I’ve come to a startling conclusion.
I don’t care if I do anything of greatness in my lifetime.
I’ve believed for a long time that I am “destined for great things” even been told this by my parents and grandparents (and who can blame them, isn’t it natural to want, nay believe, the best for your offspring?).
But to whatever credit I considered this as part of my destiny, or spiritually speaking, my calling, I relinquish it.
It is of no importance, no significance, no merit unto my own.
For what betterment does ambition bring me?
What promises of blessing from above afford me any validity or credibility?
What Christ-like endeavors should ever bring me satisfaction or fulfillment (as if I deserved them)?
Throughout my adolescence, I walked in the arrogance that I was “destined for great things.”
I believed so strongly in myself, my future, the impact that I would bring the world.
In fact, I believed that anything short of changing the world as I knew it was somehow substandard, unacceptable, dare I say, failure.
This arrogance drove me to beliefs of superiority, of a calling so much greater than the common man around me that it drove me from the very people I was called to love and serve.
“But isn’t destiny a great thing?”
“Isn’t changing the world a noble endeavor?”
“Great men and women are few and far between!”
“To him who is given much – much is expected.”
“Wasn’t Jesus a great man? Paul? John the Baptist?”
Interesting those should be named.
For Jesus was the one to wash his disciple’s feet.
Paul claimed that to follow the example of Christ was to make oneself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant.
John the Baptist lived on locust and honey – his only herald was kin to that of lunacy.
No, great men, truly great men, have not been those to flout their greatness.
Some might even say they have not even known it was greatness they were achieving.
Is it more noble to strive to change the world or to adopt a single vision of loving God and others?
“Without vision the people perish.”
Do they perish because the have no pursuit of greatness or gain?
Or do they perish because, left to their own, they indulge in selfish and self-serving behavior?
What “vision” is it that gives people motivation?
I believe that vision is the belief that sacrifice, self-denial on behalf of another, servitude from a willing heart – are all that which brings ultimate glory to the Father.
For God is truly great and he uses the foolishness of the world to confound the wise.
He uses fishermen, tax collectors, the ostracized, the outcast, the widow – all to accomplish his will.
Was it often God used the talented, the skilled, the brilliant, the beloved to accomplish his greatest acts?
Who do I think I am?
What merit have I to earn God’s desperation to use me?
Who am I to think I “have what it takes” to change the world?
Who is it God truly needs?
What right have I to believe I am entitled to greatness?
What hope do I dare place in “destiny”?
Is it not a good thing to desire great things to happen in the world?
Is it not motivating to be a part of the hungry being fed? The lost being saved? The lame walking, the blind seeing, the deaf hearing?
“Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.”
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they will be filled.”
I rob God of nothing when I desist from thoughts, beliefs and actions that manipulate me into a false hope of significance.
God doesn’t care about my greatness, He just doesn’t, and neither should I.
