by Shannon Tillman | Mar 12, 2026 | Bible Study, Blog, Thoughts
A broken promise is heartbreaking. However, when freedom and slavery were involved, a broken promise turned into criminal acts. In the book of Jeremiah, God addressed the leaders of Israel for they had made a covenant to release those in forced labor but then decided to enslave them once again.
Jeremiah 34:8-11
The word came to Jeremiah from the Lord after King Zedekiah had made a covenant with all the people in Jerusalem to proclaim freedom for the slaves. Everyone was to free their Hebrew slaves, both male and female; no one was to hold a fellow Hebrew in bondage. So all the officials and people who entered into this covenant agreed that they would free their male and female slaves and no longer hold them in bondage. They agreed, and set them free. But afterward they changed their minds and took back the slaves they had freed and enslaved them again.
Imagine being set free only to be recaptured by the one who promised you freedom. Picture the heartache of starting a new life only to be forced back into labor. Feel the emotions of looking at those who are supposed to enforce justice but instead seeing them as willing participants of injustice. Not only had they made a covenant to the people for freedom, they had made a vow before God which they broke.
Jeremiah 34:12-16
Then the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah: “This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: I made a covenant with your ancestors when I brought them out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. I said, ‘Every seventh year each of you must free any fellow Hebrews who have sold themselves to you. After they have served you six years, you must let them go free. Your ancestors, however, did not listen to me or pay attention to me. Recently you repented and did what is right in my sight: Each of you proclaimed freedom to your own people. You even made a covenant before me in the house that bears my Name. But now you have turned around and profaned my name; each of you has taken back the male and female slaves you had set free to go where they wished. You have forced them to become your slaves again.
The Lord had told the people hundreds of years before that indentured servants were required to serve no more than seven years. However, the people decided to enforce life-long labor despite the directive given by God. In other words, cultural opinions ruled. They did what they wanted instead of doing what was right. Although it seemed they had finally chosen to obey the Lord, it was only for a short time. They chose convenience for themselves over freedom for others. With unlawful force, the people enslaved the free, breaking their promise before God and man. Therefore, God declared punishment against these covenant breakers.
Jeremiah 34:18
Those who have violated my covenant and have not fulfilled the terms of the covenant they made before me, I will treat like the calf they cut in two and then walked between its pieces.
In those days, a covenant was symbolized by an animal cut in two. The ones who agreed with the covenant would walk through the pieces. It was in essence communicating that if the person broke the covenant, then he would be subject to severe punishment, even death. God decided to allow the penalties of violating the covenant to fall on those who had made the promise but broke it.
Jeremiah 34:19-20
The leaders of Judah and Jerusalem, the court officials, the priests and all the people of the land who walked between the pieces of the calf, I will deliver into the hands of their enemies who want to kill them. Their dead bodies will become food for the birds and the wild animals.
The people who were part of this covenant were leaders, court officials, and even priests! The leaders who were to guide others in righteous acts were leading them instead into deliberate crime. Court officials who were supposed to uphold the rules of the land were breaking the law. The priests who were called to obey God’s ways were rebelling against His commands.
Before we condemn the past and excuse ourselves because we do not own slaves, we need to evaluate the motives behind what we do. For example, some ministers hold people to personal bondage-wanting the congregants to fulfill the pastor’s plan, pastor’s agenda, pastor’s calendar. There is no release of the people to God’s plan, God’s agenda, God’s calendar. Or we see church leaders wanting to control decisions, wanting their way instead of God’s way. There are even unethical practices by church officials, wanting what is beneficial for their personal finances instead of choosing what is right.The unethical practices harm the home. The children of the leaders, officials, and priests witnessed their parents going back on their promise, backsliding into former ways, excusing their behavior with lofty words but shallow meaning. Think about how the priests would minister at the temple for the Jewish people while holding Jewish people in personal bondage. How confusing to watch parents do the right thing at work but walk in compromise at home! Part of the bondage may be that we are training up the next generation in unethical ways, keeping a course that dishonors God and people for years to come.
The message is clear not just to church leaders, but to everyone in the body of Christ. If in any way we are using people or their resources for our own advantage, we are keeping people in bondage. This is the exact opposite of our calling for the church is commissioned to set people free.
In grand terms, we are to be on the front lines fighting literal slavery. Human trafficking earns more money than any other industry in the world. We cannot ignore slavery. This is our watch in history and our fight to be won or lost.
On a micro-scale, we must ensure that we do what is right in the Lord’s eyes, which means we must be diligent in not compromising with culture. Motives need to be checked in all decisions to ensure that we are following God’s leading not our own agendas or opinions. We need to lead others not control them. We also must honor God with money and not create loopholes that benefit our pockets. When we walk in freedom, others will be led to freedom as well.
