“The LORD God placed the man in the Garden of Eden to tend and watch over it.”
Genesis 2:15 NLT
God places full responsibility on Adam’s shoulders; one instruction of what not to do plus plenty of opportunity to live well, while avoiding that tree. This is the very definition of stewardship. There is room for positive intention and practice, yet room for temptation and disobedience too.
It’s only as I have aged, and experienced life, that I have come to appreciate how God would have me steward my life. I am made in God’s image, yet I must discover how to live in God’s likeness for myself.
Wilting under the weight of responsibility, seeking to pass it onto someone else’s shoulders is no more than an avoidance of my duty. It betrays a lack of trustworthiness and maturity. I’ve discovered that wherever I run to hide, like Elijah, God pursues me and finds me in the desert. Here I have the opportunity to respond to God once more if I choose to.
Like Adam, none of us can know what lies before us. Yet, each of us can choose to accept responsibility for our own life. This is how we show up not just to God, but to those we encounter through life’s journey, friend and foe alike. There are always what appear to be easy ways out, I know for I’ve wilted and taken them, yet each one requires a renewal of friendship and recovery of trust in both God and self. Where once I looked to the Church or Christian friends to see me through, God has revealed that it is my friendship with the divine that is sufficient to sustain me. This learning has come at a price, yet the scars crafted through disobedience and the desertion of responsibility is in fact the source of ever deeper confidence in God and respect for self.
QUESTION
What areas do you need to take responsibility for in your life but are finding it hard?
PRAYER
Lord, help me not to run away from the hard things in life or the things I am afraid of.
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