“These are the things that the LORD has commanded you to do.”
The Players That Left
In the game Among Us, you complete missions before getting attacked by the bad guys. You can either play as innocent crewmates or as an imposter who attacks those players. One day when I was playing this game with my nieces, I noticed a handful of people exiting the game in the very beginning. I was confused. Wasn’t the whole point of the game to play it? So then why were people leaving before it even started? I eventually found out that it was because they didn’t like the character they were assigned. My nieces told me that many people liked being a special character, like the imposter, because it makes the game fun. But when they’re just ordinary crewmates completing missions, the game gets boring.
Do you ever feel like you’re unimportant or useless to God because you feel that you are more basic and ordinary than others? How many times have you wanted to quit because of that? Or have you already walked out of the game? We compare our lives, jobs, and skills with those around us. We have extreme ideas of what a holy and noble life might look like for God or what type of person He uses to help build His kingdom. So when your life doesn’t reflect that ideal expectation, then you want to call it quits. You want to leave the game before God can use you. But here’s good news if you’ve been feeling left out of God’s family: There are no ordinary people in the Kingdom of God because all believers have the same powerful calling to glorify God in accomplishing His plans.
The Plan That Determines the Game’s Objective
Every human being has the same powerful calling to glorify God by partnering with Him in accomplishing His plans. In the Old Testament, God had a marvelous plan to dwell with the Israelites through the Tabernacle and all of its other parts (Exodus 35:4-29). His glory was going to manifest when His people gathered to worship Him. This Tabernacle was a physical and portable place of worship. So Moses, a spokesperson on behalf of God, speaks to the Israelites to make God’s plan known to them. Moses says, “This is the thing that the Lord has commanded … Let every skillful craftsman among you come and make all that the LORD has commanded: the Tabernacle…” (Exodus 35:4-19).
The powerful call that God has invited all believers to partake in is the Great Commission (Matthew 28:16-20). The Great Commission is a command from Jesus, the God-man, to make disciples by teaching and training every nation and tongue to follow and lovingly obey Him until the coming of the new heaven and earth. So, what does this mean for us? It means that our ultimate calling is to become a discipler who teaches others to know, love, and obey the triune God. This is life's “game” objective: To make disciples. The Great Commission is not just a suggestion for Christians to opt out of if they don’t want to do it. It is a command. It is a clear and distinct calling that’s bestowed on every single believer—a calling that we cannot abandon nor forget. God doesn’t only choose specific people like full-time pastors, missionaries, or Bible college students to fulfill the Great Commission. He extends this calling to every single believer despite where you are in life, what background you come from, what work you do, and what community you’re in.
The 13-year-old middle schooler who encountered Jesus at Bible camp is called to make disciples and share Jesus with their classmates. The stay-at-home mom is called to make disciples and share Jesus with her newborn and toddler. The 9-5 full-time warehouse worker is called to make disciples and share Jesus with his coworkers. The couple that farms and sells their crops at farmers' markets is called to make disciples and share Jesus with their customers.
Everything we do must contribute to this grand plan that God has commanded. Our main identity and calling is to be a disciple of Jesus Christ before anything else, which means that it’s not tied to our careers, job positions, or anything we try to amount our life to apart from God.
Don’t Forget the Game Maker and the Game’s Objective
Games are fun when you play them the way they are intended to be played. The point of any game is essentially to accomplish what the game-maker has set out for the players to do. The whole objective of Among Us was never about focusing on your individual character or whether or not you were the imposter. It was to abide by the rules and finish the mission. This robbed people from truly enjoying the game. They were so caught up in their individual identity instead of the master plan.
It was never about being the better preacher than the other. It was never about comparing the spiritual giftings of yours to others. It was never about the position (or lack of) that you hold in ministry. We all have different roles. We all play different characters who, in the grand scheme of things, contribute to the greater story of Jesus Christ.
The secret to finding complete joy and satisfaction in your life is when you abandon making life all about you. The meaning of life is to worship the glorious triune God because He’s the Creator. So when we start living our life as if we're the creator who makes decisions and calls all the shots, then life will feel empty and purposeless because we weren’t designed to do that. We are merely creatures who have been designed by the Creator to worship, obey, and enjoy Him. The Great Commission is a God-given plan to restore a reality of what human beings were originally created to do and become, and humans will find so much purpose and freedom in life when it aligns with this true identity of ours in our Creator.
The next time you start feeling unimportant or unnecessary in God’s own family, remember that life has always been about the glory of the triune God. It was never about us. But in God’s glory, we will find ourselves fully joyful and satisfied because we remember our rightful position as creatures. Thank goodness God’s not picky or choosy with whom He wants to use in accomplishing His glorious plans. He invites every believer to be part of something greater than themselves and desires for all of us to extend the gospel to those who aren’t in His family yet (Romans 1:16). So don’t get distracted by your own individual identity that you forget the Game Maker and the game’s objective. When you focus on these minuscule things, you will forget the whole purpose of the game—to make disciples of all nations. So, how are you going to start accomplishing this mission?
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