It is hard to judge the significance of our actions when so much of our life is mundane, repetitive, routine. We grow up, get educated, get a job, gain friendships, and go on with our days. Then we ask, “Is this it?”
This past week I listened to a friend who was reflecting on whether or not they were doing enough, whether they were settling, or if they should push, take risks, and do something big, whatever that might be. They wondered if they were missing out, whether or not they should be more like other friends in their same stage of life who had broken radically with their past, traveled the world, found employment in far off places, and appeared to be living a more exciting life. They wondered if that could be them, if those possibilities were open, or not.
These ponderings, and the longings associated with them, are both common and natural. It is good to be reflective and to ask if the path chosen is right, proper, and fitting. I thought every question, every thought being voiced by my friend was admirable and good, demonstrating self-awareness, humility, and an openness to change.
But to ask those questions, and to answer them well, another layer is needed. What is that layer?
It is easy to say, but hard to do.
We need evaluative criteria by which to judge the answers, to hold in check longings and desires which may only reflect our tendency to compare or our propensity for disquiet and restlessness, or, more darkly, our enviousness. There is a need for a sense not only of what is good, but what is good for me. Once we have established our criteria, we do the hard work of applying it to the life, circumstance, and the unique contours of the self, the person.
This isn’t easy to do. Why? Because we tend to judge our choices, and the choices of others, on the basis of a value set that has been determined by our time and place, what Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard called a “contemporary” or “the moment.” Kierkegaard saw that we needed another vantage, “the Eternal,” to determine the significance of an action, a choice, a life, or an accomplishment.
The “view of the moment” is often what we utilize in making judgments. But those same moments, if eternally understood, may be far more significant than we have imagined.
In Purity of Heart is to Will One Thing, Kierkegaard writes:
By the help of a sense perception, a living generation often believes itself able to pass judgment on a past generation, because it misunderstood the Good. And it is even guilty of committing the same offense against a contemporary. And yet it is just in regard to his contemporary that a man should know whether he has the view of the moment, or the view of the Eternal. At some later date, it is no art to decorate the graves of the noble and to say, “If they had only lived now,” now–just as we are starting to do the same thing against a contemporary. For the difficulty and the test of what dwells in the one who judges is precisely–the contemporary. The view of the moment is the opinion which in an earthly and busy sense decides whether a man accomplishes anything or not. And in this sense, nothing in the world has ever been so completely lost as was Christianity at the time that Christ was crucified. And in the understanding of the moment, never in the world has anyone accomplished so little by the sacrifice of a consecrated life as did Jesus Christ. And yet in the same instant, eternally understood, He had accomplished all. For He did not foolishly judge by the result that was not yet there, or more rightly (for here is the conflict and battleground of the two interpretations of what is meant by “accomplishing”) the result was indeed there.
Kierkegaard understood that the full result of our actions, though “there,” may not be fully seen by us in our time or moment.
In our daily lives, our actions, choices, rhythms and routines may appear to us to be mundane, but eternally understood those same actions may be filled with an incomprehensible significance we can only partially imagine. We need a vision of the Good, and the perspective of the Eternal.
This realization is a step, but only a small one, toward being more present to the people and responsibilities you assume each day, for while it is only natural to wonder whether one is stewarding one’s life well, we should not miss the opportunity to live in view of the Eternal and the Good, that which will last and never pass away, the kingdom of God, which is near and at hand.
