Awed or Aggravated?

“Psalm 78 lists “the praiseworthy deeds of the Lord, his power, and the wonders he has done.” It includes God splitting the Red Sea into two walls, making water stand up straight. Burning a supernatural fire over the heads of his people at night, like a signal flare, to show them where to go. Making rock gush water as if it were a fire hydrant. Dropping flaky, delicious white food out of the sky.

With that hall-of-fame list of miracles, you might be surprised at the psalm’s climax. Here is the concluding deed of God that should astound anyone:

“He chose David his servant and took him from the sheep pens; from tending the sheep he brought him to be the shepherd of his people Jacob, of Israel his inheritance. And David shepherded them with integrity of heart; with skillful hands he led them.”

It’s a miracle that God would choose a kid who didn’t know much except how to take care of farm animals. It’s a marvel that God would entrust his people to David’s care. It’s a wonder that God would transfer David from a pen to a palace.

David felt overwhelmed that God had chosen him to lead. He prayed, “Who am I, O Lord God, and what is my family, that you have brought me this far? … You have looked on me as though I were the most exalted of men, O Lord God” (1 Chronicles 17:16-17).

Do you genuinely feel awed that God has called you to lead—that he has entrusted you to care for other people, guide a church or organization, point the way?

Or do you feel slightly resentful at the expectations, the lack of appreciation, the fact you’re waiting to be discovered?

I have felt both ways as a leader, and I confess: the days I have spent chafing at leadership’s indignities outnumber those on which I felt sunny and grateful for the mere privilege of influencing other human beings. I must pause until my blurry vision comes back into focus.

The fact that God chose me to lead any other Christian is a miracle. God knows my weaknesses, my worries, my whims. He knows I have less experience, thinner education, weaker leadership gifts than many other people who could do my job and would like to.

Beyond all that, why would he entrust me with people he created and is even now transforming? When they are fully glorified, the people I’m now leading will be so dazzlingly holy that I will be tempted to fall on my face and worship them.

Maybe we should take a moment, right now, and say to ourselves: It’s a miracle that God would choose me. It’s a miracle that God would use me.

—Kevin A. Miller is an executive editor of the popular preaching Web site, www.PreachingToday.com. You can reply to Kevin at Newsletter@LeadershipJournal.net.