This is part of my year-long series exploring human-centered alternatives to the spiritual promises in Oswald Chambers’ classic devotional My Utmost for His Highest. Today’s entry, “The Test of Character”, promises that believers have “inherited the divine nature” and that “the omnipotent power of the grace of God” backs even the tiniest act of obedience, with God “engineering our circumstances” and routine drudgery being divinely appointed for character development.
Here’s what I witnessed instead:
When my friend Jennifer’s mother developed dementia, her pastor assured her this was God engineering circumstances for character development. “You’ve inherited the divine nature,” he said. “The omnipotent power of God’s grace will sustain you through this drudgery. Every act of caregiving has supernatural power behind it when done in obedience.”
For months, Jennifer waited for that promised divine empowerment. She changed adult diapers believing God’s grace backed each task. She repeated conversations dozens of times daily, trusting divine purpose lay behind the repetition. She stayed up nights with her increasingly agitated mother, expecting supernatural sustenance to make the drudgery meaningful.
The divine power never showed up. Jennifer grew exhausted, resentful, isolated. Her marriage strained. Her health deteriorated from chronic sleep deprivation. The promised grace was nowhere to be found when her mother didn’t recognize her, when accidents happened, when Jennifer finally snapped from sheer exhaustion.
Her brother Mark took a completely different approach. He researched dementia systematically—learning about the brain changes causing their mother’s behaviors. He connected with support groups, gathering practical strategies from families who’d actually navigated this terrain. No spiritual framework, just information and community.
Mark arranged professional respite care so Jennifer could sleep. He installed safety devices and created routines based on dementia research, not divine calling. He found an adult day program that engaged their mother’s remaining abilities while giving the family actual relief.
The “grace” that finally sustained their family came from human knowledge and community support. Mark’s research revealed their mother’s aggression wasn’t spiritual warfare but predictable neurological changes manageable with medication and environmental modifications.
When Jennifer finally accepted help from professional caregivers, she felt relief rather than spiritual failure. The young aide who helped wasn’t motivated by divine calling but by training, fair wages, and genuine compassion developed through experience.
The “omnipotent power” that made caregiving sustainable was Medicare coverage, respite programs, and evidence-based dementia care—systems created by human effort and policy. No supernatural intervention required.
Jennifer eventually discovered that accepting the ordinary difficulty of caregiving, without expecting divine transformation, freed her to seek the practical support that actually worked. Her character developed not through spiritualized drudgery but by learning to balance compassion with self-care, accepting her limitations, and collaborating with others to provide dignified care.
The silence where God’s engineering was supposed to be? That silence was the most honest thing about the whole experience.
Reflection Question: When has accepting the ordinary difficulty of a situation, without expecting spiritual transformation, led to more effective solutions?
This story is part of my upcoming book “The Undevoted: Daily Departures from Divine Dependence,” which offers 365 human-centered alternatives to the spiritual certainties in Chambers’ devotional. Each day explores how reason, community, and human resilience can address life’s challenges without requiring divine intervention.
God or Delusion? 