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Greatness Is In The Eye Of The Beholder

Greatness Is In The Eye Of The Beholder

I’ve been told that I am a dreamer and idealist, and I confess it’s true. All my life I’ve wanted to be great—I’ve wanted to leave a legacy of some sort. I’ve wanted my life to validate my being alive somehow, or I’d rather just not bother with it at all. I think we all have this need or desire to be great, to know we have mattered somehow. It’s manifested in different ways through different people, but we all have a need for our life to validate our existence in some way. Culture, religion, family and friends are all sending us messages about success and greatness, and much of the time they are mixed.

Culture tends to consciously or subconsciously condition us that to be great is to be rich or to be known as the next American Idol, the next member of The OC cast or possibly Donald Trump’s apprentice. We are littered with the idea that greatness is the same as fame or riches or even being hip. Success is measured by money and material possessions. If I’m totally honest, I have to admit that I subconsciously buy into that. I want to be known, I want to be made much of, I want people to recognize my face as I walk down the street—I want to have the cool stuff to validate myself.

Religion, at least the modern Christian subculture, inadvertently tells us many of the same things. We want to be the next “big worship leader,” or the cool new pastor with the latest great idea, or the televangelist with the cool new TV show (OK, nobody wants that, but you get the drift). Traditional religion and culture also give us a message—it’s a formula we’ve had mapped out for us in one way or another about how we should function to be deemed “successful.” We go to college, find the right job with the right pay and benefits, find the right spouse, have children and repeat (having children that is). In between all that, we should be moral “good-ol’ boys and girls” because that is what religion and traditional Americana tell us. For the most part, family and friends buy into culture and religion and believe as they are conditioned, which only imposes those thoughts on you.

On the other hand, Christianity—true Christianity—tells us something completely different. When you come to Jesus, you are immediately validated and loved no more or no less; it does not depend on what you do or do not do. You can never do anything that will cause God to stop loving you, and you can never do anything to cause Him to love you more. God takes complete delight in seeing Jesus in you. That is revolutionary and incomprehendable all at the same time. There are no more worldly or religious hoops for us to jump through, and that love gradually allows us to see greatness as it truly is. It looks like a woman selflessly feeding the poor, or a man mowing his neighbor’s lawn, or a musician meticulously crafting a song until it is just right. We begin to equate greatness with doing all things for God’s glory. Greatness becomes not who you are or what you have, but Who knows you, what He did for you and what He is continually doing in you.

[Seth Rosson lives in Texas.]

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