The Freedom to Be Unimportant
Christ is all in all.
My wife and I live in Northwest Arkansas. If you haven’t been here, it’s beautiful. The Boston Mountains surround us, it’s green everywhere, and there’s a purity to the air that most major cities can’t have.
Both of us are from smaller towns south of the area where we currently live, which means we need to go down the mountain to see our families. At about the halfway point, there’s a tunnel cutting through part of the land (which is the most exciting part of our car rides, according to our toddlers). To return home, of course, we drive up the mountain.
When we pop out of the north side of that tunnel, we are greeted with a stunning and awe-inspiring view. It’s breathtaking.
It’s the type of view that reminds you you’re human. You know what I’m saying? The kind of view that levels you, in a healthy way. It’s like seeing a magnificent sunset at the ocean or snow-capped mountains in Utah.
It may be the stark contrast between a concrete tunnel and vast greenery, but it feels like popping out of that tunnel is like teleporting into heaven.
I often think about the trees that shape the landscape of the Boston Mountains. Do they continually grow? Have they hit their maximum tree height? How long have they been around? The answer I land on for the last question is simple: they’ve been around longer than me, and they’ll be around longer than me. That tunnel in the middle of the Boston Mountains seems to be, to me, God’s personal reminder of my humanity. Each time I’m struck by my relenting unimportance to the function of the universe.
David had a similar revelation, recorded in Psalm 8.
3When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,
4 what is man that you are mindful of him,
and the son of man that you care for him?
—Psalm 8:3-4
I imagine David sitting out in the fields taking care of his sheep. He’s seeing the moon and stars unhindered by artificial light.
Who am I? His soul asks.
David sat with the thought long enough to develop a theology around the human experience. In Psalm 62, he describes the human condition.
Those of low estate are but a breath;
those of high estate are a delusion;
in the balances they go up;
they are together lighter than a breath.
—Psalm 62:9
There’s something about the moon, the stars, and God’s created order in the Universe that levels a person. The existential, “Who am I?” question can only be answered with an honest, “Not much.” Per David’s (and ultimately, God’s) argument in Psalm 62, the total weight of the lives of the many billions of people who have lived since Adam and Eve is lighter than a breath of air.
We are nothing.
This is the shocking part of the Gospel.
We are nothing.
All we do is sin.
We have completely rebelled against God.
Yet Christ humbled himself to take on our estate and redeem a fallen humanity.
Why?
Because although we have nothing to offer the universe and its functionality, God has made us in His image. We are stamped with His glory. The only glory we can muster up is glory that has first come from the King of Glory. We have none in ourselves, yet we have all we can handle because of God.
Sin has shattered the glory of God in our lives.
Jesus of Nazareth, Son of God, lived, died, and resurrected to restore the glory.
Christ is making all things new and restoring us to our original purposes in God.
We deserve none of it—yet He lavishes it upon us.
We feel it in our bones.
We were made for glory. We were made for a crown.
So we chase kingdoms, riches, honor, and substitute glories.
Our names are supposed to be known by the saints in heaven, yet we settle for being known on social media.
Our lives are supposed to be leveraged for the Gospel of Christ, yet we settle for our lives being leveraged by brands.
Our souls are supposed to find their rest in the work of Christ, yet we settle for working our souls to death by our work.
Jesus has offered us a different way of living, but it will require something from us.
28 Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
—Matthew 11:28-30
You’ve heard this verse before, but I want you to slow down and really focus on what Jesus is saying. If we don’t read this verse closely, we risk not actually experiencing the rest that He’s offering.
Here are the commands:
Come to me
Take my yoke upon you
Learn from me
Command #1 requires faith.
Command #2 requires us to believe Christ has a better work for us.
Command #3 requires radical humility.
Often we are instructed to come to Jesus, and he will give us rest. This is true, it’s what He said. But we can’t separate the promise of rest from the context of the other commands.
Many of us are not experiencing rest because we have, without realizing it, never learned from Jesus.
We’ve come to Him in faith.
We’ve even allowed Him to refocus our work.
But we’ve never allowed Him to teach us a new way of operating.
What if you spent the summer months asking Jesus, “Will you structure my life the way it was made to be structured?”
Jesus is probably going to lead us into quiet places. Away from the crowds. Away from the demands of high-stress living. Away from maximizing our influence. Away from substitute glories. Away from our own kingdoms. Away from branding our lives. Away from vainglory. Away from a life entirely dependent on ourselves.
And into the life and glory we were made to live and experience.
I’m convinced that the way to operate at total rest is never to do anything less than God has for us and never to do anything more than God has for us. The Spirit of God is constantly leading us into exactly what God wants for us. Our task is to become so familiar with God’s voice that we never miss the mark. Is that possible? Probably not, but I’d like to try for the sake of my body, mind, spirit, and soul.
The beauty of the Gospel of Christ is that we can shout from our souls:
I don’t matter to the universe. I’ve messed everything up, yet I’m completely loved by God, and He’s given me a crown of glory to reign and rule over His World because He made me to share in His glory, not create my own.
Our insignificance brings us the opportunity to be filled with joy and say, like David, “The Lord is my shepherd, I have all that I need.” (Psalm 23:1 CSB).
If you have Christ, you have all you need.
You don’t need a significant life, or influence, or glory. You need Him. If God wants to give you significance, influence, or glory, so be it—but don’t chase it.
We can miss out on the glory this world has to offer when we know with confidence our true glory will appear one day with Jesus Christ, King of all that has been, is, or ever will be.
Live free, my friend, and don’t trade your freedom for slavery to this world.
Have a great week.
—Brandon
An amazing, loving God! What is man?? Yet:
The Lord, your God, is in your midst, a warrior who gives victory; he will rejoice over you with gladness, he will renew you in his love; he will exult over you with loud singing - Zephaniah 3:17
He rejoices, renews us with his love and celebrates us with singing.
I am overwhelmed!
And yet knowing his delight, I can be just what he made me to be, no more and no less!
Thanks for this post!
Profound worship!