So You Think You are Important?

 

So I was reading a Robert Parker “Spenser” novel recently, and I found an intriguing scene in which Spenser is observing a Hollywood man with a pinky ring in a restaurant, with, of course, a pretty woman by his side. His ostentatious manners, bragging about his recent trip to Europe, and his deplorable treatment of his waiter, all lent to the very realistic scene of a self-made man. I remember sitting next to pompous people who seem to have a deep love relationship with themselves, and I guess we, as humans, have had this problem a long while (See Narcissus).  Reflecting on this scene, I thought about the many people who do literally think the sun rises and sets on their whims.

At the extreme of the selfish spectrum are the murderers, for what can be more selfish than taking away someone else’s life, but there are many of our society who are not that extreme. Rather their selfishness is forged one quiet link at a time, eventually building a chain that would make Ebenezer’s ghost jealous. Their outlook is on themselves, and they never bother to notice what they miss by such a selfish focus. I do think that C.S. Lewis had it right in his caricatures of sinful people—such people even manage to perform acts of charity from a selfish basis.

It is not that man cannot do good; it is that the good is never done from the right mind set. Love of God ought to drive every one of our actions. Lewis perfectly captures the wrong motivation of people in The Great Divorce. A mother may love her son, but in the end, unless the love is properly placed under God, it is not love at all, but an extension of the mother’s selfish person. I do confess that I find this most hard to see when I look at others, but the Bible tells us that God looks on the heart rather than on the outward appearance. Now we usually see that outward appearance, and seldom do we catch more than a glimmer of what is going on inside. In that day, we shall see God as he is, and perhaps we will see the hearts of those in rebellion against God clearly, for the first time.

But that thought should be very scary; I know it is to me. The idea of God opening up my life, and seeing all the secrets of my heart, the heart that I know all too well, that idea is frightening to me. I use that fear to drive me to live this day, the only day that I have control of to live for God. I cannot change my sins of yesteryear, nor even of yesterday, and I do not know what the uncertain tides of the future may bring, but I can take the now, this present day, and turn it towards worshipping and loving my God.

It is almost as if success breeds failure. Men, charmed by the constant success of life with its growing potency, are lifted up to dizzying heights far beyond the common man. Yet, that lifting up, that soaring beyond expectation—is the very thing that damns their souls irrevocably. I read something recently where someone was praying for his children—not that they should be rich and famous, but that they should be righteous.

But it is an uncommon person who has the wisdom to seek first righteousness. Many of us seem to get lost in the details of life—as if the pressing needs of daily living quench the youthful quest for righteousness. I look at someone like Elvis, and I thank God that I do not have his wonderful talent for singing. You might at first be bewildered at my thankfulness, but I look at the enormous temptations that came to a young man with his immense success. Wine, women, and song were literally his to do with as he would, and his dismal record in living his life illustrates that the temptation was too much. I do thank God that I did not have to face those temptations; it is the very rare young person who finds himself strong enough to remain as a young Joseph, fleeing from acts of unrighteousness. I look at the Bible, and I understand when it says give me neither riches nor poverty, not riches lest I look on my wealth and forget my God, not poverty lest I forget and curse my God in my need. May God give us our portions, and the wisdom to be satisfied with them.

I have noticed the same thing in presidents. What man is there that does not become irrevocably conceited and proud by the time he reaches the highest office in the land? How much better that he should learn righteousness before power! Both Coolidge and Truman seem to be men capable of steering their own characters through the morass of entanglements that come from too much power. But in the many other biographies of presidents that I have read, it seems to me to be the exceptional president who is able to put his character and integrity before the temptations of power.

Luther pictured any man coming to the Bible, and being changed by the Word of God as God would have it. He pictured a people of priests, actionable and responsible before God, made righteous by faith alone, and that frightened the aristocratical church as badly as anything Luther ever did. Their very power base, largely founded on unrighteousness, was threatened by the idea of common people becoming priests. If people could go directly to the God to be made righteous, what power would remain to the church? I see the power of the church being so twisted that those who did read the good news of the Bible reeled in horror at the atrocities of the church. Luther was just one of many who were appalled at the things done in the name of Christ. I do wonder if the greatest deed that Luther and Calvin and the other great reformers did was to make the Bible available in common language for everyone to read. No longer did common citizens have to depend on the church to find out what the Bible said.

So what of the Bible? What does it say to those of us who dwell overlong on ourselves? The Bible teaches us that we have nothing of merit where we can stand before God. The answer is simple wisdom: “Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you.” Someone once remarked that the next time you think you are invaluable, put your finger in a bowl of water, and then take it out, seeing what impression you have made. Our value in ourselves is absolutely nothing. Some wise man once observed that you and I are a bunch of zeroes until we get behind the right One. And, it is at that point that our only value, our only worth, our only conceit should reside. I am behind the right One.

When we at last come to the realization of our utter worthlessness before him, is it not ironic that at the same point he declares our worth? For who else has the Incarnation come, but for man? Chafer¹ reminds us that at the cross, God declared the price of man to be higher than anything conceivable, as God himself willingly endured the judgments against man, and that God stretched himself even more than at Creation, paying the highest price, namely giving his all, that you and I might be redeemed. There was no greater price that God could have paid—he did everything possible for us in delivering himself to the cross. Now that is grace!

Yes, you are important! Made that way by God, but you only find that importance in him, and if you are going about, prideful over being that self-made man, you are missing everything that would define you as important. If you are such, you are in danger of being a zero who is never going to get behind the right one.

For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

 

1. SCRIPTURE discloses the fact that the power and resources of God are more taxed by all that enters into the salvation of the soul than His power and resources were taxed in the creation of the material universe. In salvation God has wrought to the extreme limit of His might. He spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all. He could do no more.

Chafer, Lewis Sperry (2008-07-19). Grace (Kindle Locations 447-449). Taft Software, Inc.. Kindle Edition.