An Interesting Thought On Responsibility

"The word of the LORD came to Jonah son of Amittai: 2 "Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it, because its wickedness has come up before me."

3 But Jonah ran away from the LORD and headed for Tarshish. He went down to Joppa, where he found a ship bound for that port. After paying the fare, he went aboard and sailed for Tarshish to flee from the LORD." Jonah 1:1-3

Jonah is an interesting example of responsibility. He is the perfect example of taking God's responsibility onto ourselves, and forgetting our own responsibilities. There are things that we as people can or cannot change- and it's the things that we can change that we are responsible for, and it's the things that we cannot change that God's responsible for. This is an interesting thing to think on.

I guess I'm thinking in terms of the church as a whole on this one. How many times to we concern ourselves on a church matter. How many times do we think that things at church should be a different way, or we think there needs to be change. Or conversely, we think we don't need change. Don't you think that all of those things that we busy ourselves with are things that we should leave in God's hands? Instead of focusing on the big picture, and on the church as a whole, we should focus on our tasks at hand. Are we a Sunday School teacher? We should focus on teaching those little people about God's love. Are we a maintenance person? We should focus on keeping God's building in working order. Are we involved in the finances? We should be doing everything we can to make sure that we are spending God's money in the way which honors him the most.

I guess it's just so easy sometimes to look at the big picture and become frustrated with this, that, or the other thing. What we need to remember is that God is in control. God is responsible, and we need to relax and trust God with that responsibility and turn our eyes to our own responsibilities. By taking on God's responsibilities as our own, we're taking time away from the responsibilities that are actually ours to take care of.

"What, after all, is Apollos? And what is Paul? Only servants, through whom you came to believe—as the Lord has assigned to each his task. 6I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow." 1 Corinthians 3:5-6