Making Myself Stick
A few weeks ago, when a friend asked me to do something, I blurted: “I would love to do it!” Within a day, I began to have niggling doubts and a week later, nightmares, over what I’d committed to.
Sometimes, my love (or poor impulse control) makes me offer too much. In 2022, I knew God had called me to help my parents care for my handicapped brother. Enthralled, I discussed guardianship, implying to my parents and brother that it would be for the rest of his life, as that’s what seemed most logical at the time. How painful for them when, after less than a year, I packed up and moved away, letting them down after all those promises.
Commitments to Others
Deep commitments were common in the first-century Roman world. Patron-client relationships demanded much of both parties. If a rich businesswoman became the patron of a baker, she would negotiate his debts and reasonable prices for his flour, while he, in turn, might work through the night to make special bread for her unexpected company (p. 162-3, Misreading the Bible with Western Eyes).
When Paul received gifts from the Philippians, he understood all the strings attached. They would expect him to come to Philippi whenever they needed him.
But God had called Paul as a missionary to other cities. Imagine if Paul had stuck close to Philippi and had never gone to Cyprus, Athens, Malta, or Rome.
How did Paul get away with breaking the obligation? Paul’s letter to the church at Philippi says: “I have received full payment and have more than enough. I am amply supplied, now that I have received from Epaphroditus the gifts you sent. They are a fragrant offering, an acceptable sacrifice, pleasing to God. And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:18-19).
Paul deals with the cultural expectation by saying their gift is to God, rather than to Paul. Because it is given to God, it will be God who performs the client’s responsibilities in the relationship (p. 165).
The Prime Mover
When I prayed asking God if I’d been the evil cause that drove my brother back to my elderly parents for care, I saw a picture of a giant hand, God’s hand, carrying my brother from the house where we’d been living, back down the road to my parents’ home. When I prayed, “Oh God, it was so mean. What will they do now?” I sensed God saying that He was fully available to my brother and my parents.
I guess I was not meant to be a saviour. I’m called to love deeply and give generously, but my love and offerings do not demonstrate how great I am, nor do they save people. They come from God’s Spirit, and they are for God’s purposes.
Slow to Learn
Unfortunately, this has been an ongoing theme for me. I had to extricate myself from yet another situation, and phoned a friend to pray about my intense guilt. While she prayed, God gave a picture of the sticky backing on a command hook. (I’d never bought command hooks because I’d assumed removing them would rip the paint off my walls, but I’d just learned otherwise.) In the picture, I pulled the tab downwards until it harmlessly released the sticky backing. Perhaps God was saying it was fine to commit, but not so tightly; I need to be able to release.
My dad likes to add the abbreviation “DV” to his plans (deo volente – God willing). It’s an idea straight from Jesus’ brother, James. “Now listen, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.’ Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, ‘If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that’” (James 4:13-15).
Guilt
Guilt creeps in now as I write. Surely, baptizing my terrible behaviour with Christian-sounding excuses will make my family feel worse.
I don’t even like when Jesus behaved so irresponsibly. At age 12, he stayed in Jerusalem when his parents thought he was heading home with them. It took a full three-days search before they discovered him in the temple, listening to the teachers and asking them questions.
How cruel Jesus’ answer seems: “Why did you seek me? Did you not know that I must be about my Father’s business?” (Luke 2:49).
His posture of un-stickiness teaches us there is a time for everything. “A time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing” (Ecclesiastes 3:5).
My mom doesn’t question how suddenly I was called away from helping them. She insists that I arrived at the perfect time, when she was most overwhelmed, and when my uncle down the road needed help after an accident. My guilt keeps me from rejoicing that God orchestrated the perfect timing, and it clouds the incredible joy of the year I spent with them.
Let’s continue to be about our Father’s business, and not darken our days with regret.