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Practical Resources: A Response to June 26th

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, “Always Now”, promises that believers can access God’s “overflowing, endlessly renewing favor” in real-time during any difficulty, claiming that drawing upon divine grace “now” in moments of need will make them “a marvel to yourself and others.”

Here’s what happened when someone tried to access this promised grace:

“Don’t wait to pray about this later,” her Bible study leader advised urgently. “Draw on God’s grace right now. His favor is overflowing and endlessly renewing. You can count on there being enough for whatever you’re facing.”

Maria had just lost her job in brutal company layoffs. Panic about rent, groceries, health insurance crashed over her in waves. But instead of succumbing to anxiety, she would access divine grace in real-time. This supernatural resource would make her “a marvel to herself and others.”

When anxiety about finances overwhelmed her, Maria tried to draw on God’s grace in the moment rather than worry. When employers rejected her applications, she attempted to access divine favor instantly rather than dwelling on disappointment. The overflowing, endlessly renewing grace was supposed to be available now, not later.

But the promised grace was completely absent when she needed it most.

During job interviews, Maria’s anxiety was crushing despite desperate attempts to draw on divine favor. Facing eviction notices, God’s “endlessly renewing” grace provided zero practical relief from mounting financial pressure. The spiritual resource that was supposed to be accessible “now” felt like grasping at empty air during actual moments of crisis.

Meanwhile, her neighbor Carlos approached unemployment with zero expectation of divine assistance. Instead of waiting for supernatural grace, Carlos immediately filed for unemployment benefits, updated his resume, began networking with former colleagues. When job-search anxiety felt overwhelming, he used practical stress management and sought support from friends and family.

Carlos didn’t expect divine favor to sustain him through hardship. He created his own support systems, maintained professional relationships, took concrete steps to improve his employment prospects. His approach wasn’t about drawing on supernatural grace but about using available human resources and practical strategies.

When Maria’s financial situation became desperate, she finally abandoned the spiritual approach and followed Carlos’s example. Instead of continuing to seek God’s grace in moments of need, she applied for government assistance, reached out to her professional network, took a temporary retail job to cover expenses.

The breakthrough came not from accessing divine favor but from practical action and human support systems. Her job search succeeded when she stopped waiting for spiritual grace and started using career counseling services, interview preparation resources, networking opportunities.

Where was the overflowing, endlessly renewing favor when she was facing eviction? Where was the divine grace that was supposed to be always available in moments of hardship?

The “grace” that actually sustained Maria through unemployment wasn’t divine favor but community support, government assistance programs, and her own persistent effort. The marvel wasn’t supernatural transformation but human resilience and practical problem-solving.

The silence where God’s endlessly renewing favor was supposed to flow revealed the honest truth: there was no divine grace to draw upon. Only human resources and community support that actually worked when accessed consistently.

Reflection Question: When have practical resources and human support been more reliable than trying to access divine grace in moments of crisis?

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.

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Healthy Grieving: A Response to June 25th

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, “Receiving Yourself in the Fires of Sorrow”, promises that believers who embrace suffering will “receive the self God created them to be,” claiming that sorrow burns up shallowness and transforms people into trustworthy individuals who become “nourishment for others.”

Here’s what embracing the fires of sorrow actually delivered:

“Don’t ask God to save you from this hour,” his pastor counseled gently. “Receive yourself in the fires of sorrow. God will use this pain to burn up your shallowness and transform you into someone others can trust and turn to.”

David’s wife had died after eighteen months of brutal cancer treatment. The grief felt like drowning in acid, but his pastor offered this spiritual framework as the path through suffering. Instead of seeking ways to minimize pain, David should lean into the sorrow and wait for it to reveal “the self God created him to be.”

David tried desperately to embrace this teaching. He accepted his grief without resistance, believing that surrendering to suffering would fulfill God’s transformative purpose for his life. Months of “receiving himself in the fires of sorrow,” waiting for divine alchemy to burn away shallowness.

But the promised transformation was a vicious lie.

The sorrow wasn’t burning up shallowness—it was consuming his capacity for joy, hope, relationship. Rather than becoming someone others could trust and turn to, David found himself increasingly unable to connect with anyone or offer meaningful support.

Friends stopped calling because conversations had become exercises in managing his overwhelming, unprocessed grief. Instead of becoming “nourishment for others,” his raw pain made him emotionally unavailable to everyone around him.

Meanwhile, his brother-in-law Tom faced similar devastation when his father died suddenly. But Tom didn’t try to receive himself in fires of sorrow or wait for suffering to transform him spiritually. Instead, Tom sought grief counseling, joined a bereavement support group, gradually developed healthy ways to process loss while maintaining human connections.

Tom didn’t embrace suffering as divine tool for character development. He treated grief as difficult human experience requiring practical support, time, and intentional healing strategies. When acute grief began to ease, Tom volunteered with hospice, using his experience to help others navigate similar losses.

