Wellspring Group

Wholeheartedness Is Not…Managing.

Managing doesn't always look like a problem from the outside. It looks like competence. Like someone who has it together, who doesn't burden others, who handles what comes their way without making it anyone else's concern. And in many seasons of life, managing is exactly what gets us through. It's not without value. The problem isn't that we learned to manage. The problem is when managing becomes the only way we know how to live.

Because managing can keep us at a safe distance from our own hearts. When we are always in control of what comes out, we may never feel what's actually there. We stay functional. We stay presentable. We stay fine. And somewhere underneath all of that fine, something real might be waiting to be acknowledged.

Becoming Wholehearted explores how manage our behavior, our image, and our emotions can sabotage what we most long for. The wholehearted life isn't about having everything handled. It's about being honest with ourselves, with God, and with others about what's going on in the deepest parts of our hearts. And it's about the healing work God does in us as we live in relationships where we are seen, known, valued, and accepted for who we truly are.

God isn't asking us to manage our way to Him. The invitation has always been to come as we actually are: unmanaged, unpolished, honest. Not because He needs us to fall apart, but because the parts of us we've been managing are often the parts He most wants to meet us in.

Do you have the need to manage parts of your life? Who can you be honest with today, rather than hiding behind the image you want to project?

— Wellspring Group | wellspringgroup.org

Lies We Believe: “Surrendering control means everything will fall apart.”

If we're honest, control doesn't always feel like a problem. It often feels like responsibility. Maybe even faithfulness. The only reasonable response to a world that is unpredictable, right? If we don't stay on top of it, who will? And so we hold on. We plan for every outcome, manage every detail, and carry far more than we were ever meant to carry, and we tell ourselves that's just what it means to be dependable.

But control can be one of our most sophisticated self-protective strategies. “Becoming Wholehearted” describes these self protective strategies as the ways we seek to meet our deep desires apart from God. They may work well for a season, but ultimately they sabotage the things we most long for. Control keeps us safe. It also keeps us exhausted. And it quietly keeps God at a distance from the very places we need Him most.

Surrendering control isn't giving up on what matters. It isn't passive or irresponsible. It can be one of the most active and courageous things we do, making room for God to be God in the places we have been trying to be God ourselves. Proverbs 3:5-6 invites us to trust in the Lord with all our heart and lean not on our own understanding. That's not an invitation to stop caring. It's an invitation to stop carrying what only He can hold.

The desire underneath our need for control is worth getting curious about. Most of the time it points to something real. A longing for safety, for things to go well, for the people we love to be okay. Those desires aren't wrong. But when we bring them to God instead of managing them alone, something can begin to shift.

What desire might your need for control be asking you to acknowledge today?

— Wellspring Group | wellspringgroup.org

Wholeheartedness Is Not…Numbing.

Numbing doesn't always look the way we think it does. It isn't always a substance or a destructive habit. Sometimes it looks like a full calendar that never has a quiet moment in it. A phone that gets picked up the second something uncomfortable surfaces. A life so packed with productivity and noise that nothing painful ever gets a chance to rise to the top.

Most of us have learned to numb without even realizing we're doing it. Because the feelings we're avoiding are real and they're heavy, and staying in motion feels a lot better than sitting still long enough to feel them. The problem is when we turn the volume down on pain we could be turning it down on everything else too. The joy could get quieter. The connection could get shallower. We stay safe from the hard things, but we could also drift further from the good ones.

Wholeheartedness isn't about forcing ourselves to feel everything all at once or wallowing in what's hard. It's about developing the willingness to stop running long enough to notice what's actually there. Psalm 46:10 invites us to be still and know that He is God — and there's something about that stillness that can feel terrifying when we've been moving for a long time. But stillness can also be where we begin to hear what we've been drowning out.

In the stillness, what begins to surface in your heart? Whatever it is, consider taking a moment to share honestly with God what you’re experiencing.

— Wellspring Group | wellspringgroup.org

Lies We Believe: “Being emotional is a problem.”

