What If You’re Not Who You Think You Are? | John Mark McMillan

Why It Matters

McMillan’s shift from front‑line worship songwriter to author-with-music underscores how artists are redefining careers and brands amid changing industry and faith-audience expectations. His story signals broader trends in creative sustainability, audience segmentation between sacred and secular markets, and the role of personal life in artistic direction.

Summary

Songwriter and worship leader John Mark McMillan — best known for “How He Loves Us” — discusses a late-career reassessment in which he nearly quit music to pursue writing books, ultimately keeping music as a side pursuit while returning toward more explicitly sacred work. He reflects on navigating the blurred boundaries between secular and sacred labels in the music industry, his creative identity at nearly 47, and the practical rhythms of family life. McMillan also describes a long marriage, parenting teenagers, and how everyday domestic rhythms have become a source of spiritual fulfillment. The conversation mixes career pivoting, faith-based artistry, and personal reflection on what it means to be who you think you are.

Original Description

In this episode of Dad Tired, Jerrad Lopes sits down with songwriter, worship leader, recording artist, and author John Mark McMillan, best known for writing the worship song “How He Loves.”

This conversation goes way beyond music.

Jerrad and John Mark talk about identity, creativity, family, raising teenagers, contemplation, distraction, phones, church, and the search for meaning in a world that constantly pulls us away from God, from our families, and from ourselves.

John Mark shares about nearly quitting music, rediscovering his love for writing, and learning to create from a more honest place. Together, he and Jerrad explore what happens when men build their lives around survival, performance, success, or approval, and how God often uses painful seasons to help us rediscover who we really are.

If you’ve ever felt distracted, disconnected, spiritually dry, or unsure of who you are beneath all the roles you play, this conversation will speak deeply to you.

In this episode:

John Mark McMillan on almost quitting music

Why identity gets tangled up in what we do

The beauty of ordinary family life

Raising teenagers and having real conversations

Why contemplation matters

How phones and distraction are shaping our souls

Why the church can be a place of presence in a noisy world

How God uses painful seasons to bring us back to who we really are

Listen to the Dad Tired podcast: https://www.dadtired.com