April 1998--Revision
After encouragement to revisit this article, I have come to the realization that cynicism can be a deadly weapon when you're mind suffers from irrationality. The reason this article remains is that the main point is still true. For those of you offended by the previous draft--I am sorry.
You ever get caught in the hopeless trap of trying to be noticed at work. It's a odd game that we all play. We spend our days wanting to be seen and needed to move up the ladder. We all want to make a name for ourselves. We all want our work to be remembered.
I've been working at my job for almost five years and I think I've finally learned the lesson that I'm supposed to be taught. Work means nothing. It's not that work is bad, but if our emphasis is on the final product only, this is the quickest path to disappointment. The problem is that you and everyone around you has the same goal-Significance.
I've spent the last five years, scraping, fighting, jockeying for position -- for "power." Making attempts to prove myself as a person of talent and ability. It's a mind-boggling trap. A trap that can't be beaten.
This is obviously a cynical view of the workplace. But it's an illustration of one of the basic needs of human existence-Significance.
What is the answer? The answer come in accepting your true significance. I am a child of God. You are a child of God and that's enough. What does that mean?
The best place to start is Scripture:
See how great a love the Father has bestowed upon us, that we should be called children of God; and such we are….Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we shall be. We know that, when He appears, we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him just as He is. And every one who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure (1 John 3:1-3-NIV).
Think about all the people in your life, you're trying to impress: Your boss, your parents, people of influence.
As a Christian, who are you trying to impress? God,
obviously. How do you impress God? Well, you can't and you can.
You can't impress God by trying to be the best at something. You
can't impress God by being the best this or the best that. It's
not some contest your trying to win either. That's how we get
into the comparison game with others.
We impress God the same way we impressed our parents as a child. Imaging being in Kindergarten. You're still developing those awkward motor skills as you try to master the big fat crayon. Your assignment is to draw an accurate portrait of your father for Father's Day. Instead of getting a dead-on likeness, the stick drawing of your dad looks exactly like the other kids' stick drawing, except your dad's mohawk is blue, because you had to be different.
You take the drawing home and for some strange reason your dad loves the picture. He loves it so much that mounts it on the refrigerator, next to the picture you colored of the green house on a green hill silhouetted on a green sky with a purple sun hanging overhead.
I think God is impressed with our effort, more than impressed with the results. The next time you get caught in the fight over significance, pull out your crayons and draw a picture of your dad.
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