The Desire for Greatness

"Yeah, I thought about going into the exercise field, but I just didn't know how I'd be able to use that for Christ."

When I heard those words, it instantly hit a chord in my mind regarding something that I've been thinking a lot about lately: our desire for greatness.

Humans have an innate desire to see that their life has meaning. We all want to be worthwhile, to be a somebody, to know that our life and what we are doing matters.  If you ask me, this is the main cause of every 20-something-year-old's existential crisis. Attempting to answer the question, "What will I do with my life that will actually matter, and be something that I actually enjoy?"

And in order to live a life full of meaning, we come to the conclusion that we have to do great things. And that makes sense, right? To be great, you must do great things. But this is the point that I think that we tend to misconstrue.

Great things, according to many, are to be like Billy Graham and lead hundreds of thousands of people to Christ. Great things are to be like Jerry Falwell, and to start up the largest evangelical Christian university in the world. Great things are to be like Hudson Taylor, who brought the Bible to the Chinese people.

In our minds, being like these people becomes the true definition of being great.

We set these extremely lofty standards for ourselves as to what doing great, and being great really is. And when we fail to meet these expectations we view ourselves as failures. We are no longer a missionary in the jungles of Africa, but are now just an insurance salesman. We failed. Guilt sets in over a matter that it should not even be involved in, and we let ourselves become miserable because we are now worthless. We are no longer doing something that matters, we're not doing anything of eternal significance.

This undeserved guilt is a powerful tool of Satan. If you can convince a man that he is guilty of something, and he accepts it, you can have enormous influence over his life. Happiness is no longer an option for the guilty man, because he will have a sense that he does not deserve it. This lack of joy, this unyielding guilt will then creep its way in towards other areas of this man's life until both he, and others find him to be a miserable person, and as a result, someone who is not as effective of a Christian as they could be.

I had a teacher in high school once who would constantly say that you can glorify God even if you're just a ditch digger. I never really thought too deeply about it at the time. It was just another teacher's sayings. But I think that he said that because he knew what kind of thoughts we were going to wrestle with in the future when our livelihoods occupied a much larger portion of our minds than before.

Sometimes I wonder if this is not a form of spiritual pride, if you will. "Well, having a normal job is ok for other people, but not for me. I need to do something better. I need to do something that will actually reach people."

And this is a superficial way of thinking that has predominated over many of our minds. We get the sense that there are the higher 'spiritual' occupations, and then there is everything else. I think this is the thinking behind why almost every other person I met at college wanted to go into the mission field, myself included. We all wanted to do something meaningful with our lives, and that was the only way that we thought we could do it. (I sometimes wonder if overtly-mission sending churches cultivate these ideas within their youth groups without even realizing it. Whether that's true or not, I don't know. It's just something I think about sometimes.)

If you're not working for a non-profit, if you're not serving in the middle of a jungle somewhere, or the like, is what you're doing worthwhile? I say yes. With the exception of prostitution, drug dealing, and other similar vocations, every job can be used to not only bring glory to God, but to show people Christ as well.

Is this to say that some people are not called to other countries? Absolutely not. Some people are undoubtedly called to the mission field. But at the same time, I think that it is a dangerous mistake to assume that if that is not your calling, what you are doing is not of any eternal significance, and that you should feel guilty.

This world could not exist if everybody had the exact same job. If everybody was a pastor, who would collect the garbage? If everybody was a missionary, who would grow our food? If everybody was a worship pastor, who would manage the hospitals? Does this sound eerily similar to 1 Corinthians 12:12-31 to anybody?

Is being a missionary applaudable? Absolutely. But the public school teacher who teaches her class to the utmost of her ability, the football coach who leads his young men to become more responsible, and the businessman who constantly do their best to create innovative solutions to problems and provide people with the products they need also hold applaudable positions.

As to going to a 'mission field', I would point out that even America in itself is a mission field. Have you read a local newspaper lately? Have you seen the moral crises that this country is going through? Abortion, homosexuality, wicked government, lies, and sexual immorality are rampant. We NEED strong Christians within our workforce. We need Christian politicians, Christian business owners, Christian teachers, writers, lawyers, legislators and so on. Why? Because if Christians do not seek out these positions, who will? It will be the people without any sense of morality, the people who do not know the difference between right and wrong, and the like. America needs Christians.

So, to wrap it all up, yes, being a missionary is awesome. But so are being a hotel manager, a pilot, a movie director, or even a personal trainer. You can serve God and do great things for Him no matter where you are. When we get down to the very root of the matter, I don't think that God is concerned as much with our specific vocation as He is with our hearts.

Are you loving God with all your heart, mind, and soul, and showing love for other people with the same intensity that God does for us? Because if you are, I would argue that even if you are just digging ditches, what you do, does matter to God.

And that would be pretty great.

Love God, and do what you want. -St. Augustine