Devin Schadt / April 27th, 2026

The Way of a Man Series | #136

1546 words

Why God Doesn’t Call You to Be Great

What This Article Is About

Our problem is not loving ourselves too much, but too little.
The important distinction between “greatness” and glory, and why this difference determines whether God’s glory can be revealed through us.

What You Will Find in This Article

What appears to be self-love is often hidden self-loathing masked by a false image
The danger of projecting a “perfect” life that isolates others and fuels comparison
Why the pursuit of worldly greatness is misleading and spiritually harmful
The essential difference between greatness and glory
How Christ reveals that true glory comes through the Cross
Why embracing your weakness and true self leads to authentic confidence and holiness

Why God Doesn’t Call You to Be Great

Do We Love Ourselves Too Much?

The problem is not loving yourself too much.
Rather, the real difficulty is loving yourself too little.

I don’t believe that humanity’s root problem is loving ourselves too much.
In fact, we often love ourselves too little.

While we may see ourselves as self-focused, turning inward more than outward, this often serves as a way to cope with our internal struggles.
What we perceive as self-love, humans often use as a mask to cover the foul, festering disease of self-loathing.

We might present a false self because we mistakenly believe our true self wouldn’t be accepted.
How many miserable people do we know who post “happy” photos of themselves on social media?

The Problem With Appearing to Have It All Together

Indeed, we are not satisfied with hiding our secret self-disgust.
Rather, we thrust forward the successful, achieving, fulfilled, and joyful version of ourselves.

Consequently, we press ourselves into a corner.
We entrap ourselves in a pseudo personality that others cannot and will not approach.

Indeed, an onlooker sees us as “having it all together.”
They conclude, “He is unapproachable. He cannot relate to me and my struggles.”

A friend of mine confessed, “I cannot look at photos of my happily married friends on social anymore. Their happiness reminds me of my marital sadness. They only remind me of how broken my marriage is.”

Yet, none of them is perfect.
They simply choose to mask their imperfections.
Furthermore, not only do they cloak their personal anguish, but additionally, they set forth a false image that induces jealousy, envy, and despair.

Betrayed by “Greatness”

Our books, our university’s banners, our marketing campaigns proclaim that, “We are Made for Greatness.”

We render greatness as the hallowed summit, the pinnacle point of arrival.
There on the peak of the mount of greatness, we will plant the staff of our flag.
Upon that apex, all humanity will gaze.
They will admire our banner of greatness as it waves in the wind.

We are confused.
Rather, we have been betrayed.
Indeed, we have been misled by the worldly ideal of greatness.

We have re-imaged temporal significance, baptizing it as a Christian doctrine.

Consequently, we claim that we despise the ways of the world.
However, we have infused the ways of the world into the Word.

The Word summons us to flee from the maxims and false promises of the world.
However, as we flee from them, we secretly carry them along with us into the realm of religion.

For example, I even acquiesced to a publisher’s demand and added a subtitle to one of my books, “80 Days to Fatherly Greatness.” This illustrates how easily such thinking infiltrates our intentions.

Glory Versus Greatness

I don’t think that our Lord’s mandate is, “Be Great.”
No.
Instead, he calls us to glory.
This distinction is crucial to understanding the difference between worldly greatness and divine glory.

Greatness is always relative to others.
Glory, on the other hand, is absolute.

A person identifies greatness through comparisons, measurements, and metrics against other human beings.
Whereas St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas define glory as clarity.

Indeed, “glorification is clarification.” (Summa Theologica (Supplement, Q. 85).
Specifically, according to St. Thomas, “clarity” is the luminous visible manifestation of the soul’s grace.

Glory is truth.
Humility is truth. (St. Therese)
Humility is the truth of who you are.
Indeed, in our relationship with God, you and I are little.
Very little.

St. Louis de Montfort wrote that the Blessed Virgin Mary is less than an atom in comparison to God.

“With the whole Church I acknowledge that Mary, being a mere creature fashioned by the hands of God, is compared to his infinite majesty, less than an atom, or rather is simply nothing, since he alone can say, “I am he who is.” (St. Louis de Montfort, Total Consecration; Day 26)

Nevertheless, all generations hail her as most blessed among all women.

