Potentially Problematic

God has apparently decided that one of His current assignments is ruining perfectly good words for me.

Today’s word?

Potential.

Because I have spent a lot of my life thinking potential was something I was obligated to use.

If I could do it, maybe I should.

If I was good at it, maybe it was meant for me.

If an opportunity presented itself, maybe God opened the door.

If I had the gift, surely I was supposed to use it there.

Meanwhile, I am starting to realize that some of my greatest distractions have not been things I was bad at.

They were things I was good at.

Well.

That is inconvenient.

Because I know how to recognize obvious disobedience. The big flashing red signs are easy.

It is much harder to recognize something that looks productive, feels exciting, uses my gifts, makes sense on paper…

and still is not what God told me to do.

Proverbs 29:18 says, “Where there is no vision, the people are unrestrained.”

That word unrestrained got me.

I used to think vision was primarily about knowing where I was going. Goals. Purpose. Direction. A beautiful little picture of the future God had planned for me.

Yet vision also tells me where I am not going.

It tells me what does not get my yes.

It tells me what I have to walk past.

It tells me what I can absolutely do…

and still should not touch.

Apparently, vision is not just a picture.

It is a boundary.

And restraint has historically not been one of my favorite words.

I like options.

I like possibilities.

I like knowing I could do something if I wanted to.

There is something intoxicating about possibility because possibility does not require commitment. I can imagine twelve different versions of my life and convince myself that all twelve deserve exploration.

Then I wonder why I am confused.

Of course I am confused.

I have twelve tabs open in my spirit.

I have mistaken having options for having direction.

And the more gifts I recognize in myself, the more dangerous that can become because gifts create possibilities.

Possibilities create options.

Options create noise.

Noise makes it harder to hear.

Then suddenly I am asking God for clarity while simultaneously entertaining everything He never said.

That sentence irritated me enough to know I needed to sit with it.

I cannot keep asking God to make His voice louder while refusing to turn anything else down.

Because I have been incredibly willing to do what I can do instead of slowing down long enough to ask what I am called to do.

Those are not the same thing.

“Can” asks about my ability.

“Called” asks about His authority.

And whew.

I have had the ability to do plenty of things God never authorized.

I have also had another little habit.

Putting my vision in front of God’s.

Not intentionally, of course.

I would never announce, “Hello Lord, I have decided that my plan is better than Yours.”

I am much more sophisticated than that.

I pray about my plan first.

Then I ask Him to bless it.

See? Christian.

I have created entire pictures of what I thought my life should look like, decided how something should happen, determined when it should happen, prayed fervently about it, found scripture that made me feel encouraged about it, and somewhere along the way I quietly stopped calling it my desire and started treating it like God’s promise.

Then when it did not happen?

I was disappointed with Him.

That one made me stare at the wall for a minute.

Because there have been times I was disappointed with God for not fulfilling promises He never made.

I made the plan.

I picked the destination.

I created the timeline.

I decided what His faithfulness should look like.

Then I essentially slid the paperwork across heaven’s desk and said, “I just need Your signature at the bottom.”

And when He did not sign?

“God, why aren’t You moving?”

Girl.

Because He did not write it.

There have been seasons where I was waiting on God to move while God was probably waiting on me to realize He never told me to go there.

I wanted Him to finance my vision.

He wanted to correct my vision.

Those are two completely different prayer requests.

And that is where The Hot Chick became painfully appropriate in my head.

Because spiritually, I have had some Jessica moments.

Looking around at my own life like…

Wait.

Whose life is this?

How did I get here?

Why am I wearing this?

Why am I maintaining this?

WHOSE HANDS ARE THESE?

Except instead of Rob Schneider staring back at me in the mirror, it has been commitments, expectations, plans, relationships with assignments, ideas I refused to release, and versions of myself that were built around what I could do instead of who God was developing me to become.

I recognized my gifts.

I did not recognize myself.

That is terrifying.

To build a life that looks successful and eventually realize it does not look like the vision God gave me.

Because misalignment does not always look ugly.

Sometimes misalignment looks impressive.

Sometimes it produces applause.

Sometimes it makes money.

Sometimes people congratulate me.

Sometimes I am genuinely good at it.

And sometimes none of that means God assigned it to me.

Vision gives me the ability to endure the discomfort of saying no to something good because I know what I am protecting.

Maybe that is what restraint really is.

Protection.

I have spent years treating restraint like bondage when restraint might actually be one of the greatest expressions of freedom.

Freedom is not being able to do everything.

Freedom is not needing to.

That is a completely different kind of liberty.

Knowing who I am.

Knowing what I am called to.

Knowing what season I am in.

Knowing what God said.

And being able to look at something that appeals to me and say:

“That is good.

I could probably do it.

I might even do it well.

And it still is not mine.”

That takes development.

Which is probably why God seems far more interested in my development than my résumé.

