When God Says, 'Stop Helping Me!'

Romans 14:1-12  Lectionary Reading

This passage reminds me of the famous line by Jackie Chan as Passepartout in the 2004 classic Around the World in 80 Days:

[Passepartout is fighting while the caged Phileas coaches him]
Phileas Fogg: Watch out to the right!
[Passepartout misses]
Phileas Fogg: No, my right.
[Passepartout is hit]
Passepartout: Stop helping me!

It is a lot like our trying to help God make moves, judgments, especially considering the level of God-relatedness of others. How fitting, on the 10th anniversary of 9/11, is this reminder from Apostle Paul: sometimes God tells us- ‘Stop helping me!’

We are each accountable to God. We grow in our relationship to God as we give God permission to transform us. Others around us do play an important role, that is, in the areas in which we have ourselves made our choice to allow God to shape and form us.

When we begin to put ourselves in the role of God, making the decisions, judgments, and punishments which belong to him, we step out of the God-like grace, mercy, and love, and toward the dark and relationally destructive side- a path that led ultimately into the kind of dark and violent actions which we saw so horribly that day the towers fell.

God does not need our help acting on his behalf in judgment and punishment of others, but does call for our help in sharing the debt of love we owe to each other.