Faithformed: Honest Faith for People Who Don't Have it All Together

Justin Belt
  • 4.7 (6)
  • Christianity

Most faith content is made by people already on the other side of the hard season. This isn't that. FaithFormed is for the person stuck in the middle of a story that doesn't make sense. The one trusting God in the waiting and wondering if He's still listening. The one whose faith is being tested by silence, loss, or a season that just won't end. The one who keeps showing up anyway. Host Justin Belt is a writer, minister, and author of The Purpose in the Pause, Slaying the Lion, and Rise Up. He doesn't have neat answers about why God feels silent sometimes. But he brings honesty, biblical truth, and the stubborn belief that God is still working even when you can't see it. Each week Justin offers honest conversations about faith, doubt, spiritual warfare, waiting on God, and what it actually looks like to follow Christ when life falls apart. If you're navigating a hard season, feeling forgotten by God, or just need someone to be honest about the struggle — this show is for you. New episodes every Monday.

  1. 2d ago

    62: How Do I Pray When I Don’t Know What to Say? | The Lord’s Prayer and Borrowed Words

    Send us Fan Mail How do I pray when I don’t know what to say? If you sit down to pray and nothing comes, or the Lord’s Prayer feels too general for what you’re carrying, this episode is for you. In Part 2 of a six-week series, Teach Us To Pray, Justin starts with a number he can’t give you, because he has lost count of the times he has sat down or knelt down to pray and had nothing to say. Then he takes two honest questions to Scripture. Is it a kind of sacrilege to kneel with nothing? And does it count to pray words that aren’t yours? Together we look at Luke 11:1-4 and Matthew 6:5-13, where Jesus answers “teach us to pray” with actual words; Psalm 88, the psalm that ends in the dark and still made it into the Bible; Psalm 22:1 and Psalm 31:5, the borrowed words Jesus prayed on the cross; Gethsemane in Matthew 26, where he prays “your will be done” and then prays the same words again; Isaiah 63 and 64, where “Our Father” is prayed in the ruins of a burned temple; Ezekiel 36:22-27, the promise behind “hallowed be your name”; and Hebrews 7:25, where Jesus is still praying. Then we travel to the earliest Christians. The Didache, a short handbook from the early church, told believers to pray the Lord’s Prayer three times a day. Cyril of Jerusalem and Tertullian of Carthage both wrote about it too, and they have something to say about why a set prayer helps on the days you have nothing. You’ll leave with one practice for the week: the Lord’s Prayer prayed slowly, a line at a time, with a breath after each line and room for one sentence of your own. This episode is for the dad at the dinner table with his head bowed and nothing coming, and for anyone who has found the Lord’s Prayer thin and wondered what that says about them. Get this week’s prayer practice in your inbox through the newsletter The Pursuit of Formed Faith. Link in the show notes. If this episode helped you, share it with someone who needs it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, and subscribe so next Monday’s episode finds you. Support the show Connect with us via our Instagram: @faithformed_pod Email us any questions or comments to yourpursuitpodcast@gmail.com Order your copy of my latest book, "The Purpose in the Pause", here Join the new community via my newsletter, The Pursuit of Formed Faith. It's new and ready for you!

