Do Not Exchange Wholeness for a Fleeting Victory
By Kateb Nuri-Alim Shunnar
I’ve done it before, exchanging my faith, my blessings, and my connection with the Creator for what I thought was a good life… for something as small as a bowl of gumbo. It sounds ridiculous now, but at the time, it made perfect sense. I was impatient. Restless. Tired of waiting for things to come together, so I decided to take control. And for a while, it looked like I had made the right choice.
That’s the tricky thing about moving without the Creator it doesn’t always fall apart right away. In fact, at first, everything seems to be working out. You start thinking, See? I was right. What was I even waiting for? But the thing about shortcuts is they don’t show you the wreckage until you’re too far down the road to turn back. One day, you stop and look behind you only to see the damage. The relationships you strained. The peace you lost. The favor you took for granted. And suddenly, that decision that once felt so right? It doesn’t seem so great anymore.
I had to learn the hard way that the Creator is not meant to be a backup plan. He’s not a spare tire you pull out when life goes flat, only to toss back in the trunk once the road smooths out. But that’s exactly how we treat Him sometimes. We plead for help when we’re desperate, crying out for guidance when we’re lost, and then, the moment things start to look better, we go right back to acting like we’ve got everything under control. It’s an insane cycle one I’ve been guilty of more times than I can count.
But here’s the truth: when we exchange wholeness for position, we’re not really winning. Sure, we might gain some status, a little extra money, or even a moment in the spotlight, but none of that matters if our spirit is running on empty. I’ve chased things I thought would fill me up, only to feel drained and confused when they didn’t satisfy me. Without the Creator at the center, nothing truly fulfills success, not recognition, not even the things we once begged for.
So I had to stop. Stop sacrificing my peace for temporary victories. Stop doubting just because things weren’t happening on my timeline. Stop treating the Creator like some emergency exit I only turn to when I’m in trouble.
I won’t make that mistake again. I refuse to trade something priceless for something temporary. And if that means waiting, trusting, and staying the course even when I can’t see the next step so be it. Because I know firsthand what happens when I try to run the show on my own, and I never want to find myself watching the smoke in my rearview mirror again.
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