What is that to you?

'What is that to you?  You follow me!'

I just ran across this interesting statement the other day, I've read it a hundred times, but each time it strikes me as rather significant, and even counter cultural.  In the Gospel of John, Jesus is speaking to Peter, who after a revelation of his own fate, asks what will come of their companion and his fellow disciple, whereat, he is basically told to mind his own business and focus on his own responsibilities, regardless of what is happening to others.  In an age where we are each of us 'competing' for attention, significance, and renown be it Facebook, in the workplace, or on the athletic field or local politics, we are each so concerned with what everybody else is doing that we often forget what we ourselves are about.

It is that way in the stories too, there can only be one Prince, one Princess, or one legendary warrior, but there is a whole host of supporting characters and subplots, which if absent, would make the whole story rather moot and certainly dull, if it even happened at all.  And in our lives as well, who knows what pivotal, though unsung, roll you might be playing at this very moment?  If we are too busy worrying about what so and so is doing about such and such, we can't do our own work well, if we even manage to accomplish it.  The parable of the talents also sums this up well: each man is not judged based on the work of another, but rather upon his ability to do his best with what he was given; the guy with ten talents isn't used to demean or critique the guy with five, but both are called 'good and faithful servants,' only the dude who buried his because he was too afraid to use what he had been given is chastised, if he had earnestly tried like the other guys, even with his little, he too would have been praised.

There are many things I wonder at right now: why was my childhood so lousy, why don't I have any extended family, do I really need all this education in my current role, why do abusive or negligent parents have more kids than they can handle and we struggle to have even one, why is my physical health so temperamental…and a million other things, compared to 'normal' or what I think it should be. It doesn't matter, there might be a reason, but I'm not to know, this is the story I've been placed in and herein I need to do the best I can with what I have, not worry about what I don't.  I heard about some friends of ours, missionary wanna-bes, and finally we know where they want to go.  My jaw dropped, I couldn't imagine going There, but it seems that is where they feel called to go, all of a sudden I felt rather small and dirty and insignificant, they'll have quite the ministry while we'll toil away here at the back end of forever…then it hit me again: 'what is that to you?'  I haven't been called to go There, I know we've been placed Here for the foreseeable future, just because their ministry is theoretically cooler doesn't mean a single thing in relation to our own.  'You follow Me!'

Has your own story turned out far differently than you thought it should?  Are you feeling discouraged, forgotten, insignificant, useless when compared to others?  There is certainly a little rebuke in the statement, but there is far more comfort: we need not worry about everyone else, solely our own selves, and there is a plan and a purpose uniquely made for each of us, if we are willing to take our eyes off of everyone else and follow patiently and faithfully, we will eventually find it.  'Don't worry about anything else, just follow Me.'  But will we?