One of the hardest lessons I’ve had to learn is that being needed and being called are not always the same thing.
For a long time, I filled spaces because there was a need. People were being blessed. Lives were being impacted. Doors were opening.
God was clearly using me.
And honestly, that’s what made it so difficult to let go.
If the work had been unhealthy, surrender would have been easy. If it had been unfruitful, walking away would have made sense.
But it wasn’t.
People genuinely benefited from what I was doing. I was leading worship at a marriage group, helping with a college chapel, serving in leadership opportunities at my kids’ school, and supporting ministries and people who had come to depend on my involvement.
The need was real. The impact was real. The gratitude was real.
So when my responsibilities began to change, and God expanded my assignment into a broader season of leadership, I found myself wrestling with a question:
If God is using me here, should I keep doing it? At first, my answer was yes. Of course I should. How could stepping away from something good possibly be God’s will?
But over time, the Holy Spirit began pressing on my heart.
Not because the work was wrong. Not because the people were wrong. But because my calling had changed.
I started realizing that continuing to say yes to every previous assignment was causing me to cross boundaries I wasn’t supposed to cross anymore. My priorities were becoming blurred. My energy was stretched thin. My attention was divided.
And the conviction became impossible to ignore: Just because I was needed didn’t mean I was still called.
It was during that process that the story of Mary and Martha began speaking to me differently.
For years, I read that passage as a lesson about being busy versus spending time with Jesus. But now I see another layer.
Martha wasn’t doing something wrong. She was serving. She was hosting. She was meeting a very real need. In fact, if Martha had stopped what she was doing, there probably would have been things left undone.
That’s what makes Jesus’ response so surprising. He never told Martha that the need wasn’t real. He never told her that the work didn’t matter.
Instead, He told her she was worried and distracted by many things, while Mary had chosen what was most important.
As I reflected on that story, I realized how much I related to Martha.
Not because I was doing the wrong things. But because I was still carrying assignments God was no longer asking me to carry.
The need was still real. The work still mattered. People were still being blessed.
But somewhere along the way, I had confused being needed with being called.
And I think that’s exactly what God was confronting in me. Because God never called me to be indispensable. He never called me to fill every gap. He never called me to meet every need.
He called me to follow Him. And sometimes following Him means trusting Him with the things we’re leaving behind.
That was difficult to accept. Because part of me believed that if I stepped away, the need would remain unmet.
But God gently reminded me of something I should have known all along:
The ministry never belonged to me. The people never belonged to me. The opportunities never belonged to me. They belonged to Him.
And maybe the space I was occupying wasn’t supposed to stay occupied by me forever.
Maybe God wanted that space available for someone else to answer their own call to obedience.
Someone else needed the opportunity to step forward. Someone else needed room to discover how God could use them. Someone else needed to become the answer to the prayer I thought only I could answer.
So I let go.
Not all at once, but intentionally. And guess what? God provided.
Worship leaders stepped into those ministry spaces. Help arrived for the school. People answered the call. The work continued. The ministry moved forward.
The Kingdom of God didn’t skip a beat.
And in the process, God blessed the work of my hands in the new assignment He had given me.
That’s when I learned something I hope I never forget:
Faithfulness isn’t holding onto yesterday’s assignment because it was fruitful.
Faithfulness is following God into today’s assignment because He is leading.
Not because the need disappeared. But because the calling changed.
Sometimes obedience means stepping in. Sometimes obedience means stepping back.
Both require trust. Both require faith.
And both belong to God.
Let’s Tune In.