It is time for us to repent of any way that we are not honoring God in our treatment of others. Whether on a large or small scale, we are accountable before God to obey His decrees. Anything less than that is breaking covenant with the Lord and His command to us:
John 13:34-35
“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
Love fulfills the covenant with God and man. A lack of love violates His decree. May we choose love in all relationships, in all decisions, in all circumstances, in all financial matters. If and when we fall short, let us repent and then return to the command of love which sets us and others free.
by Kevin Tillman | Mar 5, 2026 | Blog, Thoughts
When Life Feels Stuck
What God May Be Doing When Nothing Seems to Be Moving
There are seasons when life seems to move forward without much effort. New opportunities appear. The Doors open and the decisions feel clear.
And then there are those “other” seasons. The seasons where everything seems to stall. Nothing makes sense. And, life just seems hard.
You keep doing the things you know to do. You pray. You work. You go to church. You try to stay faithful with the responsibilities in front of you. Yet, somewhere in the back of your mind there’s a quiet question that starts showing up.
Is anything actually changing? Is anything ever going to change?
It’s not always discouragement. Sometimes it’s just the feeling that you’re standing still while time keeps moving. The world is still spinning and others seem to be content and happy, but not you.
Obviously we don’t enjoy those seasons. We like progress. We like the sense that something is happening. When that feeling disappears, it can leave us wondering whether we’ve somehow missed the direction God intended for us.
But if you read Scripture carefully, you begin to notice that many of the people God used most walked through long stretches where nothing seemed to be happening at all.
Joseph spent years in places he never planned. What began as betrayal eventually led to prison. Those years must have felt confusing at times. Yet later it became clear that God was arranging circumstances Joseph himself could never have orchestrated or imagined.
David had already been anointed as the future king of Israel long before he actually wore the crown. Between those two times were years of uncertainty and waiting. Some of those years were even spent hiding in caves. From the outside, it might have looked like his life had taken a wrong turn. Yet God was shaping something in him. There was a preparation going on in the background.
There is a quiet and subtle kind of work God often does in seasons where movement feels slow. This is where character is formed. Patience develops. Perspective begins to change in ways that only time can produce. Those things rarely happen in the fast-moving times of life. They tend to grow in the quiet ones.
One of the challenges with feeling stuck is that we measure progress mostly by visible change. New opportunities and new direction. But, sometimes God measures progress differently. He’s working beneath the surface in ways that aren’t immediately obvious.
The things matter more than you likely realize are… The way you respond to frustration and the faith you display even when life feels routine. The willingness to keep walking with God despite not having clarity.
Looking back over the years, many believers discover that some of the seasons they once described as “stuck” were actually seasons where their lives were being prepared for something they couldn’t yet see. It’s difficult to recognize that while you’re in the middle of it. In the moment, it often feels like standing in the same place longer than you expected, and it can be frustrating. Still, the absence of visible change does not mean the absence of God’s work. Often the most important things God develops in a life happen slowly. Gradually enough that you may not notice the change while it’s happening. But one day you look back and realize something is different. Something has shifted. I’m the same person, but I’m not the same person. Your trust has deepened. Your perspective has matured. The things that once unsettled you don’t carry the same anxiety… You’ve grown. That growth began during a season when you thought life had stopped moving.
So if you happen to be in a season where things feel slower than you hoped. If you feel “stuck” right now try not to assume that nothing is happening. God’s work isn’t always dramatic. It often unfolds little by little, shaping a life from the inside long before the results become visible on the outside.
The seasons that feel the most uneventful at the time are the very ones that prepare us for what comes next. If you feel stuck today, just realize you might be in the best place you can possibly be. Hold on to your faith, and keep moving forward. God’s still got this!
by Shannon Tillman | Feb 26, 2026 | Bible Study, Blog, Thoughts
It happened again. I was faced with the same pattern of dysfunction. Why does change not happen? Why do relationships seem to be the same? What keeps lives from being different? In the midst of the difficult situation, I asked the Lord why someone, especially a believing someone, would continue in obvious wrongdoing against others. The Lord brought me to Acts 16 for the answer.
Acts 16:16a
Once when we were going to the place of prayer, we were met by a female slave who had a spirit by which she predicted the future.
This slave girl had an evil spirit that predicted events in the future. Why would the owners tolerate a demon in their lives, in their home, in their workplace?
Acts 16:16b
She earned a great deal of money for her owners by fortune-telling.
