Don’t be surprised when religious institutions and powerful religious leaders turn against you the moment it becomes clear where your allegiance lies. It’s the moment of truth—when you are asked, perhaps by someone you trust and respect, to follow them instead of Jesus. Two roads diverge from the place at which you stand and now you must decide…

If earthly authority is about power, and the right to exercise that power to change the world, what does authority look like for those who are following Christ? Surely spiritual authority is a sanctified version of the same, simply exercised for a greater good—position, confidence, and strength leveraged to accomplish Jesus’s purposes in Jesus’s name.

Unless, it’s nothing like that at all…