466: When Pain Gets Wasted. Shawn Johnson on Stewarding the Middle Season of Life, How Bitterness Erodes Trust, and Why We Settle for Temporary Rest Instead of True Peace

There’s a way to live that squanders pain while your heart hardens and your trust thins. Things like numbing, retelling the wound, and calling it wisdom. This week on Win Today, Shawn Johnson, lead pastor of Red Rocks Church and author of Attacking Anxiety, joins me to explore how people waste pain and how to steward the middle seasons when nothing seems to be moving, but everything inside you is being formed. We draw the line between rest and peace, why bitterness and distrust grow in the same soil, and how to turn waiting into worship without pretending the ache away. If you’re stuck in the middle, angry at the delay, or exhausted from managing outcomes, this conversation will help you regain your presence and cultivate a hard-won hope that lasts.

You’ll learn:

• What “wasting pain” looks like, and how God repurposes it without romanticizing suffering.
• How to steward the middle: waiting as formation, not failure.
• The link between bitterness and broken trust, and the practices that starve bitterness.
• Rest vs. peace: why we chase relief and miss the presence that heals.
• A simple framework to move forward when anxiety, delay, and disappointment stack up.

Guest Bio

Shawn Johnson is the lead pastor and co-founder of Red Rocks Church (Denver, multi-site), and the author of Attacking Anxiety, where he chronicles his own fight with anxiety and depression and the practices that helped him rebuild. His ministry blends candor about suffering with a relentless call to faith and formation. Today isn’t about his résumé; it’s about your next faithful step in the middle.

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Website | Instagram

Resources Mentioned This Week

• Kiss the Fire: 7 Ways to Get Back Up When You Want to Give Up
• Healing What You Can’t Erase: Transform Your Mental, Emotional, and Spiritual Health from the Inside Out

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