Winning, Losers, and the Example of Christ

I love that you don’t “win” in God’s kingdom based on your money, being President, how attractive your wife is, or how many retweets you get on Twitter. I love that the person God is most impressed with in the world is probably not even someone we’ve heard of—just some ordinary believer faithfully doing mundane tasks, day in and day out, with great love.

Why do the nations conspire
and the peoples plot in vain?
The kings of the earth rise up
and the rulers band together
against the Lord and against his anointed, saying,
“Let us break their chains
and throw off their shackles.”

The One enthroned in heaven laughs;
the Lord scoffs at them.

—Psalm 2:1-4 NIV

But … Do I Love Winning Too Much?

But in my honest moments, I have to ask myself if one of the reasons I resent Donald Trump so much (and yes, I am trying to pray for him) is because I actually still believe, at my core, that true power comes from earthly standards of winning. Am I angry because his vision of America won and mine did not? (No, dear reader, mine was not Hillary Clinton’s, so don’t even start down that road!) Am I angry that Greg Gianforte won the congressional race in Montana, over two other better options, partly because I don’t feel my conviction about resisting Trumpism can be validated without earthly markers of success? Am I angry I couldn’t summon enough power of persuasiveness to beat Trump or his followers? Am I angry my power is not what I thought it was?

Do I honestly believe that I need to win to be successful? Or do I believe that God can work through my weakened self to bring about good?

Am I clawing my way to the top of the political heap–or am I emptying the power I do have for the sake of serving my neighbor?

For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are,  so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.”

—1 Corinthians 1:26-31 NIV

If my life is hidden with Christ in God, yes, I will do all I can to serve my neighbor. I will grieve evil when it comes and speak and work against it. But my sense of self-worth and hope will not be attached to whether I “win” or not. I will not care about winning because of me but because of my neighbor.

Christ has come and given me life. I am now in him; to be loved by him is true success—though one I have in no way earned. If I never accomplish another thing in life, he will still love me and call me his child.

Worldly ideas of success and “winning” are not biblical ones. Obtaining power and glory is not necessarily a sign of God’s favor. The walk of salvation through Christ is often one of suffering. The way to win is by losing.

This is not only something our current President and his political followers do not understand in the least, but it is also something I struggle to understand. Thank God for the example of Jesus: “he emptied himself.”

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