Kuzcotopia Was Not in God’s Blueprint

I have always considered myself a pretty good multitasker.

Actually, let me correct that.

I have always considered multitasking one of my spiritual gifts.

I can answer an email while thinking about dinner, mentally reorganize my week while folding laundry, remember something I forgot at work while praying, & somehow start three tasks because apparently finishing one before beginning another feels entirely too pedestrian.

So when God started dealing with me about managing multiple responsibilities, my initial response was basically, “Okay God, I hear You.”

Because multitasking?

Baby, I got that.

Except, as usual, God was not talking about what I thought He was talking about.

Because there is a difference between doing multiple things & stewarding multiple things well.

And apparently having seventeen tabs open in my brain is not the same thing as being organized.

Rude.

The older I get, the more I realize life seldom gets less busy. God just gives us grace to manage what He has entrusted to us. There will always be something requiring my attention. Something will be growing while something else is being repaired. Something will be flourishing while another area is under construction. There will be seasons when I am simultaneously healing, building, working, loving, resting, serving, learning, unlearning, showing up & trying not to lose my ever loving mind.

Grace does not always remove responsibilities.

Sometimes grace teaches me how to carry them.

That is what struck me about Nehemiah.

In Nehemiah 5:1-5, while the wall is being rebuilt, another problem erupts. The people are crying out because of economic oppression, debt, hunger & injustice. Families are struggling. Children are being subjected to slavery. People are mortgaging their fields, vineyards & homes just to survive.

And Nehemiah cannot say, “Okay, but we are doing the wall right now.”

Because reconstruction in one area does not alleviate responsibility in another.

Whew.

Okay God.

I hear You.

Because I have absolutely been guilty of getting so focused on rebuilding one area that I unintentionally let another one deteriorate.

I will pour everything into work & realize I have neglected rest.

Pour into responsibilities & realize I have been unavailable relationally.

Focus on getting one thing exactly right & drop three other balls trying to perfect it.

My work muscle, specifically, has always been unusually strong.

For my 16th birthday, I wanted two things: a job & a red velvet cake.

Not a car.

Not some elaborate Sweet Sixteen.

Employment & cream cheese frosting.

Which honestly should have been everybody’s first indication that I might eventually need somebody to tell me to sit down.

I have always worked. I know how to produce. I know how to push. I know how to show up when I am tired. I know how to keep going when something needs to get done.

And those things are not inherently bad.

But somewhere along the way, my work muscle started outgrowing everything else.

It outgrew friendships.

It outgrew family.

And most dangerously, it outgrew rest.

I became incredibly strong in an area that was never supposed to carry my entire life.

And while my work life balance is significantly better than it used to be, I still struggle with it. There is still something in me that equates productivity with responsibility. If I can do more, surely I should do more. If I have capacity, fill it. If there is an empty space on the calendar, apparently that space has committed a crime & must immediately be occupied.

But 2 Corinthians 12:7-9 gives me an entirely different picture.

Paul is navigating his assignment while simultaneously navigating his thorn. He asks God to remove it, but God answers:

“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” 2 Corinthians 12:9

God does not remove Paul’s responsibility because Paul has a thorn.

But He also does not require Paul to carry everything in his own strength.

“My grace is sufficient.”

Meaning grace is not always God making my plate smaller.

Sometimes grace is God teaching me how the plate should be arranged.

And that requires something I am significantly less enthusiastic about than multitasking.

Priority.

Because successful multitasking requires vision & priority setting.

If everything is important, nothing is actually prioritized.

Habakkuk 2:2 says, “Write down the revelation and make it plain on tablets so that a herald may run with it.”

Write it.

Make it plain.

Then run.

Not run first, figure out where we are going halfway down the street & ask God to bless the cardio.

Vision tells me what I am building.

Priorities tell me what comes first.

Boundaries protect both.

Because things that are out of order do not function properly.

And there are things in my life that simply do not produce when I am out of order.

I can be doing all the “right” things & still be doing them in the wrong arrangement.

That part hurts my feelings a little.

Because I love a good productive day.

God, however, seems much more interested in a fruitful life.

Those are not always the same thing.

This is where I unfortunately have to introduce one of my biblical alter egos: Kuzco.

Because sometimes my relationship with priorities feels suspiciously like The Emperor’s New Groove.

God is showing me the blueprint, explaining the kingdom, pointing out what needs attention, & I am standing there spiritually holding my miniature model of Kuzcotopia like:

“But what about this?”

My plans.

My timeline.

My preferred arrangement.

My priorities.

My little hill with the swimming pool.

And God is basically saying, “Yes, Jazmin. I saw your presentation. Anyway…”

Because vision cannot just be what I want my life to look like.