The transformation Tom experienced wasn’t mystical result of receiving himself in fires of sorrow. It came through professional help, community support, and deliberate choices to channel experience into service. People did turn to Tom during crises—not because suffering had spiritually transformed him, but because he’d learned practical ways to support others through loss.

Where was David’s promised transformation through embracing sorrow? Where was the divine purpose that was supposed to emerge from accepting suffering?

David’s breakthrough came when he stopped waiting for sorrow to fulfill God’s plan and started seeking actual help for his depression. Therapy, medication, grief counseling provided tools to process loss constructively rather than simply enduring it as spiritual trial.

The healing that eventually made David helpful to others came not from receiving himself in fires of sorrow but from learning healthy ways to honor grief while rebuilding capacity for connection and service.

The silence where God’s transformative purpose was supposed to manifest revealed the truth: suffering doesn’t automatically create wisdom or compassion. It just creates more suffering until we address it with human tools and community support.

Reflection Question: When has seeking professional help and community support been more effective than trying to embrace suffering as spiritual transformation?

Watch Julia Sweeney Destroy the Bible

Building Trust: A Response to June 24th

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, “Reconciling Yourself to the Fact of Sin”, promises that accepting universal human wickedness prevents life’s disasters and provides safety in relationships, claiming that recognizing everyone’s capacity for sin allows instant danger recognition and protects against betrayal.

Here’s what constantly expecting sin actually produced:

“Always expect the worst from human nature,” the senior pastor warned his new leadership team. “People who don’t reconcile themselves to sin’s reality get blindsided by betrayal. Recognizing that everyone is capable of wickedness protects you from disaster.”

Mark absorbed this teaching completely, believing it would safeguard his relationships and ministry. He approached every interaction assuming people harbored sinful motives. When volunteers offered help, he wondered about hidden agendas. When staff made suggestions, he searched for self-serving angles.

This spiritual vigilance would protect him from the disasters that befell naive leaders.

But Mark’s constant suspicion became a relationship poison. His assumption of hidden wickedness created toxic atmosphere where people felt distrusted and demoralized. Volunteers stopped offering help when they sensed his skepticism. Staff became defensive and withdrawn when every suggestion met suspicious scrutiny.

Meanwhile, his colleague Pastor Jennifer approached leadership with what Chambers would call dangerous “innocence.” She assumed good intentions unless proven otherwise, trusted people’s stated motivations, gave volunteers and staff the benefit of the doubt.

According to Mark’s teaching, Jennifer was setting herself up for betrayal and disaster.

The opposite happened.

Jennifer’s trust fostered loyalty and openness. People felt valued and empowered in her ministry, creating remarkable creativity and dedication. When problems did arise, her trustful approach had built relationships strong enough to address conflicts honestly rather than defensively.

Mark’s “reconciliation to sin” created the very disasters it was supposed to prevent. His expectation of wickedness became self-fulfilling prophecy as people responded to suspicion with exactly the defensive behaviors he’d anticipated. Constant vigilance for hidden motives destroyed the trust necessary for effective collaboration.

The breaking point came when Mark’s best volunteer coordinator resigned, citing the toxic atmosphere. “I came here to serve,” she explained, “but you always act like I’m plotting something. It’s exhausting to be around someone who expects the worst from everyone.”

Where was the protection that recognizing sin was supposed to provide? Where was the safety that came from assuming universal wickedness?

Jennifer’s “naive” approach had created flourishing ministry while Mark’s “wise” recognition of sin had produced exactly the disasters he’d tried to avoid. Her trust in people’s better nature proved more practically effective than his theological realism about human depravity.

The breakthrough came when Mark realized that expecting sin everywhere created more problems than it solved. Healthy leadership required discernment and boundaries, not constant suspicion of everyone’s motives.

The wisdom that actually protected relationships wasn’t reconciling to universal wickedness but building trust while maintaining appropriate safeguards. The spiritual teaching that promised protection had delivered destruction instead.

The silence where divine wisdom was supposed to guide his leadership revealed the truth: assuming the worst about people creates the worst in people.

Reflection Question: When has assuming good intentions been more effective than constantly expecting sinful motives in relationships and leadership?

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Natural Grief: A Response to June 23rd

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, “Acquaintance with Grief”, promises that believers can become “acquainted with grief” like Jesus by recognizing sin as the root cause of all sorrow, claiming that understanding this spiritual diagnosis allows God to eliminate sin and its associated suffering.

Here’s what happened when someone actually tried to grieve this way:

“Jesus was acquainted with grief because he understood that sin causes all sorrow,” her pastor explained gently. “Emma’s death, your pain—it all traces back to humanity’s rebellion against God. Once you recognize sin as the root cause, you can let God’s life kill the sin in you and find peace.”

Lisa’s sixteen-year-old daughter had been killed by a drunk driver three weeks earlier. The unbearable pain felt like drowning in molten lead, but her pastor offered this spiritual framework as the path through grief. If sin explained all sorrow, then understanding this truth would somehow transform her relationship with suffering.