The presence of a demon profited the slave owners! Evil was permitted as long as there was a benefit. Sadly, this is true in us as well. Often, we do not confront obvious sin, which is evil and demonic, in our lives because there is a gain for us:
Sin of approval (people-pleasing, enabling, compromise, living for others not God) profits us for people to like us.
Sin of gossip profits us to create connections with some and exclude others.
Sin of addiction (which can include spending, social media, and video games) profits us to escape pain.
Sin of anger profits us to silence the opposition.
Sin of choosing what is comfortable (instead of what God is calling us to do) profits us to avoid accountability and possible failure.
Sin of control profits us to get our way.
Sin of….we could list more, but the point is made.
If our sin profits us in some way, we allow it to the harm of ourselves and others. We can know what we are doing is wrong (just as the owners knew the source of their slave’s ability was via an evil spirit) and still continue in our evil behavior. We may even excuse our actions because of the benefits that come from it, refusing to acknowledge that the transgression is demonic in nature and the enemy has control of us in that area. A toleration of sin is a toleration of demonic influence around us. We think we are benefiting from our actions in some way but in truth the enemy is gaining the most advantage from the sin.
We need to quit allowing the enemy’s control in our lives by making the changes required of us. The time has come to confront the evil and cast it out: No more delays!
Acts 16:18b
“In the name of Jesus Christ I command you to come out of her!” At that moment the spirit left her.
May we and others be set free when we choose to no longer profit from our sin.
by Kevin Tillman | Feb 19, 2026 | Blog, Thoughts
Faith is funny because most of us think of it as a point we reached at some time in the past. A decision, a prayer, or a moment we could circle on a calendar. But, when you spend time with Abraham’s story you start realizing his life didn’t really work like that. Nothing about it was tidy enough to circle.
God didn’t sit him down and explain the whole future. He told him to go… and promised clarity would come somewhere “out there” on the road. That had to feel strange. We prefer the opposite order. We want the explanation first so we can decide if obedience seems like a good idea or not. That’s where most of the tension lives for us. Not in believing God exists, but in moving without knowing how this whole thing is going to turn out.
What always stands out to me is that Abraham’s biggest problems didn’t come from rejecting God. They came from trying to help Him. Years had passed after the promise of a son. Silence was wearing on him. Eventually that waiting led to feelings of irresponsibility. So he made a decision that felt practical at the time. Not rebellious… practical. That’s what makes it relatable.
We do it all the time. We fill in the blank because God hasn’t given us an answer. We push conversations forward because we’re tired of not knowing. We’re tired of waiting! We tell ourselves we’re just being wise or proactive. Later we realize we mostly just didn’t like uncertainty and we missed having control. Control is comforting for a short period of time, but then it starts creating things we have to manage.
There’s something hard about letting God be slow. Not lazy slow… deliberate slow. It starts forming a patience in you whether you asked for it or not. I know in my life some of the hardest acts of faith have been the invisible ones. Not the big, bold decisions, but the subtle ones that required a quiet restraint. The moment you decide not to force an answer doesn’t receive applause. Actually, most people will never even know. But little by little, decision by decision it changes you.
You see it in Abraham building altars in different places along the way. No big speeches recorded. Just markers… God met me here, I trusted Him here, I’m still trusting Him now. A life shaped more by repetition than intensity. A life shaped by a series of small choices. Transformation isn’t always some big dramatic moment. A lot of it just feels like returning to the same trust over and over again until it becomes instinct.
Then there’s the moment nobody wants… that Isaac moment. The part of the story that always feels heavier when you slow down and reflect. God pressing His hand on the very thing that explained everything else in Abraham’s life. The promise itself. I don’t think surrender ever feels natural. It feels like handing God the one thing that finally made you feel settled and hearing Him say, trust Me with that too.
The strange part is how often peace shows up right after release. Not always immediately, but eventually. Carrying something tightly creates a constant fear of losing it. Giving it to God doesn’t make it disappear… it just means the outcome isn’t yours to hold together anymore.
By the time you reach the end of Abraham’s life there’s no dramatic closing scene. Scripture just says he died “satisfied with life”. I like that so much, because it sounds quieter than victory. More like someone who lived long enough to see that God had been faithful even when he wasn’t. And somehow the faith kept going after him. Isaac had watched him long before Isaac ever had to trust God personally.
That’s usually how it works. People don’t absorb faith mainly through what we say. They absorb it through what they keep seeing. How you react when things fall apart. Whether you panic or pray first. Patterns preach way louder than words, and their impact last longer.
Abraham didn’t do everything right. That’s probably why his story helps. He veered off course more than once, but he kept turning back the same direction. Over time that direction mattered more than the detours.