  2. Oct 19

    61. Why Can’t I Pray Anymore? | What the Bible Says When Prayer Feels Empty

    Send us Fan Mail Why does prayer feel so empty? If you can’t pray anymore, if you sit down and nothing comes, or you stopped altogether and don’t know how to start again, this episode is for you. In Part 1 of a six-week series on prayer, Justin Belt shares what happened when his church closed and he couldn’t put together three prayerful words, even after walking with Jesus for most of his forty-six years. Then he takes the question to Scripture and asks what the Bible actually says about believers who run out of words. Together we look at Luke 11:1, where men who had prayed all their lives still asked Jesus to teach them; Mark 1:35 and Luke 5:16, where Jesus keeps withdrawing to lonely places; Hebrews 5:7, where he prays with loud cries and tears; Psalms 77 and 143, prayers written by people who could not speak; and Romans 8:15-34, where the Holy Spirit takes hold of the other end of our weakness, prays with groanings too deep for words, and cries “Abba” in us while Christ intercedes at the Father’s right hand. Then we travel to fourth-century Egypt for the one-sentence prayer of Abba Macarius, one of the Desert Fathers. You’ll leave with one small practice, built for the worst day you’ve had in months: open hands, one sentence, three minutes. This episode is for the pastor who still says “let’s pray” and then goes home with no words, and for anyone who stopped praying and has been too ashamed to start again. Get this week’s prayer practice in your inbox through the newsletter The Pursuit of Formed Faith. Link below.  If this episode helped you, share it with someone who needs it, leave a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, and subscribe so next Monday’s episode finds you. Tags: prayer, can’t pray, prayer feels empty, how to pray, why can’t I pray, Romans 8:26, Desert Fathers, Abba Macarius, prayer with no words, pastor can’t pray, Christian podcast, spiritual formation, discipleship, what the Bible says about prayer Support the show Connect with us via our Instagram: @faithformed_pod Email us any questions or comments to yourpursuitpodcast@gmail.com Order your copy of my latest book, "The Purpose in the Pause", here Join the new community via my newsletter, The Pursuit of Formed Faith. It's new and ready for you!

  3. Oct 12

    60: Is God Telling Me to Wait or to Go? How to Know When to Step Out in Faith

    Send us Fan Mail Is God telling you to wait, or to go? If you’re trying to figure out when to step out in faith and when to wait on God, this episode walks through five passages of Scripture and ends in a flooded riverbed. I start where the Bible starts when it talks about going forward: the Red Sea. In Exodus 14:1-4, God Himself tells Israel to camp where the whole thing will look like a mistake, and a few verses later the same chapter says both “be still” (14:14) and “move on” (14:15). Then we jump forty years to Joshua 3, where the priests carrying the ark have to put their feet in a river at flood stage before the water stops. From there, we look at going afraid. Gideon is hiding in a winepress when he hears “Go in the strength you have” (Judges 6:14), and Paul arrives in Corinth “in weakness with great fear and trembling” (1 Corinthians 2:3, Acts 18:9-10). Then we look at going to the people God sends you to: Jeremiah 1:7, “Go to everyone I send you to,” and Mark 5:19, where Jesus tells a freed man to go home to his own people. You’ll also get a four-question test for any word you believe you’ve heard, built on Acts 16:6-10, where the early church “concluded” God had called them. And if you’ve been waiting and haven’t heard a word at all, Psalm 27:14 has something for you too. The ending comes back to Joshua 3:17. The priests didn’t cross first. They stood in the middle of the riverbed until everyone else was across. If you’re in the waiting, my book The Purpose in the Pause is for you. For more between episodes, sign up for The Pursuit of Formed Faith: https://justinbelt.beehiiv.com/ Scripture: Exodus 14:1-4, 14-16; Joshua 3:1-17; Judges 6:11-16, 25-27; Acts 18:9-10; 1 Corinthians 2:3; Jeremiah 1:5-8, 17-19; Mark 5:1-20; Acts 16:6-10; Psalm 27:14. Keywords: is God telling me to wait or go, how to know if God is telling you to go, how to know when to step out in faith, wait on God or step out in faith, when to wait and when to move forward, afraid to obey God, Exodus 14:15 meaning, be still and move on, Joshua 3 priests in the Jordan, Gideon go in the strength you have, Jeremiah 1 do not say I am only a child, Mark 5:19 go home to your own people, Acts 16:10 concluding, how to discern God’s direction, Christian podcast Support the show Connect with us via our Instagram: @faithformed_pod Email us any questions or comments to yourpursuitpodcast@gmail.com Order your copy of my latest book, "The Purpose in the Pause", here Join the new community via my newsletter, The Pursuit of Formed Faith. It's new and ready for you!