She studied Scripture about sin’s effects. Prayed desperately for God to rule in her life and eliminate whatever spiritual rebellion had caused Emma’s death. Waited for the promised acquaintance with grief that would bring divine peace.

But this theological explanation felt like salt in an open wound. Emma hadn’t died because of sin—she’d died because someone chose to drive drunk and ran a red light. The grief consuming Lisa wasn’t mysterious spiritual consequence but natural human response to losing her child.

Where was the peace that was supposed to come from understanding sin’s role? Where was God’s life killing the supposed spiritual cause of her sorrow?

Her sister Janet, a grief counselor, watched Lisa’s struggle with growing alarm. Janet understood sorrow as complex human experience involving love, attachment, and devastating loss. She didn’t need spiritual explanations for why people suffer when those they love die.

“Grief is the price of love,” Janet told Lisa bluntly. “The intensity of your pain reflects the depth of your bond with Emma. This isn’t divine punishment requiring theological interpretation—it’s human experience requiring patience, support, and time.”

When Lisa finally joined a secular grief support group, she encountered people who understood her pain without needing to explain it through sin. Other parents who’d lost children didn’t discuss rebellion against God or spiritual mutiny. They shared practical strategies for surviving holidays, handling triggers, rebuilding meaning after unthinkable loss.

The “acquaintance with grief” that actually helped came through connecting with others who’d experienced similar devastation. Their wisdom wasn’t about sin causing sorrow but about grief as natural response to love interrupted by death.

Lisa’s healing began when she stopped trying to understand Emma’s death through spiritual frameworks and started honoring her grief as appropriate response to losing someone irreplaceable. Comfort came not from God ruling over sin but from human community that understood suffering without explaining it away.

The breakthrough was realizing that some losses don’t require theological interpretation. They require human compassion, time, and the gradual rebuilding of life around the permanent hole left by love.

The silence where divine explanation was supposed to provide meaning delivered the most honest truth: grief doesn’t need spiritual justification. It needs human understanding.

Reflection Question: When has understanding grief as natural human response to loss been more helpful than seeking spiritual explanations for suffering?

Why Humanity Must Overthrow Faith to Survive

Ethical Oversight: A Response to June 22nd

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 Undeviating Test”, promises that God operates by an “eternal law” where “life serves you back in the coin you pay,” claiming judgmental people will face divine retribution while the truly righteous recognize their own capacity for evil through grace.

Here’s what this divine law actually delivered:

“Life serves you back in the coin you pay,” the accountability group leader warned. “If you judge others harshly, God will judge you the same way. The truly righteous person recognizes they’re capable of the same sins they criticize.”

Robert absorbed this teaching completely, believing it revealed how God’s justice operated in the world. He became paralyzingly careful about criticizing others, convinced that harsh judgments would boomerang back through divine law.

When colleagues cut corners at work or lied to customers, Robert stayed silent. When he witnessed financial irregularities, he looked the other way. Speaking up would trigger God’s retributive judgment against his own character flaws, wouldn’t it? The eternal law demanded spiritual humility, not moral oversight.

This divine caution created a sickening dynamic. Robert watched unethical behavior flourish while he remained passive, believing that calling out wrongdoing would invoke punishment for his own imperfections. The promised “eternal law” made him complicit in harm he could have prevented.

His coworker Sarah took a radically different approach. As a former prosecutor, she understood accountability practically, not spiritually. When Sarah witnessed fraud or negligence, she documented it and reported it through proper channels—not from moral superiority but because organizations require functional oversight.

Sarah didn’t worry about divine retribution for holding people accountable. She recognized that pointing out problems was often the most compassionate response for everyone involved, including those who needed intervention before facing serious consequences.

When federal auditors eventually exposed their company’s financial irregularities, Robert felt vindicated. Surely those who had been “shrewd in finding defects” would face divine retribution while his gracious silence would be rewarded by God’s eternal law.

The opposite happened.

Investigators commended Sarah for her detailed reports and ethical vigilance. Her willingness to document problems had limited damage and protected pension funds. Robert’s spiritual passivity had enabled harm to continue longer than necessary.

Where was the divine retribution for Sarah’s “judgmental” behavior? Where was God’s reward for Robert’s humble non-judgment? The eternal law that was supposed to punish those who held others accountable never materialized.

Sarah’s career flourished because she’d demonstrated integrity and professional competence. Robert faced uncomfortable questions about why he’d remained silent when he could have prevented harm.

The breakthrough came when Robert realized that calling out genuine problems wasn’t hypocritical judgment—it was ethical responsibility. Functional oversight served protection and accountability, not self-righteous condemnation.

The divine retribution system he’d feared was completely imaginary. Good outcomes came to those who addressed problems constructively, not to those who stayed passive out of spiritual terror.

The silence where God’s eternal law was supposed to operate revealed the truth: there was no cosmic justice system rewarding non-judgment or punishing accountability. Just human consequences for human choices.

Reflection Question: When has addressing problems directly been more effective than staying silent out of concern about being judgmental?

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