Playing the Great Man
Scripture Reading: Proverbs 12:9
Better to be lowly and have a servant than to play the great man and lack bread.
The following is an exaggerated example of the principle at play here:
Anna Sorokin showed up in New York around 2013 and quickly convinced people she was a wealthy heiress whose name was Anna Delvey. Using this fake identity and persona, she was able to con people out of thousands of dollars. She was eventually caught, arrested, tried, and convicted. She spent a few years in prison (She was released in 2021) and has fines and restitution she is supposed to pay back.
She did what this proverb warns against. She “played the great man,” or in her case, the great woman.
You might be thinking that this is an interesting story, but what does it have to do with me? That is why I said it is an exaggerated example. I doubt anyone reading this is conning people into thinking you are a wealthy socialite. At least, I hope not. What can be true though, is we can be guilty of pretending to be something we are not on a smaller scale.
We can try to play the great man. We can exaggerate our education, achievements, past accomplishments, and experiences. We can use filters to change the way we look. I noticed a person’s profile photo on X and thought, “Wow, they look good for their age.” Later I saw a contemporary news photo of that person and realized that they had done some fine Photoshop work on their profile picture. They were playing the great man. Or, in that case, the handsome man.
So, the point of this proverb isn’t about whether you have servants, but whether you live humbly and just are who you are.
What is the key to living this way? I think it is to live before God and not man. The person who “plays the great man,” is a person who is trying to impress other people. Their audience is made up of other people and they want other people’s applause.
The person who is freed from great man syndrome lives with an audience of One. They live “Coram Deo,” before the face of God. They seek the approval of God, not men. They are concerning themselves with how they come across to the world around them. They are concerned with how the God who made them sees them.
Live Coram Deo today.
