Today I added to my list of inspiring people. In our world of "super heroes", it's tough to find inspiring role models. Most of the great heroes of our day are made that way through some radiation accident or medical experiment. I can't hope to be a superman because I can't fly. I can't hope to be a Batman because I don't have a butler like Alfred. One reason I like history so much is because it teaches it's students about real people, who lived real lives, and overcame real challenges. These people had the same twenty-four hour days that we did. They had the same weaknesses, the same struggles, the same desires. They wanted to stay in bed and take it easy just like we do. Most people in history are like most people today. They are an average, boring, "good" person just trying to be happy and survive. However, every so often an individual arises from the masses and shines like a star amidst the deep dark of humanities past. Gloriously they send forth their motivating messages, proclaiming to the future generations that greatness is something for everyone.
One such person who calls from the past is Joan of Arc. A thirteen year old french peasant who was called of God to go against everything society told her was normal and correct. She defied the whimsical trends of her culture. She ignored what was "cool" so that she could follow God's will. As a result God raised her up. In her was fulfilled the words of Jesus, her Lord and ours that, "the first shall be last and the last shall be first, anyone who humbles himself shall be exalted but he who exalt himself shall be humbled." So it was with her. From a humble peasant, from a no name family in a no name town, in the midst of a war, eighty years old this girl emerged as a beacon of hope to a dying nation and gave breath to a people who had gotten the wind shot out of them by English longbows.
When I watch a modern Super Hero movie I'm excited to see the bad guys lose and the good guys win. I don't believe that's wrong and I'm not trying to criticize those sorts of movies. However, when I read about a Joan of Arc I'm motivated to go to work, to smile more, to jump out of bed with the morning light. Why? Because she was a real person who waged the war of life and by God's grace, she won. She learned to love God in the small things. She was faithful with little so God gave her much. People who are actually great in real life are great because they learned the small things well. They master the basics. That's what history continues to teach me. Regardless of time, culture or ethnicity great people of the past knew how to work hard, handle disappointment, hold on to hope, recover from defeat and never give up.
The life of greatness is chosen, it's done mostly in solitude and it's hard. It's not about fame or fortune, wealth or honor. It's the roud less traveled, the higher road from which most people shrink away in fear. It's a road though that has been walked before and we can read the stories of those that have struggled up it's winding way and found peace and satisfaction at it's summit.
Onward then, to the books and the libraries. Those relics of the past that people have forgotten. We must brush the dust from the covers and smooth out the pages of these stories. We must free them fro the confines of the bookends to wander in our imaginations as they have done in generations past. Stories like Hector of Troy, Cicero of Rome, Pericles of Athens, Paphnutius of Thebes, Joan of Arc of France, these men and women with all their human vices can inspire us to live lives worthy of the men and women God created us to be, not the animals our society is turning us into.