Does God Prefer Someone Else?

Or is who you are what we need?

I’ve spent a lot of my life working around and under strong, inspiring leaders. Gifted communicators. People who seemed to carry an ease and confidence I couldn’t quite locate in myself. And somewhere in that proximity, a quiet question formed. One I wouldn’t have said out loud, but one I can hear now if I’m honest:

Does God prefer I become more like her? Or him?

I’ve had to reckon with this question not just for my own soul’s sake, but because of what it means for how I lead others. For a long time, my hesitation in giving people direct developmental feedback was rooted less in wisdom and more in my own unresolved identity stuff. If I’m still quietly wondering whether God prefers a different version of me, how am I going to help you become the fullest version of you?

Paul had something important to say about this in 1 Corinthians 12. The body of Christ has many parts. The eye can’t tell the hand it doesn’t belong. The ear can’t wish it were a foot. Everyone trying to become the same part would be, as Paul diplomatically puts it, not a body at all. God apparently designed our differences on purpose.

This then forces me to face certain questions - does God really love extroverts more - or introverts? Prefer lions or golden retrievers? 1s or 7s? Feelers or thinkers?

Photo by Kira auf der Heide on Unsplash

The answer is no. Theologically, obviously. But it’s worth saying out loud, because a lot of us have unconsciously absorbed the idea that God has a preferred personality type and we’re either relieved or behind depending on our assessment results.

What I keep finding is that the way out of comparison isn’t more self-confidence. It’s a higher view of God. As Dallas Willard put it, “all human troubles come from thinking of God wrongly, which then means, thinking about ourselves wrongly.”

If we imagine God as a talent scout - always scanning the room for better resources, always comparing our output to someone else’s - then of course we’ll spend our lives trying to become someone we’re not. We’ll quietly imitate someone else’s calling or wish we had their gifts or opportunities. And we’ll keep showing up at the comparison game, exhausted and slightly behind.

But if God is the patient Gardener of John 15, tending each branch with specific and unhurried attention, then there’s no competition. There’s just your vine you are growing and developing together.

John, who wrote the Gospel that bears his name, referred to himself throughout simply as “the disciple Jesus loved.” I used to smirk a bit at this. Okay, John, you sure got carried away with this whole love thing. But I’ve come to see it differently.

John, writing likely late in life, had landed on what was most true and most essential about himself — not his role, not his accomplishments, not his proximity to other impressive disciples. Just this: he was the one Jesus loved.

That’s the foundation good leadership development comes from. Not “should I become more like her?” But - how do I help you become the healthiest, fullest version of the person God already made you to be? That’s a better question. And it turns out it requires that I’ve done some of that work myself first.

Starting from this place of God’s love myself makes it possible for me to want the best and most for others - for you. It is this foundation that affords us the ability to be inspired by others and learn from their life - without it devolving into comparison.

I think of it this way and sometimes I write it out when I struggle: Other people are awesome. And no one can be me.

We need who you are, friend. Thank God you are on the planet. I know we have more to learn and grow into and develop. But thank God for your life. It is truly one-of-a-kind.

Amen.