As St. Louis also says, “It is principally in souls that she is glorified with her Son more than in any visible creature. So we may call her, as the saints do, Queen of our hearts.” (ibid)

We are “more little” than the Blessed Mother.
Yes, glory is not the same as greatness.

God bestows glory on man.
Man bestows greatness on himself.

Greatness is Misleading

Worldly greatness is “a little poop in the brownie.”
My friend says that a truth that contains a lie is like having a little poop in the brownie.
“Ooh, those brownies are so good,” he would say sarcastically, “even if there is a little poop in them.

Greatness, then, is glory maligned.
Greatness is glory without the Cross.
And that is where we find that the poop is in the brownie.

Truly, Satan wants you to pursue greatness—without embracing the Cross.

Glory: The Opposite of Greatness

Indeed, our Lord Himself indicates what glory is.
In the Gospel of John, on three occasions, Jesus proclaims that he will be lifted up in glory. (See John 3, 8, 12)

In fact, the word that Our Lord uses for “lifted up” is the Greek word, hypsoō (ὑψόω, pronounced hoop-so’-o), which means to be lifted up, elevated, or exalted.
The Savior uses this word hypsoō interchangeably.
In other words, when our Lord proclaims that he will be lifted up in glorification, He is also saying that His glorification is synonymous with his execution.

Jesus clearly tells us: to be glorified is to be crucified.
Our exaltation comes by means of execution.

The world’s definition of greatness lacks that subtle nuance.

I have heard it said that what a man is under duress is what he is and nothing more.

The Messiah underwent the most horrific, torturous “duress.”
During this ignominious, ineffably excruciating moment, time stood still.
The bystander’s eyes were fixed on Jesus.
How would He react to the pain?
Would He condemn those who inflicted and persecuted Him?
Would He “Come down from that Cross” and show the world that He is divine?

What a man is under duress is what he is.

Rather, Jesus revealed who He truly is—the obedient Son of God the Father.
He revealed, on full display, the littleness of His naked, marred humanity.

Furthermore, our Lord demonstrated that glory, according to the world, is shameful.
Indeed, He clearly, emphatically professed by means of the Cross, man’s ideal of greatness is quite the opposite of divine glory.

St. Bernard’s Four Stages of Love

St. Bernard, in his treatise, On the Love of God, outlines the four stages of a soul’s journey from self-centeredness to divine union.

Stage 1: Love of self for one’s own sake
Stage 2: Love of God for one’s own sake
Stage 3: Love of God for God’s own sake
Stage 4: Love of self for God’s own sake

I find it fascinating that the third level, to love God for His own sake, is not the highest level of love.
Rather, the highest and most pure level of love is to love oneself for God’s own sake.

Embracing and Loving Our True Self

Perhaps we would do more for ourselves, for Christ, and for Christianity by embracing our littleness, our weakness, and glorying in these aspects of us.
Specifically, we must become grateful for who we really are—especially the aspects of ourselves that we deem not to be “great.”
Consequently, when we thank God for who He has made us to be (the total true self), we begin to love our total true self.

Indeed, by loving our little self, we become confident in our true self.
Thus, we would no longer posture, pose, and proclaim a pseudo-self of worldly greatness.

Why?

Because we are no longer afraid to expose the self we now love.
Therefore, we allow God’s glory to be manifested through our littleness.
This is the highest level of love.

To love thyself above thy God is to hate thyself and thy God.
Yet, to love God above thyself, is to love thyself as God loves thee.

For by loving the One who loves thee more than thou love thyself,
God imparts to thee the grace to love thyself as He does.

The New Evangelization

I believe that Catholicism (true Christianity) would prosper and become the predominant way of life if we would stop hating ourselves and rather love the “parts” of ourselves that we perceive as limiting, weak, and pathetic.

Perhaps God wants those aspects of us to be more known.

Indeed, glorification is clarification.
The more your true self is clarified, the more you will glorify God, and God will glorify you.

See also:
The Well-Ordered Man

Every Man’s Threefold Purpose

Stop Blaming the Devil

Finding Your Way Home: Hearing God’s Voice