I’ve heard many preachers talk about when people say “Why me?” They talk about how, in the midst of suffering, some are tempted to cry those words to God. “Why me?” As if somehow our faith exempts us from hard times. They respond by talking about the most faithful and righteous of all, Jesus Christ and all that He suffered. They encourage us to face suffering with our eyes on Jesus and to change our question to “Why not me?” They have a point. Jesus told us in this world we will have trouble, so trouble should not surprise us. Instead, we need to continue to trust in Jesus when what He told us will happen happens, placing our faith in the One who has overcome the world! 

For the record, they’re right to say say that, but today I want to come at it from a different angle. You see lately I have been seeing a lot of great creative Gospel sharing coming from the church. TV shows like The Chosen, Christian movies that are starting to do very well at the box office, Christian music, and on and on. To me it’s extremely inspiring, but there’s a problem there too. People, including people in the church, seem to love to pick out every flaw and criticize every effort. 

Right now I am reading a very good book called Charlie Brown’s Christmas Miracle by Michael Keane. It’s the story about how one of the most famous Christmas television programs of all time came to be. There was a lot happening behind the scenes. Peanuts creator Charles Schultz was a devout Christian. When he was approached about the idea of a Peanuts Christmas Special, he wanted to do a program that talked about the true meaning of Christmas. This includes the famous scene where Linus recites part of Luke chapter two. His partners in the creation of the show, saw two problems with it. Secular audiences would see it as too religious, while Christians would object to animated characters sharing Scripture, seeing it as irreverent. Yes, I know, but this was 1965. To me this helped the issue hit home. If we’re going to create things to glorify God, we should expect push back from unbelievers. What concerns me more is how often the staunchest critics come from within the church. In some cases this is understandable. We want to make sure the Gospel is properly put forth and to avoid even the appearance of false teaching. On the other hand, the only perfect Creation was God’s creation and we even managed to mar that with our sins. Maybe we should be willing to extend a little grace to flawed human beings who are trying to glorify our God. After all, if evil people who were willing to steal, kill and destroy to stop the Kingdom of God have been unable to do it, I highly doubt a faithful believer who sets His heart on obediently creating work to the glory of God will mess up God’s plan. So it you’re feeling led to create, don’t let critical people hold you back. Realize everyone has been criticized by someone. After all, who faced more criticism than Jesus? So create your work, and when people are critical, look at your work, make sure you didn’t inadvertently blaspheme, and if not, hold your head high, praise the Lord and say, “Everyone else is being criticized, even Jesus. Why not me?”

Further, I want to ask you to look at your own attitude. Sometimes it’s not the fear of critics so much as it is my own inner critic. I look at some of the great stuff others are doing. I see all the success they have, the resources and everything else and make the assumption that I could never arrive at that level of success. It’s in those moments that I need to look past my gifts to the Giver, and look at whether or not He is sufficient. What if the only difference between me and that other person is that he stepped out in faithfulness and did the work while I allowed my inner critic to dissuade me? What if all I need to do is look at my calling, see God’s vision and say, “Why not me?” What we all need to remember is that God is always faithful. If He has called you to it, He will make it do what it is supposed to do. It might be a raving success or it might look like an abject failure but God will use it as He sees fit and you will know you have been faithful.