  4. Oct 5

    59: Why Do I Keep Making Myself Smaller? | What the Bible Says About False Humility

    Send us Fan Mail Somebody pays me a compliment and before the sentence is finished, I'm already taking it back. For years I called that humility. If you've ever wondered why you keep making yourself smaller, this episode takes the question to Scripture. We look at false humility: the habit of downplaying your gifts and quietly shrinking to fit the room while calling it a virtue. Philippians 2:3 tells us to value others above ourselves, and we look closely at what Paul was actually correcting there, which was selfish ambition and vain conceit. He never asked anyone to misjudge their own size. From there we walk with the people in Scripture who shrank. Esther, whose silence in Esther 4:14 carried a cost for other people. Moses, who argued with a burning bush about his own smallness in Exodus 3 and 4 and heard "I will be with you" every time. The woman in Mark 5:25-34 who tried to take her healing and disappear into the crowd, and the Savior who stopped everything to call her daughter. Augustine and Howard Thurman join the conversation, and the episode lands on 2 Corinthians 4:7 and the clay jar, where the treasure inside was never meant to stay hidden. Along the way, a few plain pictures of what taking up space looks like in an ordinary conversation. If you've ever asked why you downplay your accomplishments, or why you can't just say thank you, this one is for you. Scripture: Philippians 2:3, Esther 4:14, Exodus 3:11-12, Exodus 4:10, Mark 5:25-34, 2 Corinthians 4:7. Share it with someone who deflects every compliment. Get more between episodes: sign up for The Pursuit of Formed Faith at https://justinbelt.beehiiv.com/ Keywords: why do I keep making myself smaller, false humility, why do I downplay my accomplishments, why can't I take a compliment, is humility biblical, Philippians 2:3 meaning, Esther 4:14 meaning, Moses excuses burning bush, woman with the issue of blood Mark 5, treasure in jars of clay 2 Corinthians 4:7, Howard Thurman sound of the genuine, Augustine Confessions you were within me, Christian podcast on identity Support the show Connect with us via our Instagram: @faithformed_pod Email us any questions or comments to yourpursuitpodcast@gmail.com Order your copy of my latest book, "The Purpose in the Pause", here Join the new community via my newsletter, The Pursuit of Formed Faith. It's new and ready for you!

  5. Sep 28

    58. Texting With Jesus: Christianity in an AI World" | Can an AI Be Your Pastor?

    Send us Fan Mail There is an app where you can text with Jesus. Not read about Him. Text Him, and an AI answers back in His voice, in real time. It sounds like a punchline. It isn't. If you've wondered whether it's wrong to use AI for your faith, or whether a chatbot could ever actually be your pastor, this episode is a pastoral, honest answer, not from someone standing outside the technology, but from someone who uses it and will tell you exactly how. We look at why apps like Text With Jesus and Bible Chat (reportedly 25 million downloads) are genuinely working for people: constant availability, no judgment, and a real, documented loss of trust in human religious leaders after real scandal and abuse. That ache is legitimate, and this episode doesn't mock it. Then the actual danger, not that it's "fake," everyone knows that, but that these apps have been documented misciting Scripture with total confidence, and there's no elder, no pastor, no community to catch it. With Acts 17's Bereans (who could test a fixed, accountable person, not a shifting pattern) and 1 Corinthians 12:26 ("if one part suffers, every part suffers with it"), this episode draws the line. We also give real, respectful time to the opposite view: a growing number of pastors who believe AI has no place in sermon preparation at all. That argument deserves to be heard, not dismissed, before we land on where the actual boundary sits. A chatbot can hand you information. It cannot suffer with you, know your name, or be the body Christ actually built His church to be. Use the tools. Never mistake them for a shepherd. Scripture: Acts 17:10-11, 1 Corinthians 12:26, John 1:14. Share it with someone who's mentioned using one of these apps, not to shame them, to point them toward the real thing. A free companion resource, "Tool or Idol," is available here. Get your copy today! Keywords: can AI be your pastor, is it wrong to use AI for faith, Text With Jesus app, Bible Chat AI app, AI chatbot spiritual guidance, can a chatbot replace church, Christianity and artificial intelligence, discipleship in the age of AI, should pastors use AI for sermons Support the show Connect with us via our Instagram: @faithformed_pod Email us any questions or comments to yourpursuitpodcast@gmail.com Order your copy of my latest book, "The Purpose in the Pause", here Join the new community via my newsletter, The Pursuit of Formed Faith. It's new and ready for you!

