The Healthy Pastor Initiative is investing in the inner life of the leaders carrying that mission. Over the last few weeks, God has opened several meaningful spaces for pastors to slow down, tell the truth, and receive grace together.
Chicagoland Gathering — Confession & the Work of a Pastor
On October 16, Park Community Church (Chicago) hosted a Movement Gathering with Exponential, where Jamin Goggin, head of the Healthy Pastor Initiative, shared on confession and pastoral health. It was a rare in-person space where leaders named the pressures beneath the surface of ministry — and considered how honest, confessional leadership is not a liability to mission but a pathway to long-term faithfulness.
As the Healthy Pastor Initiative gets underway, Jamin has been able to create spaces for pastors to explore their own spiritual health in order to complete the race of ministry well. These have included:
- A retreat in London for pastors exploring “Faithfulness in Ministry”
- Visiting pastors from Brazil in Southern California who shared how God is moving in their context and to strengthen relational partnership
- Multiple U.S. retreats focused on prayer, rest, shared honesty, and vocational sustainability
Each gathering has carried the same conviction: if the Church is to finish the task, pastors must finish their race well.
Why This Matters Now
Confession and pastoral health are not “soft topics.” They are guardrails for ministry. When pastors carry unspoken weight or unaddressed sin for years, cracks eventually surface publicly — often after deep damage has already been done.
The Healthy Pastor Initiative is working upstream — forming communities and practices that keep leaders in the light before crisis forces exposure.
A Timely Tool: Pastoral Confessions
In the very same season that these retreats and gatherings are taking shape, Jamin has just released his book Pastoral Confessions — not as theory, but as a continuation of the same invitation he is leading pastors into in rooms around the world: truthfulness before God and one another as the path to healing.
The book puts language to what many pastors are already feeling — and gives a theological and practical framework for a confessional way of leading that guards endurance, not just effectiveness. You can find the book here.
Check out Pastor Jamin’s audio series “Conversations on Finishing the Race” and the full Healthy Pastor Course - available now in the Healthy Church Teaching Network platform at healthychurchglobal.com/training.
