What does it mean to be great? In this day and age when business oriented best sellers help us learn how to get from simply being good to finally being great, I find myself yearning for a bit more.  Should greatness always be our goal?  If so, how do we define greatness?  

On February 4, 1968, the late Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his final sermon at the Ebeneezer Baptist Church in Atlanta.   It was entitled, “The Drum Major Instinct.”  Reflecting on his words, I found them to be just as relevant today, if not more, than they were then.  Here is an excerpt:

“And so Jesus gave us a new norm of greatness. If you want to be important, wonderful. If you want to be recognized, wonderful. If you want to be great, wonderful. But recognize that he who is greatest among you shall be your servant. That’s a new definition of greatness. And this morning, the thing that I like about it, by giving that definition of greatness, it means that everybody can be great, because everybody can serve. You don’t have to have a college degree to serve. You don’t have to make your subject and your verb agree to serve. You don’t have to know about Plato and Aristotle to serve. You don’t have to know Einstein’s theory of relativity to serve. You don’t have to know the second theory of thermodynamics in physics to serve. You only need a heart full of grace, a soul generated by love. And you can be that servant.”

Instead of spending so much time and energy striving to get from good to great, could it be that we need to see ourselves as those called to go from a preoccupation with being great to a desire for being good.  

What would it mean for us on this Fourth of July weekend to truly strive as a nation to make sure that our greatness is always defined by our goodness?