  6. Sep 21

    57. What Does It Mean to Be Favored by God? | Favored Doesn't Mean What You Think It Means

    Send us Fan Mail Scroll social media long enough and someone will tell you God's favor means open doors, promotions, and money showing up. That's not what favor means in Scripture. Not close. If you've ever wondered what it actually means to be favored by God, this episode answers it, using Scripture almost entirely to make the case. We start with the actual word, hen in Hebrew and charis in Greek, the same word translated "grace" everywhere else in the New Testament. Favor isn't a wage for impressive behavior. It's unearned closeness. We also name the phrase you've heard, maybe said yourself: "favor ain't fair." There's something right about it, it's just charis in different words, and the instinct to testify about an undeserved gift is good and biblical. But with James Cone's voice alongside Scripture, this episode asks the harder question: what happens to the friend still waiting, still building, still hasn't seen a single visible sign, if we only ever say the phrase over the new car? Then Mary, told she's "highly favored" in Luke 1, and what that favor actually produced: a scandal that could have gotten her killed, a pregnancy nobody understood, and eventually, as Simeon told her, a sword through her own soul watching her son die. Noah, who "found favor" and then spent decades building an ark nobody believed in, mocked the entire time, with nothing visible to show for it until the very end. And Jeremiah and Asaph in Psalm 73, two honest men who watched the wicked prosper while they suffered, and found the answer wasn't an explanation, it was nearness, God holding their hand, worth more than the ease they didn't have. If your life doesn't look like the prosperity version of favor right now, that's not evidence you've missed out on it. Scripture: Luke 1:28-30, Genesis 6:8, Ephesians 2:8-9, Jeremiah 12:1, Psalm 73. Share it with someone measuring God's favor by how easy their life is going. Keywords: what does it mean to be favored by God, biblical meaning of favor, favor ain't fair meaning, difference between favor and grace, Mary highly favored meaning Luke 1, Noah found favor Genesis 6, why do the wicked prosper Jeremiah, Psalm 73 meaning, James Cone prosperity gospel Support the show Connect with us via our Instagram: @faithformed_pod Email us any questions or comments to yourpursuitpodcast@gmail.com Order your copy of my latest book, "The Purpose in the Pause", here Join the new community via my newsletter, The Pursuit of Formed Faith. It's new and ready for you!

