“Be not conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” - Romans 12.2
We live in a godless society which values, above all, beauty, brains, talent, money, power, and man’s praise. Just look at television shows like American Idol or America’s Next Top Model. If you do not have the talent or beauty to compete favorably against your neighbor you get voted off, eliminated. In the world of the show, you cease to exist.
God tells us that in His kingdom, only three things will endure. These are: faith, hope, and love; the greatest of these being love. Just as money is the greatest commodity on earth, faith, hope, and love are the greatest, and I would venture to say the only, commodities of heaven.
From the world’s perspective, nothing is eternal. Life ends when the body does. The closest thing to achieving eternal life is living on in the minds of other men; this is why fame is so important, why people like Donald Trump spend their lives building empires to themselves. The Romans understood this which was why the worst fate that could befall any leader was to have his name “stricken from memory.”
In contrast, the Bible teaches that every person is born with an eternal soul; and that all souls will live on forever, whether in Heaven, united with God, or in Hell, separated from Him.
For this reason, it doesn’t matter how much talent, beauty, or brains you have. For as Paul’s epistle to the Romans reminds us: “[W]hat do you have that you did not receive and if you did receive it why do you boast as if you did not?”It matters not what you have, but what you do with what you have; it is not, ultimately, who you are that is important, but who you are becoming.
You may be thinking, What a silly, foolish concept. If this is true, then there is no way for a man to compare himself with another man. No way for a man to take ownership over his own, hard-earned achievements. It may be distasteful to the American way of thinking, but that is precisely the point! For “…God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise…And the base things of the world and the despised God has chosen, the things that are not, so that He may nullify the things that are. So that no man may boast before God” (italics mine).
God has ordered the universe in such a way so that all boasting must be toward Him; all praise must be oriented toward Him; whatever value you and I perceive in human existence is imputed by Him. So that everything that has breath praises the Lord.
By turning man’s value system upside down, God forces dependence on Him alone. In His infinite wisdom He has created a universe wherein a mother – someone who spends her days washing, nursing, clothing, cooking and playing – could be, in the next life, judge of a kingdom or queen of a realm. After all, Jesus was a carpenter. His disciples were fisherman. None came from kingly tribes but God called them great because they had faith in Him.
Throughout the Bible we are given ample evidence that here we are not citizens, but strangers. Our true citizenship is in heaven; and it is to heaven we must look when determining our values. When my husband’s grandfather sailed from Holland to America he spent his time reading about America, its laws and values, its great leaders and statesmen, the historical developments which made it what it then was; he even went so far as to memorize those features which stuck out to him as being quintessentially American.
Is this not a perfect metaphor for our lives on earth? We are on a voyage, sailing toward our true home. Thus while we are in between places we should spend our time transferring our citizenship, refining our hope, and actively seeking to transform our minds in conformity with His will.
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