Poor, misguided soul. That’s what I thought as I was recently watching a college basketball game and saw that one of the players had a big tattoo emblazoned on his back which read, “All eyes on ME.”
After my initial repulsion at such an arrogant statement, I began to feel sorry for this young man, suspecting that he has been caught in the “It’s all about me” vortex of our culture. It’s a black hole that sucks folks down, down, down into the muck of self-absorption, isolation and ultimately, despair.
It makes me think of a current T.V. commercial for a department store chain. The catchy jingle says, “Everything we do at _____, it’s all for you.” Oh really? All for ME? Wow, then how about giving it to me FREE because that’s what I want? Here’s reality: The profit part of the deal is not for ME – it’s for THEM, or they wouldn’t stay in business. The part of it that is for me is the stuff I get to take home and the credit card bill that cruises in a month later.
Or how about the restaurant whose slogan promised, “Have it your way.” MY way, once again, would be free … with all the calories removed, please. I never once really had it MY way at that place.
Marketing folks know what most of us try to deny – that we are madly in love with ourselves. From the depths of our beings, we want “All eyes on ME.” We want everything to be “all for us” and to “have it our way.” At the end of our lives, we want to go out in a blaze of glory singing (without the Elvis costume, please), “I Did it My Way.”
Or do we? Well, I for one, do not. I’ve lived long enough to know that my way is too often not the right way (but please don’t tell my husband or kids), and if I live my whole life doing everything MY way, I probably won’t be in any mood to sing as I go out.
A wonderful chorus we sing at my church has lyrics that address this very issue — how this life is not about us, it’s all about Jesus Christ and bringing the focus and glory to Him. But read what happens if I invert the lyrics a bit: “It’s all about me, Jesus; and all this is for me, for my glory and my fame/ It’s not about You, as if I should do things Your way/I alone am God, so please surrender to my ways.”
Pretty sick, huh? And yet so subtly pervasive.
“Look out for yourself … don’t let anybody hold you back … do whatever it takes to make yourself happy … you gotta take care of Number One … If you just loved yourself more, your problems would be solved.”
Know who that doesn’t sound like? Jesus, about whom the Bible says, “…although He existed in the form of God, (He) did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant … And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.” (Philippians 2:7-8)
And perhaps the young man with the big tattoo could learn something real important from the verse that follows: “Therefore also God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name …” (Philippians 2:9).
The truly Christian life is an upside-down, amazing way to live. You have to die to live, give to receive, let go of things you think you need to gain what you really needed even more (but probably didn’t realize it), empty yourself to feel fulfilled, humble yourself to be exalted.
Jesus could’ve justified wearing that tattoo – “All eyes on ME” – but He didn’t. Instead, He came washing feet, loving the unlovable, serving the hateful and pouring His life out for us. And guess what? One day, all eyes will be on HIM and no one will remember a thing about that basketball player and his tacky tattoo.