and discouraged. I just needed a minute. I needed a minute with God. So I took that minute. The email appeared. I went to the retreat. And within the first five minutes, the pastor said: > “Don’t waste a good crisis.” And I thought, What? Every time I experience a pain flare, I refer to it as a crisis. Part of that comes from my father having sickle cell disease. When his pain flared and he ended up in the hospital, it was called a sickle cell crisis. I have used that same word for my own pain situation… another kind of suffering I share, in some way, with my father. So, within five minutes, this pastor says, “Don’t waste a good crisis,” and immediately I am paying attention. Of course I want God. I see what You are doing. I know the past six or seven years have been a crisis You have orchestrated. Yes, You did this to me. You allowed me to enter this season. You allowed the surgery to go wrong. You allowed what is about to become eight surgeries, 21 procedures, 15 rounds of physical therapy, endless pain, deep suffering, and losing it all. You allowed all of it… but You would not waste a good crisis. You trusted me. You chose me. You did not merely allow me… You offered me. The moment the pastor said those words, I knew I was in the right place. We had worshiped. We had prayed. Then he opened with that sentence. I did not get warm and fuzzy feelings about attending beforehand. I had prayed, but I did not hear, “Joel, go to the conference.” I simply knew I could not ignore the fact that I had stumbled across this email after nearly forgetting about it. Suddenly it was right in front of me. I prayed about it and could not find a reason that meant I should not go. I did not have enough money, but God has always given me enough. I did not have it, but He has always provided it. Okay, God… another faith exercise. I have done a few faith exercises over the past six years. So there I was, knowing I was there for a purpose and on purpose. God does not waste a good crisis. Then the pastor said, “Open to 1 Samuel.” The Passage I Had Been Studying What I forgot to mention is that, since receiving this revelation, I had studied only one book of the Bible. For the previous three days, I had been studying 1 Samuel and moving toward 2 Samuel, though I had not left 1 Samuel yet. I was studying Saul. I was studying David. I was studying the similarities between Saul and David… and the similarities between Saul and David, and Joel and Bill. I was trying to understand more of what God had revealed to me. I had watched multiple videos. I had read the text. I had read supporting texts and commentary. Even the night before, as I laid my head down to sleep, the only thing I played was an audio version of 1 Samuel. Multiple times during the night, I remember waking up and thinking, Huh… interesting, God. I’m asleep, but I hear You. I hear what You’re saying. I understand that part of the text. I finally stopped the audio when I realized it had moved into 2 Samuel. It was probably three or four o’clock in the morning. I had to get up at six and head to church. And then the Scripture for that day came from Samuel. Not only was it about Saul and David, but in 1 Samuel 30, David was fighting a battle he should not have had to fight. Why was David fighting a battle he should not have had to fight? For the same reason Joel has fought battles Joel should not have had to fight… because his predecessor did not defeat the enemy, so he was left to face it. The Amalekites were still an enemy of Israel because Saul had failed to defeat that enemy. David was stuck fighting the enemy his predecessor left behind… an enemy that should no longer have remained a threat to Israel. My predecessor left me plenty of enemies to face and battles to fight too. And what timing. Within 30 minutes of doing something I had not planned to do… something I did not even know whether I was supposed to do… I sat there receiving more evidence of the revelation God had given me on Tuesday. And I am not talking about lightweight evidence. I am talking about doctor-of-theology-level evidence. I honestly may never have connected the fact that David, in 1 Samuel 30, was fighting a battle Saul had failed to finish. I may never have made that connection. But now I was there. For three or four days, God had been unfolding this revelation around the opening of my book, ENTRUSTED… the story of how I came to understand spiritual gifting in the first place, why it matters so deeply to me, and why I have become enamored with it. Understanding spiritual gifts helped me understand the anointing I had been entrusted with. It profoundly shaped my path in life. For so long, I watched a person gifted similarly to me abuse those gifts. That made me protective. What began as fear and nervousness about exercising my gifts, God transformed into protection and holiness. He created in me a reverence… an utter respect for the gift, for God, and for His Kingdom. For too long, I ran from ministry because I did not want to become like my father. But that distance created something holy. It created an opportunity for me to reengage with God organically and naturally… not merely through my father’s lineage and not as a continuation of his story. God allowed me to break chains. He allowed me to forgive. He allowed me to put myself back together and dress again in armor. Not my father’s armor. Not the armor Saul tried to place on David… armor that did not fit. God gave me my own armor. He dressed me in my own righteousness. He continues to develop reverence and caution in me about how these gifts should be used in His Kingdom. How I Have Learned to Hear God How am I able to talk to God? Why do I seem to hear from God so often and so clearly? Because I try to talk to Him all the time. And even when I am uncertain, I pray. Yesterday, I was uncertain. I prayed. I asked my mom to pray. I still was not sure about the conference. When I walked in that morning and did not initially see anyone who looked like me, I did not know what was going on. I did not know what I had walked into. I was not sure. But then I became sure. Five minutes in, we were already talking about not wasting a good crisis… words I use, connected to a thought I have carried: I am not going to waste this suffering. I recently heard a quote: “If I go through pain, that pain owes me.” I believe that. I believe this season of suffering owes me. I know God is using this suffering for good. I know it because I have seen it. I cannot wait to come through this and see even more of it. When I reflect on that moment, I can see that God was able to use it because I paused. That was confirmation. It was affirmation that God had been communicating with me. The message began on Tuesday with a revelation. On Friday, God unpacked it further in a way I may not have been able to reach on my own. I am a