  7. Sep 14

    56. Why Don't I Feel Like a Man Yet? | What Nobody Told You About Being a Man

    Send us Fan Mail I was scared to death when my first son was born. Not the normal kind of scared. I was scared because I didn't feel like a man yet, and now I was supposed to grow one. If you've ever asked yourself why you don't feel like a man yet, even after checking every box, this episode is for you. I grew up with a father in my home. I got married. Twenty years now. Five kids. I checked every box anyone could hand me. And some days it still feels foreign. I used to think something was wrong with me for that. This episode names four counterfeits I sat in personally while looking for the feeling of having arrived at manhood, the hobby-list version, the empty performance-sermon version, the provider-only version, and the cultural checklist version, and admits something I went looking for before I made this: nobody has ever actually studied whether men feel like they've become what they're supposed to become. That silence says something. We go to Genesis 2:15, the oldest job description a man has ever been given, to cultivate and to guard, and to 1 Corinthians 16:13, Paul's four-word charge that's never a finish line, always an ongoing action. Then to Christ Himself, strength that knelt to wash feet, wept at a tomb, and overturned tables when the moment called for it. And we close with 1 Kings 2, the last thing David said to Solomon with his dying breath, and what it means for a man who's still walking this out imperfectly, twenty years in. You don't have to have arrived. You just have to keep following. Scripture: Genesis 2:15, 1 Corinthians 16:13, John 15:13, 1 Kings 2:2-3. Share it with a man who's checked every box and still feels like he's faking it. If this one found you, there's more where it came from. Sign up for The Pursuit of Formed Faith, my newsletter, at the link below. That's where the deeper stuff lives between episodes. Keywords: why don't I feel like a man yet, why do I feel like I haven't become a man, biblical masculinity, what does Genesis say about manhood, David's charge to Solomon, 1 Corinthians 16:13 meaning, Christian manhood, why are young men returning to church, fatherlessness statistics, toxic masculinity Christian response Support the show Connect with us via our Instagram: @faithformed_pod Email us any questions or comments to yourpursuitpodcast@gmail.com Order your copy of my latest book, "The Purpose in the Pause", here Join the new community via my newsletter, The Pursuit of Formed Faith. It's new and ready for you!

  8. Sep 7

    55. Deconstruction vs. Doubt: How to Tell the Difference | Questioning Toward God, Not Away From Him

    Send us Fan Mail I test everything against Scripture, even what I was taught as a child. My life is still full of sin and mistakes while I do it. And the questions I don't have answers for haven't pushed me away from God. They've pulled me closer to Him. That's not deconstruction. This episode names the actual difference, because almost nobody ever hands people a way to tell the two apart, and a lot of good, honest, hungry people are quietly terrified they're doing the wrong one when they're actually doing the right one. Two people can ask the exact same hard question about the exact same doctrine and end up in completely opposite places. Barna's research shows 42% of American adults report having "deconstructed" the faith of their youth, a number far larger than the number who actually leave the faith entirely. Pew's research on why people stay versus leave shows the activity, questioning, isn't the variable. The direction is. We go to Job, where God's anger in the whole book lands not on Job's brutal, unfiltered questions, but on his friends' tidy, false comfort. "You have not spoken the truth about me, as my servant Job has." With Esau McCaulley, whose own theological education pressured him toward deconstruction and who instead went deeper into the text through Black church hermeneutics and came out the other side calling it "an exercise in hope," and C.S. Lewis, whose grief after losing his wife knocked down what he called his "house of cards" faith and rebuilt something smaller and truer, this episode offers a real, honest test for which direction your own questioning is actually taking you. Your questions were never the threat. Scripture: Job 42:7, and the whole of Job's honest complaint. Share it with someone questioning right now, or someone watching a person they love question, and give them the distinction this episode names. This episode discusses doubt, deconstruction, and church hurt with honesty and care. If you're navigating a faith crisis and need support, consider reaching out to a trusted pastor or counselor. Support the show Connect with us via our Instagram: @faithformed_pod Email us any questions or comments to yourpursuitpodcast@gmail.com Order your copy of my latest book, "The Purpose in the Pause", here Join the new community via my newsletter, The Pursuit of Formed Faith. It's new and ready for you!

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Most faith content is made by people already on the other side of the hard season. This isn't that. FaithFormed is for the person stuck in the middle of a story that doesn't make sense. The one trusting God in the waiting and wondering if He's still listening. The one whose faith is being tested by silence, loss, or a season that just won't end. The one who keeps showing up anyway. Host Justin Belt is a writer, minister, and author of The Purpose in the Pause, Slaying the Lion, and Rise Up. He doesn't have neat answers about why God feels silent sometimes. But he brings honesty, biblical truth, and the stubborn belief that God is still working even when you can't see it. Each week Justin offers honest conversations about faith, doubt, spiritual warfare, waiting on God, and what it actually looks like to follow Christ when life falls apart. If you're navigating a hard season, feeling forgotten by God, or just need someone to be honest about the struggle — this show is for you. New episodes every Monday.

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