In addition to being an incredible friend of mine, one of my all-time favorite former co-workers, and guest writer this week, Mike Haynes is a youth pastor and owner of G Shades Youth Ministry Curriculum. He loves communicating from the stage, improving systems, and helping teenagers discover how God has wired them to make a difference. Mike and his wife, Anna, have three amazing kids and are thoroughly enjoying watching them grow up too fast.
Recently, it finally happened.
I caught COVID.
It took until July 29, 2022 for me to actually catch it, and in true youth pastor fashion, I caught it from being at summer camp.
As you’re probably very aware, the effect COVID-19 has on any given person or family ranges from medically devastating to mildly inconvenient, and I’m grateful to God that my experience swung toward the latter end of that spectrum. But even so, my need to quarantine put my wife and me in the inconvenient position of having to make a tough family decision. As we talked through what choice we would make for our family, it became apparent that there were no perfect options. So, my incredible wife told me it was my call to make on behalf of our family.
And as I took the next hour or so to mull over the options, I talked with the Holy Spirit and a few trusted friends and advisors, and before long it became pretty apparent to me which option felt right to me. The problem is, I am by nature a people pleaser. Or, maybe you could frame it as an Enneagram 3. Or, maybe you could say my natural temperament seeks out peace and harmony. There are lots of frameworks to put it in, but the point is, I don’t like it when people don’t like me—even for a moment. This is something I’ve navigated my entire life, from having social-chameleon-like tendencies as a kid to over-performing in job interviews as an adult. I want people to like me.
Need someone to eat something spicy and mildly suffer for everyone else’s amusement? Count me in!
In the middle of a heated argument and need a third person to come in and pick a side? Count me out!
You feel where I’m coming from here?
Because in this particular case (and many other cases, as you can imagine), that lifelong tendency was a problem. I knew the option I felt was right wasn’t the one my spouse wanted, and I didn’t want to make a decision that would make her unhappy, or more pointedly, unhappy with me.
Friends, whether we’re talking about relationships, work responsibilities, or family dynamics, this is the tension in functioning as your own unique person, isn’t it? Sometimes we find ourselves in a position where we have to choose between making people we care about happy and making a decision that best cares for everyone—including ourselves. And for any of you who are wired like me, hearing feedback from mentors or even the Spirit of God Himself doesn’t make it any easier to intentionally choose to make people you love unhappy, or more pointedly, unhappy with you.
You know what you want.
You know why you want it.
You know that they don’t.
And that’s enough to stop the train in its tracks.
But as I cough-talked/fever-dreamed (because COVID) with Jesus about this situation, He poked at my heart-level desire to please people and be well-liked at all times, and gently encouraged me to not be afraid to just...be…me. Because God in Christ makes decisions that affect us and can make us unhappy, and He does it because He is confident it will ultimately benefit us in the long run. You could honestly argue I was experiencing that dynamic in that very moment, since I was deeply unhappy that the timing of my catching COVID inconvenienced my family, and yet here I am now writing to you about how, in Christ, this experience was redemptive for my heart!
God, in Christ, is secure enough in His identity to lead us into temporal unhappiness if it means caring for us well. His love for us and firmness in His identity as Shepherd leads Him to make temporarily unpopular decisions.
And sometimes you and I are going to need to follow suit.
We don’t define God. God does.
Our opinion of God’s well-thought-out decisions do not define God. God does.
Others do not define you. God does.
And others’ opinions of your well-thought-out decisions do not define you. God does.
So, if I can encourage you (and me), let’s not allow our fear of being disliked to paralyze us into indecisiveness. Sometimes we’ll make the right choices, and honestly, sometimes we won’t. But the way others react one way or another doesn’t get to be the thing that defines us.
Because the only One who can define you is the One who designed you.
Want to talk more? Please feel free to send me an email or schedule some one-on-one time with me. And consider subscribing to my blog, where I post lots of helpful suggestions on how you can begin (and continue) this journey of recovering your blueprint!
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