Being emotional is not okay—at least that’s the message many of us picked up along the way, even if nobody said it out loud. Keep it together. Don't be so sensitive. Get a grip. Feelings are a sign of weakness. Composure is the goal. The less we feel the better we function.

So we got good at managing our emotions. We pushed them aside, stayed in control, and called it maturity. But what we were actually doing was disconnecting. From our own hearts. From the people around us. From the very place where God most wants to meet us.

Emotions shouldn’t control us. But they also shouldn’t be ignored. They point us to things going on below the surface of our hearts. The book Becoming Wholehearted reminds us that the heart is the desiring, feeling, thinking, choosing part of who we are. It is not meant to be managed into silence. It is in the intersection of our heart, God's heart, and the hearts of others that we authentically experience His presence transforming us into the people He created us to be.

Jesus wept. He felt compassion so deep it moved Him to action. He experienced grief, joy, and anguish — a full, messy, emotional life that was never once called a lack of faith. Feeling deeply isn't losing control. It can be evidence of a heart that is fully alive and open to what God is doing in and around us.

What one feeling or emotion seems closest to the surface in your life right now? What does it tell you about the deep desires in your heart that are being met or unmet?

— Wellspring Group | wellspringgroup.org

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We did it. 🤍
$300,000. Exceeded.
We genuinely didn't know what this summer would hold when we launched this campaign. But you showed up.

Because of your generosity, Wellspring is stepping into what's next from a place of strength. More capacity to equip small groups. More ability to develop leaders. More reach into communities we've never touched before.

To every person who gave, whether it was your first gift to Wellspring or your tenth year of partnership, thank you. You didn't just donate to a ministry. You helped build the runway for a movement.

We can't wait to show you what comes next!

Wholeheartedness Is Not….Performing.

Most of us learned to perform before we even knew we were doing it. We learned early that certain emotions were acceptable and others weren't. That strength was rewarded and vulnerability was risky. So we got good at showing up the way people needed us to show up. Fine, capable, together.

Performance feels like the safe option because it is, in a way. If no one ever sees the real version of us, no one can reject it. But there's a cost that accumulates quietly over time. We can't be truly known and be performing at the same time. And most of us, underneath the performance, are longing to be known more than almost anything else.

So what does wholeheartedness actually look like instead? It isn’t pretending life isn’t hard or that we have it all together. Wholeheartedness is the willingness to stop managing what we feel and start bringing it into the light, with God, with safe people and with ourselves. It's showing up as we actually are and discovering that the Lord loves us and our true authentic selves. Because He authored us.

God has never asked us to perform for Him. He already knows what's underneath. The invitation has always been to come as we are. Undone, uncertain, unfinished. That's where wholeheartedness begins. In the moment we stop pretending and start showing up honestly, we become available to the kind of connection our hearts were made for.

What might it look like to trade the performance for vulnerability?

To learn more about vulnerability, check out our book, Becoming Wholehearted! Link in bio:)

— Wellspring Group | wellspringgroup.org

Lies We Believe: “My past disqualifies me.”

Most of us have a version of this lie running quietly in the background. We replay the things we've done, the seasons we're not proud of, the choices we wish we could take back. Or maybe it's not even something we did. Maybe it's something that was done to us, something we carry that feels like it marks us in a way that can't be undone. Either way the conclusion feels the same: the things I've done, the things done to me, are too much. Whatever God can do with someone else's life, it probably doesn't apply to mine.

But scripture tells a different story. Moses was a murderer before he led a nation to freedom. Peter denied Jesus three times before he became the rock the church was built on. Paul spent years persecuting the very people he would give his life to serve. The pattern throughout scripture isn't that God uses people who have clean records. It's that He consistently uses broken, complicated, sinful people. When we repent, He redeems our stories, even the parts we are most ashamed of.

