Greatness – What It Is
Last week, with the Tower of Babel as our scriptural touchpoint, we considered what greatness is not. So this week’s question is: “what is the biblical vision of greatness?”
Turn just a single page past Babel in Genesis, and the contrasting picture of greatness begins. It features an old couple, Abraham and Sarah, who fought doubts about their own aging bodies to hold on to God’s unlikely promise God of an heir. Flip to the next Old Testament book, and you’ll find a middle-aged under-achiever named Moses, who even with much self-doubt took up God’s calling to lead his people to freedom.
Two Old Testament greatness gems are in tiny books, and tell about women. Ruth wasn’t even a Hebrew, but she forsook her Moabite loyalties for a relationship with God and his people. The other book tells of a young beauty named Esther, who laid her life on the line to protect God’s glory and his people.
Then there was one seen as great even in his time. David rose to fame while still an unknown runt of a shepherd, as he took five stones and a sling, and faced down a giant for the sake of God.
None of these Old Testament characters built a towering monument, literal or figurative. Yet all were truly great – and especially so because they foreshadowed an even greater one yet to come.
His beginning was remarkably inauspicious, born in a barn to a mom with a bad reputation. He grew up in a remote village, working with his dad as a carpenter. He had no degrees or credentials. Yet crowds swarmed to him, for he touched their lives with astonishing love – and literally touched untouchable lepers. He spoke to ostracized Samaritans. He took devalued women seriously and hugged ignored children. He built up disciples who didn’t have much going for them. He showed a new way of living to those who had given up on life. He both told about and showed God’s love – a greatness that rose to heaven, without a single brick or stone.
That’s the greatness to which you’ve been called! Not to a “greatness” of towering brick and tar, but to countless lives so changed by the love you carry that they tower to heaven!
What would that mean for young people climbing career ladders? They should surely seek to be competent. But they must steer out of the fast lane, and on to the service road.
And how about parents who want to launch their children toward greatness? They can certainly enable diligence in school, and at the same time teach them Jesus style values by taking them to visit nursing homes, and fostering friendships across cultural and racial lines.
And how about our nation? There is much talk of making our nation great, especially on this 250th celebration year. But sadly, there is a Babel-like confusion about what that greatness would be. Rather than taking our cues from political parties, let’s follow Jesus in this arena of life too, supporting the government policies and candidates which most closely align to biblical values, while respecting those who differ, and building genuine relationships across division lines wherever we can. However the world sizes up such efforts, the Lord sees them as towering!
Do you believe the scriptural account of greatness? If so, then this is your time. And the greatness to which God is calling you to is not that of Babel, but of Jesus. If you want something that towers, that’s it!