God had a vision for Abram, but Abram had to become Abraham.

Jacob became Israel.

Simon became Peter.

Saul became Paul.

God was not simply changing names.

He was developing people capable of carrying what He had already seen.

That changes the way I look at the frustrating middle.

Because I love revelation.

I love the moment where God shows me something.

I love the excitement of possibility.

I love when something clicks and I can see where He may be leading.

Development?

Development is ghetto.

Development is God showing me the destination and then turning around and pointing directly at my character.

“Oh, we’re going to deal with THAT first.”

Sir.

I thought we were discussing purpose.

Apparently, we are.

Because God’s vision for me puts a demand on my development.

The future He has for me requires something from the woman standing here now.

More discipline.

More discernment.

More patience.

More humility.

More consistency.

More integrity.

More restraint.

And sometimes less.

Less proving.

Less performing.

Less impulsivity.

Less needing to be everywhere.

Less saying yes because I am afraid the opportunity will not come again.

Less trying to squeeze every gift I have into every season I enter.

God does not appear nearly as impressed with my ability to do a lot of things as I am.

His priority is who I become.

That might be one of the hardest lessons I have had to learn because I like tangible evidence of progress.

Show me the numbers.

Show me the growth.

Show me the thing I built.

Show me the result.

Development is quieter.

Yet I can lose what I build.

I cannot lose what I become.

Something can fail and I can build again.

Money can leave and I can earn again.

An opportunity can disappear and another can come.

A plan can collapse and I can start over.

Yet if obedience was developed in me, I still have obedience.

If discipline was developed in me, I still have discipline.

If wisdom was developed in me, I still have wisdom.

If restraint was developed in me, I carry that into whatever comes next.

Maybe God is less concerned with making sure I never lose anything and more concerned with developing someone who can rebuild without losing herself.

That’ll preach directly to me.

Then Proverbs 6:16–19 came swinging.

Haughty eyes.

A lying tongue.

Hands that shed innocent blood.

A heart that devises wicked schemes.

Feet that rush into evil.

A false witness.

Someone who stirs up conflict.

Eyes.

Tongue.

Hands.

Heart.

Feet.

God cares about governance.

He cares about what controls me.

My mouth cannot simply do what it can do.

My feet cannot simply go where they can go.

My mind cannot entertain everything it can imagine.

My gifts cannot accept every place they can function.

My life cannot be governed by capability.

Because anything ungoverned eventually becomes dangerous.

Even something good.

Fire belongs somewhere.

Water belongs somewhere.

Power belongs somewhere.

My gifts belong somewhere.

Oil belongs somewhere.

And I need to stop looking for my oil everywhere I am capable of functioning.

Restraint is my friend.

I cannot believe I typed that voluntarily.

Yet it is.

Because when I have revelation, restraint stops feeling like deprivation.

I know what I am protecting.

I know what deserves my yes.

Which means I finally know what deserves my no.

Because if I am not clear about what I am called to do, I will spend my life doing anything I can do.

That line hurt.

I have confused “can” with “called” more times than I want to admit.

I have confused opportunity with assignment.

Talent with authorization.

Movement with progress.

Desire with vision.

My plan with His promise.

Then wondered why I felt frustrated, scattered and exhausted.

Maybe I was not always tired because I was carrying too much.

Maybe sometimes I was tired because I was carrying what was never mine.

And I do not want that anymore.

I do not want to be successful at the wrong assignment.

I do not want to become excellent at maintaining something God never told me to build.

I do not want to spend years asking Him to breathe on something He has been asking me to put down.

I do not want another spiritual Hot Chick moment where I finally look in the mirror and realize the life staring back at me does not match the identity God gave me.

I want His vision badly enough to surrender mine.

Not decorate mine with scripture.

Not pray mine into legitimacy.

Not put Jesus in the passenger seat and call the trip obedience.

Actually surrender it.

Because vision is not me showing God the future I want.

Vision is God revealing enough of His preferred future that I can govern myself in the present.

That means some doors stay closed.

Some ideas remain ideas.

Some opportunities get a no.

Some gifts wait.

Some plans die.

Some versions of me have to die too.

And maybe that is development.

Not God turning me into someone else.

God stripping away everything I picked up while trying to become someone He never asked me to be.

So my prayer is changing.

I do not want to keep asking, “God, what can I do?”

I can do a lot.

That is part of the problem.

I want to ask:

“God, what am I called to do?”

Then give me enough vision to recognize it.

Enough restraint to protect it.

Enough humility to submit my version of the future to Yours.

And enough patience to let You develop me before I demand You deploy me.

Because I can lose what I built.

I cannot lose who I became.

And maybe the greatest evidence that God’s vision is becoming clearer in my life will not be how many things I finally say yes to.

Maybe it will be how many things I can finally say no to…

without wondering what I missed.