Quick Fixes Don't Help Barren Soil

In the documentary The Biggest Little Farm, a husband and wife purchase a barren plot of land in California.

Through their learning and effort, the sun-scorched, lifeless, cracked soil is brought back to life. But not through quick fixes. Not by dumping in fertilizer or forcing the ground to yield more.

The soil had been so depleted by over-harvesting and a complete lack of replenishment that water couldn’t even penetrate it. Instead, flooding would occur.

Can your soul relate?

When even the waters of new life can’t get through?

The couple discovered that a slow, intentional, and deeply attuned approach changes everything. And they had to learn how soil becomes fertile again.

Through regenerative/holistic agriculture, land can be healed. It doesn’t just survive...it begins to thrive. Over time, the soil becomes rich again. Life returns.

The system works not because it was optimized, but because it was restored.

It’s a powerful metaphor.

And it might just be a model for a different way to live and lead.

What If Our Lives Are More Like Soil Than Machines?

We live in a world that runs on output. From a young age, we are trained to value progress, productivity, and efficiency...whether in ministry, business, parenting, or leadership.

But here’s the catch: that mindset often ignores the most essential part of us.

The soil.

Your soul.

Your soul is the integrating center of your life.

“When we speak of the Human Soul, we are speaking of the deepest level of life and power in the human being.”

- Dallas Willard, Renovation of the Heart

When your soul is healthy, everything else has a chance to flourish. But when it’s depleted—when it’s dry, cracked, and exhausted...even good things can’t take root.

Like overworked soil, our inner lives can be slowly stripped of vitality by unrelenting demands. Even meaningful work can leave us diminished if our soul is never replenished.

But it doesn’t have to be that way.

A Different Kind of Leadership

Think of your workplace, your leadership, and those around you.

At the beginning, we start fully alive to God and begin to work from that place. But in our hustle culture, the cart can go in front of the horse quickly. The work continues, but we lose our connection with God and can go numb to our souls.

Think about this: What if you could be more alive at the end of your season of leadership than you were at the start? 

More Christlike than at the beginning.

More at peace.

Knowing how to rest and work in balance.

Deep, meaningful relationships. 

Often in many of our lived experiences, it can too easily be the opposite. The beginning is exciting, but we can lose ourselves or our souls along the way. 

It doesn't have to be like that. 

We believe you were created to live and lead in a way that’s deeply sustainable. A way that aligns with how God made you. 

The path forward begins by reimagining leadership itself—not as a machine to keep running, but as a garden to tend.

In regenerative farming, the farmer doesn’t just extract what the land can give. They pay attention. They know the need for replenishment. They protect the integrity of the ecosystem.

Over time, the soil gets better, not worse.

The same can be true of your soul.

What Soul-Healthy Living Actually Looks Like

Soul-healthy leadership isn’t soft. It’s strong. Resilient. Deeply rooted. It holds up over time because it honors the integrity of how God designed life to flourish.

That kind of life prioritizes:

• Margin instead of constant urgency

• Presence over performance

• Restorative rhythms rather than reactive chaos

• Inner life over outward success

And just like with the land, this change doesn’t happen overnight. But slowly, over time, the soul becomes fertile again.

Relationships deepen. Discernment sharpens. Wisdom grows. Courage rises.
You find yourself leading not from scarcity, but from overflow.

The Way Forward

There’s something powerful about the image of cracked soil; so dry it can’t even absorb water. It’s not just thirsty. It’s hardened. No longer receptive to life.

But even that soil, with time and care, can become good ground again.

And so can we.

This is the invitation before us: not to do more, but to live differently. To become the kind of people who can sustain meaningful work for the long haul because we’re rooted in a life with God that goes deeper than checking boxes and covering bases.

We believe this is not only possible, but essential.

It’s time to recover the soul of our leadership.
And the soil might just show us how.

Interested in taking the next step?

Whether you feel it or not, your inner life is shaping your outer life. Strengthening Our Souls is a foundational course designed to help you slow down, reconnect with God, and build rhythms that last.

• Foundational soul care practices
• Self-paced format, go slow, go deep
• Practical, approachable steps

“I am more in tune with the Spirit of God. I developed habits of morning prayer walks and evening examen… Strengthening Our Souls was good for my soul.”

— Daniel Miller, Senior Pastor | Meridian Church of God

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