Jamin Goggin and his wife, Kristin, have been kind friends of mine for several years. We have walked the farm together, praying in the sunlight hours and shared the joy of long meals filled with laughter, love, and rich conversation about life with God. Jamin has not only been a praying friend, but he has also been a pastor and theologian whose heart for God and love for the Church have long been an encouragement to my own soul. It’s a joy to welcome Jamin to the farm’s table today…
Guest Post by Jamin Goggin
Envy infected my pastoral bones early.
I caught it on my first trip to youth summer camp.
I was a wide-eyed and hopeful new youth pastor, enthusiastic about a full week of highly relational ministry with high school students.
After a long drive full of laughter and conversation, we piled out of our vans right alongside two rows of buses. I watched as hundreds of students exited the buses.
Envy hit me before I could even smell the mountain air.
As I watched another youth pastor count his “flock” with clipboard in hand, my heart counted it a loss.
I already knew my group was small, but for the first time it bothered me.
Then I saw it—the name of the church that this youth group belonged to—printed on the matching T-shirts the leaders were wearing. My envy latched onto this like a leech thirsty for blood. It was a church I already harbored silent judgment of.
My envy isn’t the problem; the way they do ministry is. Or so I told myself. There is no better way to avoid the sting of a “loss” than convincing yourself the “winners” have cheated.
In my early years of ministry, envy began to slowly rot my pastoral bones, but I ignored it.
“It turns out, you need strong bones to protect vital organs.“
How readily we dismiss illness in our youth? To be sure, there were signs of weakness caused by this slow decay, but the adrenaline of ministry dulled my spiritual senses to such things. Without knowing why, my heart quickly became vulnerable to criticism and failure. It began to beat with insecurity and anxiety. It turns out, you need strong bones to protect vital organs.
As I aged in ministry, I would occasionally feel the ache of envy. When a friend from seminary was promoted before me. When a pastoral peer was asked to be a plenary speaker at a conference I was just attending. When another pastor’s book won awards while mine seemed to go unnoticed. My heartbeat with bitter envy when ministry trophies were handed out to others.
That envy sucked the joy out of my vocation. Time and again, I felt the sting of defeat in the victory of others.
Just as I did in my youth, I ignored my own illness by arrogantly diagnosing others, like a therapist who invests their life counseling people with addictions having never dealt with their own.
I made judgments about the character of pastors I did not know. I assumed the worst of co-laborers’ motives and condemned their philosophy of ministry. Occasionally, I would whisper these silent judgments in the “right” company, often with fellow pastors who, being the enemy of my enemy, became friends.
Envy is miserable, and misery loves company.
A decade into my pastoral career, I was serving at a church with dozens of pastors. It was a work environment that naturally bred competition, but by God’s grace it became a space of supernaturally driven confession.
“It was there in the nakedness of my confession that I experienced the covering of God’s grace.“
Envy showed its ugly face with more regularity, hiding in the shadows less and showing its teeth more. The light of God’s presence shone bright upon this hideous vice in my soul.
God persisted in exposing the sin in prayer, beckoning me to drag the beast of envy from its shadowed shelter into the broad daylight of grace and truth.
It was there in the nakedness of my confession that I experienced the covering of God’s grace.
It was there in the dry mouth of my penitent prayers that times of refreshing came from the Lord. It was there that my brittle pastoral bones were rejuvenated by the Spirit and given new density.
A density of love for fellow pastors that was not my own.
Prayer of the Envious Heart
Heavenly Father, I present my envy to you. I confess that
I have longed to possess that which you have given to
another. Indeed, I have secretly wished to see them dispossessed
of those very blessings. In my envy I have maligned
and criticized my co- laborers in Christ, treating them as
rivals to beat rather than partners to share the yoke of
ministry with. At times I have been unfaithful to the work
you have called me to because I have anxiously toiled to
achieve the pastoral identity of a fellow shepherd I have
envied. Lord, meet me here in your grace. Teach my heart
to be satisfied in the acceptance I have in Christ rather
than any worldly accomplishment. Here are my rotting
bones of envy; heal me with the balm of your loving
presence. In the name of Jesus, amen.
Content taken from Pastoral Confessions – Baker Publishing Group by Jamin Goggin, ©2025. Used by permission of Baker Publishing Group | Trusted Christian Book Publishers.
Jamin Goggin (PhD, University of Aberdeen) served as a local church pastor for twenty years. He is an associate professor at Talbot School of Theology at Biola University and the director of the Healthy Pastor Initiative at Finishing the Task. He lives with his wife, Kristin, and their four children in Escondido, California.
Friends, if you or anyone you care deeply about is in ministry, there’s real healing to be found in the pages of Jamin’s book today!
It is a book that invites us all, once again, to experience the lavish grace of God in our lives. Pick up copy for yourself and for your pastor — Pastoral Confessions will be a blessing to any pastor who reads it. In these pages the good news of the gospel rings out! For more information, check out JaminGoggin.com
{Our humble thanks to Baker Books for their partnership in today’s devotional.}