Romans 8:1 may be one of the most powerful verses for anyone carrying the weight of their past. "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." Not less condemnation. Not condemnation with exceptions. None. The past that we've been using as evidence against ourselves is not the evidence God is looking at. The shame that tells us we're disqualified is not the verdict He has spoken over us.

Our past doesn't have the final word on our story. In God's Larger Story it can become the very thing that equips us to sit with others in the painful parts of their own stories.

What is one area of your life where you've seen God redeeming the broken, painful parts of your story, and using them to point others to His Larger Story?

- Wellspring Group | wellspringgroup.org

Lies We Believe: “I have to have it together before I can come to God.”

So we wait. We tell ourselves we'll pray more when we're in a better headspace. We'll open the Bible when we're not so angry. We'll go back to church and we'll come to God when we have something better to bring Him than this mess. And so we keep our distance, not out of rebellion, but out of something that almost feels like respect. Like we need to clean ourselves up before we knock on the door.

But we were never meant to clean ourselves up before coming to the One who does the cleaning. That's not how He works and it was never what He asked of us. The very premise of grace is that we couldn't get there on our own.

Romans 5:8 tells us that while we were still sinners, Christ came anyway. Not after we figured it out. Not once we were further along. Right in the middle of it. That wasn't an accident. That was the point. He has never been waiting at the finish line for us to arrive worthy. He meets us in the middle of the mess, in the undone places, in the moments we feel least qualified to show up.

Coming to God undone isn't a lack of faith. It might be the most honest act of faith there is. The invitation was never "come when you're ready." It was always "come as you are."

What would it look like to come to God exactly as you are today?
As you think about coming to God this way, what are you feeling and desiring?

— Wellspring Group | wellspringgroup.org

We’re almost there. 🤍

$262,170 raised. $37,830 to go.

This is the moment. The matching campaign ends August 31 and we are so close to the finish line.
Every gift given before midnight on August 31 is still matched, dollar for dollar. That means right now, your $250 becomes $500. Your $100 becomes $200. Every dollar you give between now and then counts twice.

We’ve watched this community show up in ways that have genuinely moved us. Leaders, teams, and churches being transformed.

There are two ways to finish strong with us:
💙 Give a one-time gift and double your impact before the deadline.
💙 Become a Multiplier: A monthly partner whose entire first year of giving is matched. It’s the longest-lasting way to fuel this movement.
We don’t want to cross this finish line without you.

Give now or become a Multiplier → link in bio!

A Wellspring Word: Disconnect

The Disconnect is the gap between what we think we believe and what we truly believe, often at a subconscious level, about God, ourselves, others, and life. �
It’s not enough to know biblical truth. If what we say we believe and try to live by doesn’t shape our choices, it’s a sign of a disconnected heart. Disconnects can be caused by fear, unresolved pain, or subconscious beliefs we develop based on life experiences. They leave us wondering, like Paul, why lasting change is hard to achieve.

“I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. “ Romans 7:15 (see also vs 16-25)

We’ve all had those moments when shame swamps us and guilt points its accusing finger our way. It doesn’t matter what “it” is that you messed up. The sense of failure burns like acid, choking out the hope that you could ever live up to your own standards, much less God’s.

I remember a long season when I struggled to pray and read the Bible. Condemnation was a close companion. I should do better. I had done better. What changed? God felt distant—until the moment he opened my eyes to a subconscious belief born out disappointment in my life: God doesn’t see me or care about me personally. He only loves me because he’s chosen to love human beings collectively. I thought I was solid in my belief in God’s love. But this was the true belief that drove my behavior, including my angry and bitter responses toward God and others.

Awareness opened the door to repentance and change. I still struggle with sin and find myself placing distance between myself and God. Now, though, I’m much quicker to pause and ask God to search my heart, to surface the fears, pain, and beliefs that underlie my choices.

What about you?
What is one area in your life where you’re struggling with repeated sin that leaves you feeling guilt and shame?
How is fear or pain contributing to the choices you make?
What are you subconsciously believing about yourself, God, the situation, or others?

- Anisa Sumlar, Creative Director at Wellspring Group