We are getting to that point in the semester where my life is robbed from me for about four or five weeks and I pile myself under mostly unread books in my office and try to find something to say that will be both interesting enough to keep me busy and content for this seemingly interminable period and, perhaps more importantly, something that my professors will enjoy and reward me with high marks for having written. Therefore, blog activity will be truncated until this period ends when I will have a flood of new material to write about, including: Christian socialism, James Joyce, getting back into running after a long winter’s hibernation, the debilitating Kansas summer heat, impending fatherhood, and much more.
In the meantime, I am going to cop out and do a series of posts based on a message that I gave recently to the student group at our church. This is mostly so I don’t have to do much original thinking for the purposes of this blog and because the topic will be a good reminder to me to persevere in this trying time. This post is by way of introduction and I will follow it up with four posts that highlight the main points of my talk, posting once a week until the madness of this semester passes.
The topic of the message was personal excellence and the Biblical mandate, if indeed there is one, for a Christian to strive for excellence in what you could call worldly matters, the everyday things such as: working a job, being a student, pursuing hobbies, etc. I believe this enough of a framework in which this can make sense. Here was my introduction:
Let me begin by saying that I was asked to speak on this topic not because of any level of personal excellence that I have attained in my life. My inclinations are toward apathy and general uselessness, an ideal life for me would consist of lots of time spent watching courtroom dramas, running, and playing Ultimate Frisbee. However, I have been saved by a great God by great grace and mercy and therefore see myself as called and bound to transcend my natural dispositions. If I have any excellence, it does not emanate from an inclination towards discipline or a ten step plan towards excellence that I follow to perfection, but from God who loved me and saved me and wants to show himself glorious through my life.
This semester in my Renaissance era course I read a book by Count Baldesar Castiglione called The Book of the Courtier. In it, the good count goes on for over 300 pages describing the qualities and attributes desirable in a young man seeking to serve before a prince or king at court. If you have ever heard of the idea of the “Renaissance man,” this conception probably arises out of such works as these. You must be strong and a good fighter, speak Latin and Greek, have read all of the classics, be an accomplished horseman and swordsman, have a high degree of piety, basically be amazing at everything you do while pretending you don’t care about whatever it is you are doing. The literate population of Europe devoured this book. People everywhere read it diligently and tried with all of their might to implement its steps and follow Castiglione’s model. They did it because they wanted to serve before an earthly king with a temporal kingdom. We believe, as Christians, that we are co-heirs with the King of Kings and serve before an eternal God who will rule over an eternal kingdom. I want to suggest that we ought to desire to serve our King with the same fervency and diligence that the prospective courtiers exemplified in their desire to serve before their kings.
This is a difficult topic to discuss and I will try and be careful with my language tonight so as not to overstep any bounds and say something untrue. Nowhere in the Bible are we explicitly exhorted to be as excellent as we can be. Indeed, the reason for our calling, as Paul reminds the Corinthian church is for God to show favor to those who are lowly, i.e. unexcellent, in the eyes of the world: “For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; he chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God” (1 Corinthians 1:26-29). And, indeed, any personal excellence that we display in this life is fully attributable to God and his mercy. However, as true as our lowly position might be in this world, things have changed as we have been saved by God and set apart to be his representatives on this planet. We have new standards; many of us were lowly when we were called, but we are not merely to remain that way, but to excel in whatever station of life God has placed us in so that his glory and fame may spread into all of the world.
There are many scriptures I could point to which allude to this point, but for the sake of time I will flag one verse as the thesis for this talk, the jump-off point for the rest of the discussion. This is from Paul’s letter to the Colossians, “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving” (3:24-25). Our job at our jobs is to glorify the Lord through our work, to approach our position—however lowly or exalted—with a disciplined ethic and a heart to honor God, first and foremost, through our labor. This is nothing less than a call to be excellent. And because I am a good English major and I am supposed to give my thesis statement up front, here it is: as we seek to glorify God in all that we do and work as before him and not before men, this will lead us to see value in our everyday life, work, and relationships and as we pursue God’s glory and his blessing, excellence will come as a byproduct of our aim to glorify God.
In the meantime, I am going to cop out and do a series of posts based on a message that I gave recently to the student group at our church. This is mostly so I don’t have to do much original thinking for the purposes of this blog and because the topic will be a good reminder to me to persevere in this trying time. This post is by way of introduction and I will follow it up with four posts that highlight the main points of my talk, posting once a week until the madness of this semester passes.
The topic of the message was personal excellence and the Biblical mandate, if indeed there is one, for a Christian to strive for excellence in what you could call worldly matters, the everyday things such as: working a job, being a student, pursuing hobbies, etc. I believe this enough of a framework in which this can make sense. Here was my introduction:
Let me begin by saying that I was asked to speak on this topic not because of any level of personal excellence that I have attained in my life. My inclinations are toward apathy and general uselessness, an ideal life for me would consist of lots of time spent watching courtroom dramas, running, and playing Ultimate Frisbee. However, I have been saved by a great God by great grace and mercy and therefore see myself as called and bound to transcend my natural dispositions. If I have any excellence, it does not emanate from an inclination towards discipline or a ten step plan towards excellence that I follow to perfection, but from God who loved me and saved me and wants to show himself glorious through my life.
This semester in my Renaissance era course I read a book by Count Baldesar Castiglione called The Book of the Courtier. In it, the good count goes on for over 300 pages describing the qualities and attributes desirable in a young man seeking to serve before a prince or king at court. If you have ever heard of the idea of the “Renaissance man,” this conception probably arises out of such works as these. You must be strong and a good fighter, speak Latin and Greek, have read all of the classics, be an accomplished horseman and swordsman, have a high degree of piety, basically be amazing at everything you do while pretending you don’t care about whatever it is you are doing. The literate population of Europe devoured this book. People everywhere read it diligently and tried with all of their might to implement its steps and follow Castiglione’s model. They did it because they wanted to serve before an earthly king with a temporal kingdom. We believe, as Christians, that we are co-heirs with the King of Kings and serve before an eternal God who will rule over an eternal kingdom. I want to suggest that we ought to desire to serve our King with the same fervency and diligence that the prospective courtiers exemplified in their desire to serve before their kings.
This is a difficult topic to discuss and I will try and be careful with my language tonight so as not to overstep any bounds and say something untrue. Nowhere in the Bible are we explicitly exhorted to be as excellent as we can be. Indeed, the reason for our calling, as Paul reminds the Corinthian church is for God to show favor to those who are lowly, i.e. unexcellent, in the eyes of the world: “For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; he chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God” (1 Corinthians 1:26-29). And, indeed, any personal excellence that we display in this life is fully attributable to God and his mercy. However, as true as our lowly position might be in this world, things have changed as we have been saved by God and set apart to be his representatives on this planet. We have new standards; many of us were lowly when we were called, but we are not merely to remain that way, but to excel in whatever station of life God has placed us in so that his glory and fame may spread into all of the world.
There are many scriptures I could point to which allude to this point, but for the sake of time I will flag one verse as the thesis for this talk, the jump-off point for the rest of the discussion. This is from Paul’s letter to the Colossians, “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving” (3:24-25). Our job at our jobs is to glorify the Lord through our work, to approach our position—however lowly or exalted—with a disciplined ethic and a heart to honor God, first and foremost, through our labor. This is nothing less than a call to be excellent. And because I am a good English major and I am supposed to give my thesis statement up front, here it is: as we seek to glorify God in all that we do and work as before him and not before men, this will lead us to see value in our everyday life, work, and relationships and as we pursue God’s glory and his blessing, excellence will come as a byproduct of our aim to glorify God.
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