When I left the bench after more than twenty years in the law and stepped into the new work God was calling me to, I walked straight into a world where everyone else seemed already established.
They had the followings. The platforms. The experience. They knew the language, understood the technology, and seemed to know exactly what they were doing.
And there I was, starting fresh.
Some days, it felt like I had arrived at the banquet long after all the good seats were taken.
I could look around and see women who had been doing this work for years. They were writing books, speaking on stages, hosting podcasts, building communities, and reaching thousands of women.
And if I weren’t careful, comparison would begin whispering.
Maybe you started too late.
Maybe there isn’t room for you.
Maybe God gave this assignment to somebody else.
And beneath all those thoughts was an even more painful question:
Lord, did You forget about me?
Face the Fear
If you have ever felt that way, you are facing one of the mindsets that can make it difficult to trust God’s plan.
Sometimes when a woman says, “I don’t know my purpose,” another fear hides underneath those words.
She wonders whether God passed her by.
She believes God has something meaningful for other women, but maybe not for her. Maybe she missed her opportunity. Maybe she wasn’t gifted enough, spiritual enough, young enough, connected enough, or accomplished enough.
It is the wound of feeling unchosen.
And that wound almost always grows in the soil of comparison.
Comparison has a way of convincing us that someone else’s visibility is evidence of our invisibility. We see what God is doing in her life and begin questioning what He is doing in ours.
Her door opened.
Her prayer was answered.
Her business grew.
Her ministry took off.
Her book was published.
Her opportunity came.
And somewhere along the way, we turn her blessing into evidence against God’s faithfulness to us.
But someone else’s season says absolutely nothing about God’s plan for yours.
God does not have a limited supply of purpose. He doesn’t run out of assignments. And He doesn’t have to diminish another woman’s calling to make room for yours.
If you have ever quietly wondered, Does God see me at all? then hold that fear up against the truth of who He is.
You Are Carved on His Hands
Let’s start with the deepest fear: God forgot me.
Listen to God’s answer in Isaiah 49:15-16 (NIV): “Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I will not forget you! See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands.”
God refers to one of the fiercest forms of human love we know, the love of a mother for her child, and says even that could fail before His love for you ever would.
Then He gives us this beautiful picture.
You are engraved on the palms of His hands.
Not written in pencil where you can be erased. Not scribbled on a piece of paper that can be misplaced. Engraved.
Permanent.
Your name isn’t on some list God has to go searching for when He remembers you exist. You are continually before Him.
So, when heaven seems quiet, don’t confuse silence with absence.
When the door hasn’t opened, don’t confuse waiting with rejection.
And when someone else gets the opportunity you wanted, don’t confuse their season with evidence that yours will never come.
God has not forgotten you.
Remember Hagar
Being overlooked by people is not the same as being overlooked by God.
Just ask Hagar.
Hagar was a servant and a foreigner. She was caught in circumstances she did not create and then mistreated so badly that she fled into the wilderness.
Imagine how invisible she must have felt.
She was away from home, from security, and from anyone who seemed to care what happened to her.
But God found her there.
Genesis 16 tells us that the angel of the Lord met Hagar in the wilderness and spoke directly to her situation.
And Hagar responded by giving God a name. In Genesis 16:13 (NIV), she says, “You are the God who sees me.”
I love that.
The woman who had every reason to feel invisible discovered something about God that changed the way she saw her circumstances.
He sees me.
Maybe you need that reminder today.
God sees the work nobody applauds.
He sees the prayers nobody hears.
He sees the years you spent caring for everybody else.
He sees the dreams you placed on the shelf because somebody needed you.
He sees the disappointment you don’t talk about.
He sees the gifts you wonder whether you will ever get to use.
And He sees the woman you are still becoming.
You may feel overlooked, but you have never been unseen.
Look at How God Chooses
God doesn’t just notice overlooked people. Throughout Scripture, He repeatedly chooses them.
When Samuel went to Jesse’s house to anoint Israel’s next king, Jesse brought out the sons who looked like kings.
But David wasn’t even invited to the lineup.
He was out tending sheep.
But God told Samuel, “People look at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.”
(1 Samuel 16:7, NIV)
Eventually Samuel asked whether Jesse had any other sons.
There was one.
David.
The son nobody thought necessary to call into the room was the one God had chosen all along.
Think about that.
David’s absence from the lineup did not cancel God’s anointing on his life.
Neither does yours.
You may not be in the room yet.
You may not have the title yet.
You may not have the audience yet.
You may not have received the invitation yet.
But human recognition has never been a prerequisite for divine calling.
Sometimes God does some of His most important preparation in the field, long before anybody knows your name.
David learned courage in that field. He learned responsibility there. He learned how to worship there. He learned how to fight there.
The field wasn’t proof that God had forgotten him.
It was part of God’s preparation.
And just maybe some of the places you have interpreted as evidence that God overlooked you have actually been places where He has been preparing you.
Your Calling Doesn’t Have to Be Loud
We also need to let go of the idea that a calling only matters if people can see it.
Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 12:18 (NIV), “But in fact God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be.”
Every one of them.
That includes you.
God placed you in His body intentionally. Your gifts are intentional. Your experiences are intentional. The people you are equipped to serve are intentional.
Your calling does not become more legitimate because it has a microphone attached to it.
Some assignments happen on stages. Others happen across kitchen tables.
Some women are called to influence thousands. Others may profoundly shape the lives of five people God has specifically entrusted to them.
One isn’t more significant than the other.
We measure significance by size.
God measures faithfulness.
That means you cannot use somebody else’s numbers, visibility, timeline, or assignment to determine the value of your own.
Chosen Before You Had Anything to Prove
Jesus told His disciples, “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit.” (John 15:16, NIV)
Notice where the choosing begins.
With Him.
You didn’t have to earn your way onto God’s list.
You didn’t have to become impressive enough for Him to notice you.
You didn’t have to build a platform, collect accomplishments, or prove that you were worthy of an assignment.
He chose you.
And that changes the question.
Instead of asking, Why hasn’t God given me what He gave her? begin asking, God, what have You chosen me to do here?
Instead of asking, Why hasn’t my moment come? ask, What are You developing in me during this season?
Instead of asking, Does God see me? remind yourself, I am already seen.
Because maybe you aren’t behind.
Maybe you haven’t missed your turn.
Maybe the field you’re standing in isn’t where God left you.
Maybe it’s where He’s preparing you.
And maybe this season isn’t about trying harder to become visible.
Maybe it’s about learning to trust the God who has seen you all along.
So, when comparison whispers that there is no room left for you, don’t believe it.
When waiting makes you wonder whether God changed His mind about you, don’t believe that either.
And when you look around and it seems as though everybody else has been chosen, remember Hagar in the wilderness. Remember David in the field. Remember your name engraved on His hands.
Do not ever forget that God sees you, remembers you, and has chosen you.
And whatever He has called you to do does not require you to become somebody else in order to do it.
Your job is not to compete for a place in God’s plan.
Your job is to trust Him enough to walk faithfully in the place He has already prepared for you.