Maybe that’s what faith actually is. Not a flawless line forward. More like a person who keeps reorienting themselves toward God over and over and over. Some days confidently, some days barely… but still turning.
Eventually all those turns become a path. And one day you look back and realize the destination wasn’t a place you arrived at all at once. It was the person you became while you kept walking.
by Shannon Tillman | Feb 12, 2026 | Blog, Thoughts
My mom shuffled around the house, exhausted from a lack of sleep. Her blood pressure was elevated and she felt awful. However, she realized her physical condition was influenced by her emotions. Her body was responding to worry over a particular situation. While she knew she should not worry, she was struggling to stop the thoughts raging through her mind. Have you ever felt the same way?
John 14:1
Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me.
The troubled heart points to unbelief. Any area where we are not believing God is the place where we are troubled. A troubled heart is an arrow pointing out the lie that we are believing over God. We need to follow the troubled heart so the lie is unveiled and truth be placed in the area where we struggle. It is not a matter of “trying harder” to not be upset, worried, or concerned. Instead, we are to press in and see what the troubled heart reveals about the state of our soul.
For example, I am troubled with a decision. I struggle with wondering if I can even make the right choices for my life. I could go on and explain my past family dysfunctions or terrible events I experienced or how painful situations occurred. But those only give the root of the problem, they do not solve my troubled heart. Instead, I must look at the area of God I do not believe. Bottom line, I do not think He will take care of me if I make the wrong decision. This reveals a deeper lie: I have to figure it out on my own for I do not really believe His guidance over my life. These lies that stem from my past cause a troubled heart in me whenever I face large decisions.
The thing with a troubled heart is that it is not necessarily troubled by everything. I do not struggle with financial concerns. I believe God is my Provider. I have experienced supernatural help from Him when in the natural I would not be able to make it another month. However, my husband finds a troubled heart in this area. When we were without jobs for a time, he would worry at night while I slept peacefully. His troubled heart pointed him to the lie that he had to be the one to figure out a solution, instead of trusting that God would reveal His plan in His time.
We need to evaluate our own troubled hearts to discover the area of our personal unbelief. Then, we can replace the lie with the Truth, with Jesus, of who He truly is to us, for us, in us, and through us. We do not have to shuffle around in life, weighed down by the troubled heart. Instead, we can walk confidently in every situation by faith in our God.
John 14:1
Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me.
by Shannon Tillman | Feb 5, 2026 | Blog, Thoughts
The situation was already bleak. Unbelievably, the circumstances spiraled down further. I thought we were already at rock bottom when more bad news came. I did what I had done a thousand times; I reviewed my promise cards. (These cards are Bible verses that speak into my situation.) The words on the cards were a far cry from what I was facing. It seemed like I was holding onto a crazy dream. The facts were screaming loudly at me, mocking what seemed a delusional hope. The promises seemed to fade further away. Suddenly, I heard a statement in my heart:
“Shannon, you can either believe the facts or the truth.”
I questioned the statement. “What is the difference between facts and truth?”
“Facts are your circumstances, the earthly reality. I Am Truth. Truth supersedes facts.”
Bible stories flooded my mind:
Fact: The Red Sea trapped the Israelites who were being threatened by the encroaching Egyptian army.
Truth: God had already given the Israelites the promise of their deliverance and the Egyptians’ destruction. They finally saw it realized as they crossed through a pathway formed in the midst of the water which led to the drowning of the ensuing army.
Fact: Gideon’s 300 men army stood no chance against the Midianite army that sprawled throughout the valley.
Truth: God had already told Gideon that He would be with him and that all of the Midianites would be destroyed. Gideon and his army only blew their shofars and the enemy destroyed itself.
Fact: David and his men could not recover the loss of their families after they were kidnapped by the Amalekites.
Truth: God told David to follow them and recover all. David and his men found an abandoned, sick slave of the Amalekites who directed them to the raiding party. David and his men rescued their families as well as plundered the Amalekites.
Fact: Jesus died on a cross. He was wrapped in burial clothes and placed in a sealed tomb. It seemed like the end.
Truth: Jesus had already told His disciples that He would rise again and meet them in Galilee. Jesus always fulfills what He promises.
I do not know what facts of your circumstances may be looming over you. Let me encourage you, the facts are not the Truth. God’s Word, God’s ways will prevail.
Psalm 145:13b
The Lord is trustworthy in all he promises and faithful in all he does.
You can trust the Truth. The facts are not Truth. The facts can be changed in a moment. What was a fact a moment ago, may not be a fact now. Truth will have the final word. What He has promised, He will fulfill. Trust the Truth.