Vision has to be submitted to what God is actually building.

Which brings me to the word that makes every recovering control enthusiast develop a slight twitch:

Delegation.

Nehemiah did not rebuild Jerusalem by himself. He appointed people. He assigned sections. He trusted others with portions of the work.

Meanwhile, I can sometimes operate as though asking for help will somehow result in the immediate collapse of civilization.

Because I have control issues.

There.

I said it.

I also have standards.

And occasionally those standards put on a trench coat & pretend they are not perfectionism.

But I cannot be my best self by myself.

Delegation requires me to stop holding on too tightly for too long.

It requires me to trust that something can be done differently without necessarily being done incorrectly.

It requires me to accept that God may have given someone else grace for something I keep exhausting myself trying to control.

I can buy the house.

But God is calling me to build a home.

And homes require people.

Relationship.

Presence.

Trust.

Margin.

Rest.

They cannot be built entirely through efficiency.

But if vision & priority are difficult for me, & delegation & trust make me itch a little, effective communication may be where God really started rummaging through my drawers.

Because Nehemiah communicated.

When problems arose, he addressed them. When opposition came, he gave instruction. When people needed direction, he made the direction clear.

And I am learning that clear, consistent communication keeps people aligned & prevents misunderstandings.

Because if I do not fill in the blanks, the devil will.

And goodness gracious, that man is apparently an aspiring screenwriter.

Give him one unanswered text, one weird tone, one delayed conversation, one vague response, one assumption, one thing I should have clarified but did not, & suddenly my mind has produced a six episode limited series with betrayal, abandonment, hidden motives & a season finale nobody asked for.

This is why communication matters.

Not because every misunderstanding is spiritual warfare.

Sometimes I just did not communicate.

Sometimes they did not communicate.

Sometimes there is missing information & my imagination applied for the position.

But when I refuse to clarify, communicate, ask questions or say what needs to be said, I leave blank spaces.

And blank spaces get filled.

Usually with assumptions.

Fear.

Offense.

Old wounds.

Or lies.

Effective communication does not mean controlling how someone receives my boundary. Setting the boundary is my responsibility. How someone responds to it cannot become the thing that determines whether I keep it.

Otherwise it was never really a boundary.

It was a suggestion waiting for approval.

And perhaps the deepest lesson underneath all of this is that knowing these things is not enough.

Because we are often told to read the Bible.

Read your Bible.

Stay in the Word.

Know Scripture.

And yes.

Absolutely.

But somewhere along the way I have had to confront something uncomfortable:

My life does not benefit from the truth I hear.

My life benefits from the truth I submit to.

James 1:22 says, “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.”

That distinction matters deeply to me because Scripture itself has been mishandled throughout history.

The Bible was used to justify slavery.

The Bible was manipulated to support Jim Crow.

Scripture has been twisted to control, oppress, silence & abuse people.

So my answer cannot simply be, “Well, somebody used Scripture incorrectly, therefore I want nothing to do with Scripture.”

The abuse of Scripture does not eliminate the authority of Scripture.

It makes correct interpretation even more important.

I do not benefit from truth simply because I heard somebody quote a verse.

I benefit from the truth I understand in context, receive through the character of God, & ultimately submit my life to.

That is where transformation happens.

Because I can highlight it & still not live it.

Underline it & still resist it.

Post it & still ignore it.

Memorize it & still build Kuzcotopia directly over the place God told me not to.

The goal was never information.

It was submission.

And maybe that is what God is teaching me about multitasking.

I do not need to become better at doing everything simultaneously.

I need to become better at discerning what He has actually asked me to do, what order He has asked me to do it in, what I need to entrust to someone else, what needs to be communicated clearly, & what simply needs to wait.

Because reconstruction over here does not mean I get to neglect responsibility over there.

The wall can be going up while relationships still need tending.

Work can be demanding while rest remains necessary.

Ministry can be fruitful while home still deserves presence.

Healing can be happening while responsibility remains.

And sometimes God will not remove one thing before asking me to steward another.

Sometimes He simply says:

“My grace is sufficient for you.”

Grace for the wall.

Grace for the thorn.

Grace for the conversation.

Grace for the boundary.

Grace for the work.

Grace for the rest.

Grace for the thing I can handle.

Grace for the thing I need to hand off.

Grace to know the difference.

Maybe maturity is not proving that I can carry everything.

Maybe maturity is finally learning what belongs in my hands.

Because yes, I am a pretty good multitasker.

But God is not trying to make me a better juggler.

He is teaching me order.

And apparently there is no biblical reward for keeping all the balls in the air if I am dropping the people, the peace & the priorities He gave me underneath them.

So…

Okay God.

I hear You.

Kuzcotopia is officially under review.