What if what we are waiting for, that great version of who we think we’re supposed to be – a world changer - is an illusion? downsized faith {the myth of greatness} Featured, Social Justice — By Pam Hogeweide on March 31, 2010 at 12:00 pm Most people will live unremarkable lives that are soon forgotten after they’ve passed on. The overwhelming majority of us won’t change history or leave a lasting legacy worthy of a museum or a biography. We’re born, we live, and then we die. All pretty much behind the scenes. In a landscape filled with driven ambition to be better and best, has the modern American church scene become a bastion of spiritual excellence? When is the last time you heard a sermon on failure or weakness? Who of our spiritual leaders publicly air their brokenness or boast of their humanity? Average living has become despised as we wait for God’s epic plan for our lives to show up. If we keep waiting, we tell ourselves, it will eventually unfold. The miles of sticks and crates of carrots that have been dangled in front of us for too many years has conditioned many of us into a lull that aches for our greatness to breakout. We were meant to be more… to do more, we tell ourselves as we listen to yet another life-changing sermon on a Sunday morning. What if what we are waiting for, that great version of who we think we’re supposed to be – a world changer - is an illusion? Corporate-sized life is fading. From the economy to business and to faith communities, small is becoming the new preferred size. Microtrends are becoming micro lifestyles as people, including Christians, are discovering that bigger is not necessarily better. Downsizing is suddenly becoming fashionable. But can we make it even more personal and shrink down those grandiose visions inside of us that insist we were meant for greatness? In the Western mindset, big accomplishments that create economic or social power equals greatness. For sure, there are many who prosper at what they do. Thank God for the inventors and creatives who go out on a limb to try something innovative. But in the kingdom of God, greatness is not measured this way. God’s kingdom is an upside down kingdom where the smallest becomes the biggest and the greatest citizens are its invisible sons and daughters. Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl tells people not to aim for success. “The more you aim at it and make it a target, the more are going to miss it,” he says. Instead, says Frankl, let success become an unintended side effect of one’s personal dedication to a cause greater than one’s self. Downsizing personal goals flies in the face of the instruction from gurus and preachers of motivation. They tell us to let inspiration propel us to heights of personal accomplishment that will produce some kind of wow. Is that what Jesus set out to preach? Was he a motivational speaker calling for his followers to live their best life now? Maybe we need to demotivate, scale down our lofty goals for greatness as Christ followers. Can we let God be great in the common exchanges of day to day life? Can we embrace an identity of obscurity as power brokers swirl around us with strategy meetings for brand marketing? (branding is a popular term used by many churched people who have a business mindset towards their ministry) The strategy of Jesus with the original twelve was this: You’ve observed how godless rulers throw their weight around,” he said, “and when people get a little power how quickly it goes to their heads. It’s not going to be that way with you. Whoever wants to be great must become a servant. Whoever wants to be first among you must be your slave. That is what the Son of Man has done: He came to serve, not to be served—and then to give away his life in exchange for many who are held hostage. Mark 10:42-44, The Message Too often in the mega movement of Christendom we have seen superstardom overtake and corrupt pure Christian spirituality. Is this perhaps why Jesus worked so hard to intentionally reject superstardom? If Jesus worked hard to downsize shouldn’t his followers? A big part of my story in learning to downsize my life and faith comes from The Bridge, my faith community. This rowdy little church, which seems more like a tavern than a house of the holy, does big things through small efforts. Like give away groceries each week to whoever needs them. We do this without any kind of expectation that people will come to our faith community. We do it for the sake of serving those who need a bag of groceries. Here in Portland where I live, in the north part of the city where funky little neighborhoods are bursting with creative energy, there is a monthly street fair known as Last Thursday. I was hanging out one summer night enjoying the art and music and exotic smells of the various food vendors on Alberta Street where Last Thursday is hosted. It felt like a big party. I bumped into a friend who introduced me to a guy who had just returned from a time of missionary service overseas. Since he’d arrived home, he’d been regretting coming back. He wasn’t sure if he was meant to return to a life overseas or go to school or get a job…like many people, he was living in that uncomfortable place of transition. We talked at length about his dissatisfaction. “What are you doing now?” I asked as a typical Portland hipster dude walked by with blue hair and a full-sleeve tattoo of what looked like a cross between the Last Supper and a scene from Night of the Living Dead. He frowned and shoved his hands deeper into his jeans pockets. “I have a part-time job at a coffee joint, but …” His words trailed off as he stared at the sidewalk. “I don’t know. I think I’m just doing nothing. When I was living in Uganda everyday was like an adventure, but here, I’m just some guy making coffee drinks in Portland. I’m not doing anything for God.” We talked some more. I have a knack for getting total strangers to let their guard down and open up to me. My therapist says it’s really an issue with appropriate social boundaries. Go figure. “What if it’s enough to work at a job and just love the people around you?” I asked. “What if it’s cool with God that you live a simple life? That you’ve downsized?” I felt a weirdness of discomfort tighten up in my belly. Am I talking him into accepting a mediocre life? I need to shut up and let this guy find his purpose, I thought as he began to lose interest in our conversation and was ready to move on. I didn’t blame him. There was a fire dance performance about to start on the next block and God knows that my seasoned-woman-of-faith wisdom couldn’t compete with that. I slunked home wondering if I had given a zealous Christ follower permission to be ordinary? Does my average life matter? With no wow factor or dazzling talent that will bring me youtube stardom, can I really trust that my ordinary existence is meaningful? Or am fooling myself and finding a way to spiritualize mediocrity? That I am even asking these kinds of questions betrays how conditioned I’ve become to expect great things to flow from my life because of my relationship with God. This is a distortion, really, of the prosperity gospel and the idea that a life of Christian spirituality will be marked by success and ministry accomplishment. I am convinced that it is the gestures of the everyday life where sacred shots of God’s presence lie in waiting. Grand plans to be a history maker for Jesus sound great in a sermon or at a rally, but in the life swirl of the average Jane and her brother Joe, God is most discovered within the story frame of Life Right Here and Right Now. I am the revolution and it is today. Not out there somewhere in the bullshit myth of tomorrow.
Posted on: Wed, 17 Jul 2013 16:05:17 +0000
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