Bible 2495 of the 7 Day Bible verse challenge.
Ecclesiastes 4:4 NIV
Yesterday we talked about leading by example. But honestly that has to be one of the last things people want to do these days. Why be a leader when you can simply follow someone else? Why do your own thing when you can copy what someone else is doing? Everyone wants what their neighbor has. Everyone is chasing after the things that they see everyone else chasing. Everyone has simply accepted what other people say is important and don't have much interest in doing any thinking of their own.
Far too many are far too worried about being like everyone else. Too many have accepted this idea that life is some kind of competition where the main prize is social popularity and material success. So we’ve set our sights on just joining the race that everyone else is running rather than following the unique path God paved just for us. We’ve fallen in love with this idea of beating someone else to what they want so that we can feel like we’re better, or more important, or more special than they are. We don’t want to be different, we just want to be better than everyone else at being the same.
Doesn’t make much sense does it?
When you look around at our society and the things people are doing you'll see nothing but a broken record. Everyone seems to have the same priorities, the same goals, the same desires. Somewhere along the line someone decided the way things should be and everyone else just accepted it. Someone said that some worldly thing was important and everyone else agreed with it. Everyone settled for making their lives a copy of everyone else's. Everyone bought this idea that someone else had found the secret to a fulfilling life. And they believe that it’s somewhere in something in this world.
But it isn’t. Happiness isn’t found in worldly achievement. Peace doesn’t come when we beat everyone else to their goals. Joy isn’t the result of proving we’re better than everyone else. A fulfilling life cannot be found in doing what someone else has already done. We will never find any happiness, any peace, any joy, any fulfillment, or any meaning in a life that’s nothing but a copy of the lives that everyone else are trying to live according to the silly and selfish priorities of a broken world.
Envy is this weird lie that people believe and it controls their lives. It tells them that someone else has found the key to satisfaction or success or popularity, you know, all the things that it seems everyone wants. Envy keeps us from being happy with ourselves and the unique lives that God's given us. It keeps us from realizing and appreciating the unique blessings that God has given us. It prevents us from seeing the unique opportunities God gives us to be different and make a difference.
We can spend every second we're given trying to attain and achieve the same things as everyone else, but where's the impact in that? Where's the meaning? Where's the chance to make a difference? It's not there. All we’ll find in living that way is some stupid competition for a hollow prize that someone else has decided is important. It’s all just this lie that there’s something of lasting value hidden in this world. And friends, there just isn’t. If we’re chasing anything of this world then we’re chasing after the wind. We can’t catch it and even if we did we couldn’t hold it.
Why accept someone else’s idea of happiness? Why settle for what someone else thinks is important? Why not be yourself, live your own life, and make your own choices? Why not let this messed up world go on and chase all the meaningless nonsense that it wants to chase while you set your sights on something with some purpose? We only get one life. A set number of days. Please don’t waste them trying to copy someone else or beat them in some foolish worldly competition. Be you and live the life that only you have the chance to live. Yes, it will be different than everyone else’s. But we seriously need different!
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