Greatness is not our calling …

I don’t know about you, but I find it troubling at how pervasive is the teaching from pulpits that we’re called to be “great.”

We aren’t.

From the time men walked the Earth with Jesus, it could (if wanted) be understood that our obsession with self must be exchanged for an obsession with Jesus, a truth captured by a man (John the Baptist) who really did walk this Earth when Jesus did …

“He must become greater and greater, and I must become less and less,” John 3:30.

Unlike John, we tend to make the church all about the greatness of the people in it, so much so that we forget what — and Who — is truly great. It’s like the story told about a tour guide who was leading a group of people around Westminster Abbey, probably the most famous church in England. The guide pointed out the ancient Abbey’s beauties, its glorious windows, the graves of kings and queens, the throne on which England’s monarchs are crowned. She went on and on about the poet’s corner, the musician’s corner, and all of the great worthies of the past who were buried or memorialized in that great church. But when she paused for questions, one tourist asked a penetrating one. Said the tourist, “This is a lovely, beautiful, historic church. But has anyone been saved here lately?”

Some would argue that John the Baptist was a great man, after all, Jesus said he was the greatest!

“I tell you the truth, of all who have ever lived, none is greater than John the Baptist. Yet even the least person in the Kingdom of Heaven is greater than he is!” Matthew 11:11.

John the Baptist didn’t set out to be great, he set out to be productive, to produce fruit by obeying God’s call on His life.

Jesus never called us to make something of ourselves, but instead to make something from ourselves …

“You didn’t choose me. I chose you. I appointed you to go and produce lasting fruit, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask for, using my name.” John 15:16.

Are you trying to make something of yourself, or from yourself? One lifts you up, the other is a productive life for Jesus that bears fruit for His glory.

Scotty