What's influencing you more: Culture or Scripture?

Summary

Lt Gen Clint Hinote, USAF (Ret.), and CH(COL) Light Shin, USA, join host Josh Jackson to examine influencer culture through a biblical lens. Hinote brings decades of military leadership experience and is now building a speaking ministry focused on integrating Christian faith and leadership into a single, unified message. Shin serves as an active-duty Army chaplain and father of three daughters, navigating influencer culture's effects on faith and family in real time. Both will be speaking on the theme of influence at OCF's White Sulphur Springs Conference Center this summer.

The conversation begins by establishing a biblical framework for thinking about influence—one that applies to all Christians before it applies to military officers specifically. A few key distinctions anchor everything that follows.

First, the platform versus the algorithm. Both guests agree that social media platforms are morally neutral—the tool itself is neither good nor evil. Hinote compares them to the Roman road system: the same infrastructure used to carry armies also carried the early gospel across the known world. What man built for one purpose, God can use for another. The YouVersion Bible App is offered as a contemporary example of Christians using technology with vision for gospel purposes. The algorithms driving those platforms, however, are a different matter. They are deliberately engineered not to inform or build up users, but to keep them scrolling—by targeting base impulses, feeding comparison, and manufacturing shame. Hinote frames these as the "flaming arrows" of Ephesians 6, and the first thing you see on social media that triggers envy, comparison, or temptation is an arrow. Recognize it. Raise your shield of faith.

Second, influencer versus witness. Shin draws a sharp distinction from Acts 1:8, saying that an influencer seeks to build a following but a witness tells the truth about what they have seen and heard, regardless of the audience's reaction. Both guests agree that Christian influence should be a byproduct of a Christ-centered life—not a goal pursued in its own right. When influence becomes the goal, self replaces God at the center. The framework they offer is simple: know Christ above all things, do what Christ commanded, and become more like Jesus through that ongoing, lifelong process. Influence, rightly understood, flows from that. As Shin puts it, the question worth asking regularly is: "Whose kingdom did I build today—God's or mine?"

Third, authenticity over curation. The lie of influencer culture, Hinote argues, is that you have to look like you have it all figured out. In reality, authenticity builds trust, and trust is what creates genuine influence. This is as true in the gospel as it is in personal branding, and the early church wrestled with the same pull toward following personalities over Christ, as Paul addresses directly in 1 Corinthians 1:12. The standard the guests return to throughout is 1 Peter 3:15 (ESV): "Always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you—yet do it with gentleness and respect."

With that foundation in place, the conversation turns to what this means specifically for Christian officers serving in uniform.

Referenced in this conversation:

• Summer R&R 2 at WSS (Hinote)
• Summer R&R 6 at WSS (Shin)
• YouVersion Bible App
• The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness by Timothy Keller

 
Questions answered and themes covered in this interview include:
 
How is social media affecting the younger generation entering military service?

Young people entering the military are increasingly shaped by a worldview centered on self-promotion, curated personas, and metrics of online acceptance. This stands in direct tension with what military formation is designed to accomplish. The foundational goal of basic training is the breakdown of individual ego and the subordination of self to the unit. Shin references Timothy Keller's The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness as the counterpoint to what he observes: recruits arriving not in freedom, but in what he calls "bondage of self-obsession"—more concerned with how they're perceived on a platform than how they're showing up for the person next to them. Hinote adds that this tension isn't new, and that American individualism has always been something the military has had to address. However, the platforms intensify that individualism by continuously reinforcing exactly the self-focused impulses that military culture is trying to dismantle. Character development must be continuous and intentional, not treated as something institutions address only when there's time.
Resource: The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness by Timothy Keller
 
How do I share my faith as a military officer without it being weird or forced?

Start by living the message before communicating it, and know which role you're speaking from at any given moment. Hinote, drawing from his own experience rising through senior military ranks, offers a framework that proved practically useful. When you are on a platform, in uniform, with rank on your shoulders and a flag behind you, you are speaking from a position of institutional authority, and conflating that authority with the authority of Christ risks manipulation and coercion, which is not Christlike leadership. In settings where you have more personal freedom—as a church member, a neighbor, a citizen—you have more latitude to speak openly about your faith. The key is empathy: always consider what role your audience sees you occupying. In either context, when you fail—and you will—own it and apologize. Authenticity builds trust. Trust creates real influence. A practical starting point Hinote recommends for any developing leader is this: keep a journal, write down every role you hold, and identify the through line connecting them all. Then live that through line. The standard throughout is 1 Peter 3:15 (ESV): "Always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you—yet do it with gentleness and respect."

Statistics and data shared this episode (plus a few extra not included):

• A working definition of influencer culture: Influencer culture is a social and economic phenomenon created when social media platforms reward people for curating a public identity, performing for engagement, and building an audience around themselves. Influencers use their platform to shape the opinions, lifestyles, and purchasing decisions of their audience.
• Every generation is influenced in some way by influencer marketing: 55% of Gen Z trust influencer recommendations, compared with 44% of Millennials, 35% of Gen X, and 28% of Baby Boomers (2025 Clutch survey).
• StoryBox says there are approximately 127 million active social media influencers worldwide—roughly 2.4% of the global social media user base of 5+ billion people.
• EMarketer breaks that down into 4 tiers of influencers: Nano: 1,000–10,000 followers; Micro: 10,000–100,000 followers; Macro: 100,000–1 million followers; and Mega/celebrity: 1 million+ followers.
• The vast majority of influencers on TikTok (nearly 88%) are nano-influencers and Instagram follows a similar pattern with nano-influencers representing about 76% of its influencers (eMarketer).
• According to some reports, military-related content on TikTok alone amassed over 15 billion views in 2023; look up #MilTok. Military.com calls it the rise of soldier influencers.
• Influencer culture is not just shaping what people buy (or which branch to join)—it’s doing three things: It's shaping how an entire generation sees themselves, forms relationships, and decides who to trust. Consider the following:
• In terms of how they see themselves: Writer and Substack author Freya India, whose book GIRLS was published earlier this year, frames influencer culture this way—girls as young as 12 packaging themselves for Instagram, getting feedback on their appearance, measuring their worth in likes and followers. An adjacent stat is this: 47% of Gen Z often or always feel anxious (Gallup, 2023). That's the self-perception toll.
• In terms of forming relationships: A Harvard study says 61% of young adults ages 18–25 report profound loneliness—the highest rate of any age group. This is the one that tends to surprise people, because the assumption is that hyper-connected generations would be less lonely or that older generations would be the loneliest.
• In terms of deciding who to trust: Only 8% of Gen Z say there's a religious leader they can turn to (Springtide Research). And from Edelman—religious and faith leaders rank at 44% trust rate among Gen Z, well below doctors, scientists, and teachers. But here's the flip side: family members rank at 88% trust. The hunger for relational authority is still there and it’s real. Instead, it's institutional authority that's taken a hit.