smart guy, but I may never have recognized that this particular enemy David faced was an enemy Saul should have already defeated. It is a perfect picture of generational trauma. It is a perfect picture of the destruction created by narcissism and the abuse of God’s anointing. I could not have created a better analogy. And there is the beginning of my book, ENTRUSTED. My father was entrusted with an anointing. I have been entrusted with an anointing. I have been entrusted with spiritual gifts. I pray that God uses me to help other people discover the spiritual gifts they have been entrusted with too. If we can help people find their spiritual gifts… if we can teach them how valuable they are to God and help them steward what has been entrusted to them… they become better in relationship. Isolation begins to break, because they realize how little alone they actually are… how fully God is with them and how close He is. Then I can help people see how close they can become to someone else when they share their blessings and bruises. That connection eradicates isolation. From there, I can help bring them into community, where they can actually use the gifts God has placed inside them. All of it eradicates isolation. All of it does what God has told me to do… eradicate isolation in the world. I cannot describe a more affirming few days than receiving a revelation on Tuesday and having God stoke the fire on Friday. The odds… I am a numbers guy. The odds are impossible. It feels impossible that 1 Samuel was what we studied that day. Putting on the ephod was what we studied that day. I am so grateful, God. I am so blown away by You already. I cannot wait to see what You do. Be Still… and Reflect This started as a way for me to explain that there is no formula for hearing God. Suffering and time with God are some of the ways I have come into rhythm with Him. Studying His Word matters. Getting into His Word teaches me what He sounds like… and what He does not sound like. These practices have helped me hear the voice of God more clearly. And reflection. Gosh… consistent reflection. Slowing down. God wants us to be still. I do not know whether there is any practice more valuable in that stillness than reflection. Do not try to manufacture anything. Just observe. Observe what God has done. Look back over the week, the days, the moments. It takes practice, because you will miss things. Years ago, I might have missed all of this. I still miss so much. Sometimes I realize, Oh, man… I didn’t even put two and two together. I had missed this Saul-and-David connection for 20 years, and I have known their story for at least that long. Even during the past five years, when I have been in the Bible almost every day, I missed it. But what a powerful connection it is. There is something life-giving about realizing you are not crazy. You read the Bible and think, That means I’m not crazy. Look… it is right there. Someone else has gone through this. Someone else has been that broken. Someone else can be that healed. Someone else has made the mistakes I have made. Someone else has been brought back from the brink of death. Someone else desired death and wanted to rest… wanted all of it to go away… and God said, “No. It is not your time yet.” Someone else cursed the day they were born. Someone else sat beneath a tree and said, “Take me now, God.” Someone else fell to his knees and begged for forgiveness… and was then used by God to prepare the way for the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. How incredible is that? And I get to become part of that story, in some small way, in someone’s life. It is a story of redemption, reconciliation, and hope. To help even one person discover what God has placed inside them… what makes them special… could save someone’s life. And I get to do that. It is not an easy task. It is not an easy job. But it is the work I will have for the rest of my life. I am certain of little else, but I am certain of this. It will be my job, my honor, my duty, my heaviness, my blessing, and my joy for the rest of my life. In some way, I will teach people to share their blessings and bruises. I will help people connect and learn how to be friends again. But I will also teach them where friendship begins… with being a friend to yourself. With knowing what you have to offer the world. With knowing what God says about you, so that you have more to offer one person first… and then a community. That work is worth it. That work is worth it. A Prayer God, help me keep doing this work. You have given me the beginning of the book. Show me what to do next. Show me where to write next. I will get this down on paper. I will tell this story on paper… this story of connection, battling, anointing, gifting, and the confusion around what gifting means. How do I use it? What is it supposed to look like? God, I will write about the 30 years I ran from it, in the hope that someone else will not have to run for more than 30 minutes… that they can reach the end of a chapter and say, “Oh, man… I don’t want to run. I don’t want to run away from my purpose.” God, I love You so much. I thank You for the opportunity to walk with Your children… simply to bring Your children back to You, which is all You told me to do. Just bring them back to You, and they will be all right. I know it because I am living it. I know I am safe with You, and I am so grateful for this next season. I am so grateful, God, that You told me today that I am coming out of the valley. That was profound. During our first check-in today, the only thing I could think to share about myself was that I have been in the valley… and God is showing me that I am on my way out. I believe You, God, and I am so grateful. Bless this ministry, Lord. Bless Share. Bless the Spiritual Gifts Assessment. Bless SHAREapy. Bless the 2:42 group, God. Bless all these things You are building. I am here for it. Show me where to go next. Show me what to do. Show me how far to go. I do not want to do it without You. But clearly… clearly… clearly… You are giving me this book, and it is coming fast. So I am going to do my best, God, to get this out of me… not just in a video, but on paper. In Jesus’ name, amen. Gosh… I cannot believe I get to do this. I know I joked about this not being a “four easy ways to hear God’s voice” post. But when I went back through my testimony, I counted 14 different elements that mattered in my communication with God this week. This is not a formula, and your relationship with God may not look exactly like mine. But if even one or two of these jump off the page and help you recognize how God may already be communicating with you… I wanted to share them. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit wehavetoshare.substack.com/subscribe (https://wehavetoshare.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2)