Being Chosen Did Not Mean an Easier Life
A priest says David and the apostles show that blessings come with a burden we rarely see.
Ascension Presents · I’ll Never Forget What My Ex-Girlfriend Told Me (w/ Fr. Mike Schmitz)Fr. Mike Schmitz, a priest, starts with an old story about being picked. God sends the prophet Samuel to a man named Jesse, who brings out his sons one by one to find the next king of Israel. The oldest looks like a king, but God says no, and no again, through seven sons, until the youngest, David, is chosen.
Then, Schmitz says, Jesus spends all night praying on a mountain and comes down in the morning to pick 12 apostles from his wider group of followers to be with him and be sent out by him. After laying out both scenes, he invites listeners to wonder whether they see themselves as the one chosen or as one of the ones passed over?
Most people, he argues, know what it feels like to be one of the ones left standing there. That feeling, he says, usually turns into jealousy of the person who got picked, or into self doubt, into asking, am I not good enough?
His answer is blunt: "You cannot judge someone else's life based off their highlight reels."
What he means is that in the Bible, to be chosen was not to be given an easier life. David was not chosen for praise and glory, Schmitz says, he was chosen to suffer, to fight, and to spend years on the run. The apostles were chosen to leave their families, friends, homes, and jobs, and to have their lives completely disrupted.
In Schmitz's telling, their blessing came with a burden. Aside from Judas, he notes, virtually all of the apostles suffered for their faith in Jesus and died for it. To be set apart by God, he says, was a holy burden from the Lord, a blessing that also broke their lives open and rarely left them settled.
So envy misses the full picture. We see the moment someone is picked, Schmitz argues, and we forget the cost that comes with it.
Questions people ask
Who was David, and did his life really get harder after he was chosen?
David was the youngest son of Jesse who became the second king of Israel. After Samuel anointed him, he defeated the giant Goliath, became a military hero, and then spent years fleeing King Saul, who tried to kill him, before civil war and family conflict marked much of his reign.
Did almost all of the apostles really die as martyrs?
Church tradition holds that most of the twelve apostles were executed or killed for preaching about Jesus, with John traditionally believed to have died of old age. Historians note that the evidence is stronger for some, like Peter and Paul and James, son of Zebedee, than for others, but early Christians widely remembered them as martyrs.
What does Father Mike mean by 'highlight reels'?
He means the best, most visible moment, like the anointing of David or the choosing of the Twelve, compared to everything that follows. Just as people post successes on social media and hide struggles, we tend to remember someone else's selection and forget the work, risk, and suffering attached to it.