Doing God’s Job

I don’t know exactly when it happened, or how I developed the habit of becoming God’s little understudy. Not in the sense of being a faithful servant, but in the much more dangerous sense of trying to do God’s job for Him.

I have an incredible ability to involve myself in things that really aren’t mine to manage. I judge. I intervene. I offer opinions that weren’t requested. I try to correct situations and sometimes even people. Somehow, I convince myself that my involvement is necessary.

Yet when I look back over my life, I can see how many situations might have worked themselves out if I had simply kept my mouth shut, stayed out of the way, and allowed things to unfold. So much of what I become worked up about has very little bearing on my life at all. Still, something inside me wants to step in.

I want to direct the movie.

I want to tell people where to stand, what to say, how they should behave, and what they should do next. I want circumstances to unfold according to the script I have written in my head. And when they don’t, I become frustrated, anxious, and resentful.

Perhaps the problem isn’t always what is happening around me. Perhaps the problem is my insistence that I should be controlling it.

I have to remember: God has His job, and I have mine.

My job is not to control other people. It is not to straighten out every situation, correct every wrong, or make everyone see things the way I see them. My job is to remain faithful. To act with grace. To forgive. To help when help is needed. To speak when something truly needs to be said—and to learn the wisdom of silence when it doesn’t.

Sometimes I can do far more through my actions than through my words.

There is humility in accepting that I am not in charge of this ride. I didn’t create it, I cannot control it, and I certainly don’t understand everything that happens along the way. God sees what I cannot see. He knows what I cannot know.

Maybe faith is partly having enough trust to stop interfering.

To loosen my grip.

To allow people to walk their own paths.

To stop trying to arrange every outcome.

And to trust God with what belongs to God.

My responsibility is much simpler: remain faithful, walk in love, extend grace, and be good to the people God places before me.

And sometimes being good to someone means resisting the urge to judge them, correct them, or change them.

Sometimes my greatest contribution is simply to pray for them—and get out of God’s way.

“Be still, and know that I am God.” — Psalm 46:10