There’s always somebody better at something, somebody faster, stronger, smarter, always. You may have been that person for a single moment out of all the people on this planet, but it is highly unlikely, you and I are just average people, except perhaps to a singular individual, or at best a small group of people. “For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called.” (1 Cor. 1:26) Average, normal, everyday people, that is who the Lord chooses, and for His own reasons.
We are not always those looking for someone to lead us around, life is going as well as can be expected for most of us when He calls us, we’re not looking for anything in particular, nothing special draws us continuously, we simply rise in the morning, fulfill the tasks at hand, and then go to sleep at night, only to repeat the same routine until He calls us. “For many are called, but few are chosen.” (Matt. 22:14)
It is that calling from the Lord that shows us that there is something more, something that we may have caught a glimpse of for a single moment in the past, but did not know how to rest in it, so to speak, did not know exactly what it was, much less how to attain it.
Man was created in the image of God, (Gen. 1:27) that image, that spark of the divine, if you like, is within each and every one of us, it does not mean that we are a part of God, not in the sense that many would think of that term, but that the Lord is Creator, Keeper, and Sustainer of all of His creation, we draw breath because He lives, not by our own free will. It is that free will that we have been blessed with that affords us the conscience decision to accept that calling from Him, but it is not us that does the choosing, it is the Lord. How He has made that decision no man can honestly say, suffice it to say that it is for His glory, it is not because we are the best at anything, we are not special most generally even in the eyes of the world, but the Lord does not choose the qualified, He qualifies the chosen.
From this point on we are to become profitable, we must study the Scriptures, (2 Tim. 2:15) we must deny ourselves those desires of the past that we now recognize as sinful and rebellious in His eyes, we must strive to serve for His glory, and count all of our past as dung. (Phil. 3:8) We are to desire to be made into a new creation, forsaking all we know and love, if that is what He calls us to do. We are to live by faith.
Those who live in the world live for the world, they seek the praise of men, they desire recognition for their accomplishments, no matter how great or small, they want to be noticed, just not by God, for in them that spark which we spoke of earlier shows to them the folly of their ways, of their entire lives. But this they will never admit to themselves, for it is self-depreciating, and pride will know no conquest of itself in a man.
Those who seek competition will find little joy in being a servant of the Most High, for He is Lord and Master of all, and that goes against all they have been taught from their youth up, “Strive to be the best you can be,” does not rest in the heart of anyone who serves Christ, instead we strive to be profitable for the glory of another, for Jesus Christ to be lifted up in our lives, not us. Humility is the sign of the believer, in humble servitude they live their lives, seeking nothing of their own. An idea that the lost cannot even contemplate.
