Living a Life of Purpose: Beyond Fame to Faith

Reflecting on the life of Colin Powell, we are reminded of what constitutes a life well-lived. He was made some of the most amazing contributions of anybody in the history of our country. He was born in Harlem, he was very grateful for military. He said one time when somebody asked them what would you have done if you had not joined the military he said maybe driven a bus. [00:29:27]

A celebrity is sometimes talked about as somebody who is famous just for being famous so it's really about undeserved recognition, and in our day being able to build your brand and measure your worth in terms of how many followers, how many likes, has become a temptation for almost everybody so social media has both democratized celebrity recognition, and also turned it into a kind of obsession. [00:164:08]

The idea is negative recognition is better than no recognition to be ignored. Folks that work in the field of attachment talk about how for a little child starting from that very first day to be seen to be recognized to know to have your face studied by a parent by somebody who cares and can acknowledge and recognize that they know what it is that you are feeling in your face is fundamentally human development and flourishing and the soul withers apart from it. [00:220:00]

Heroes were people that were generally tall and that day the average height of a man was about five foot four and so Homer writes about people who were very attractive often they had red hair at home or for whatever reason go figure, they were strong and primarily they had skill they had high kill counts they were able to kill folks, and to aspire to be a hero in that society and then in Icelandic sagas or a lot of the Irish epics was kind of the height of human ability and that involved having deserved recognition. [00:310:63]

Saints really are people who have been separated, not in the sense that they would never touch somebody who is not religious like them they're actually functional that's the way that we could think about it we talk a lot about dysfunctional families or dysfunctional companies or dysfunctional peoples saints are supremely functional because they live the way that God intended, they are agents of shalom and not chaos. [00:470:63]

Heroes are at the center of the story, saints are often on the margins or at the periphery, heroes are warriors soldiers, saints were sometimes martyrs, heroes were marked by what they did above all, saints were often marked beginning with Jesus by what was done to them, heroes predominantly were known by the virtue of courage saints often also would have great courage but they added to that the central virtue as it was talked about by Jesus which is love. [00:518:00]

The word hero although it is a Greek word and it's in Homer is not in the New Testament at all saints occurs in the New Testament 64 times interestingly every single time the word is plural, never singular. Rich male talked about being in a restaurant in the south one time and asking when the waitress came by what is a grit and she said honey they don't come by themselves you can't get a grit you just get grits you don't get a saint you get saints. [00:579:44]

We're part of a larger community, and we're not in control of our lives it is not primarily our story it is God's story and saints live not for kudos not for kudos. Jesus put it like this, you are the light of the world, now a celebrity is after undeserved recognition a hero is after deserved recognition, the saint has been liberated from the need for recognition, and ultimately is made radiantly glorious by God. [00:612:07]

You are the light of the world, let your light so shine so that people see your good deeds and then all sign on as your twitter followers and say you are amazing you're beautiful let's do lunch don't ever change no so the people may see your good deeds and give glory to your heavenly father. [00:658:88]

Today as we think about remarkable lives of somebody like Colin Powell, let your good deeds acts of love, generosity courage faithfulness shine so that people may see them and give glory to God. [00:710:95]