The more I learn to seek God, the more I realize how much of my life is spent seeking myself. Most of my time each day is spent bowing to my schedule and my plans. Most of my thoughts are about me: my concerns, my interests, my struggles. Even most of my relationships are me-focused. Somehow I look at relationships as though they are all about me, and at times I even take for granted the fact that without the other person there would be no relationship at all!
How is it that I can go through the routines of life without acknowledging that it really isn't all about me at the end of the day? You'd think that by simply taking a look around I would notice my own insignificance. With so many people in the world, how could it all be about me? Granted, I can only see the world through my own eyes - I am only human, and thus limited - however, I still see countless other people every day. By now I should be realizing that each person I see has their own life too. Their life is not about mine just as mine is not about theirs.
A friend of mine once put it this way: we live our lives as if we have the starring role in a movie about us and everyone else is just a supporting actor who happens to be in our movie. How ridiculous, but isn't it true? We each tend to live as if the world revolves around us and that everyone else is a part of our story. You and I are more often than not failures at seeing the people around us as people with real hurts, backgrounds, hopes, needs, feelings, thoughts, struggles, dreams, pain, and stories of their own! Failures yes, but that is not our greatest failure.
Our greatest failure is that we fail to acknowledge that our life and our story is not really about us, but about God. Self-absorbed, we commit the ultimate idolatry of self-exaltation and put ourselves in the place that is rightfully God's. How arrogant! For we are merely a vapor and a breath in His-story, and the lives we live only have significance to the extent that they are lived for Him.
The more I learn to seek God, the more I learn that living for Him is dependent upon Him. In and of ourselves we are nothing. On my own, I am insignificant. Even with Him, I myself am insignificant. And this is where I find myself: learning to be okay with my own insignificance, learning to be okay with being low, learning to seek Him and not myself. Every plan, every thought, every concern, every interest, every struggle and every relationship. Let them be all for Him.
In the gospels, we read of John the Baptist, a man who preached repentance, preparing the way for Christ. During his time, he gained somewhat of a following, but when Jesus arrived on the scene, he willingly stepped aside. Jesus' own cousin, he could have easily tried to pursue his own ends, maintaining the following that he had already gained. He could have reacted jealously to the fact that Jesus was gaining a following of His own, and he could have tried to compete. But that is not what scripture tells us. John the Baptist understood that his life was not about him, but about Christ. That is why, in John 3:30 he was able to say, "He must become greater, I must become less."
As I continue learning to seek after God, I want the same attitude to be true of my life.
Labels: reflections