{"id":4332,"date":"2025-01-09T07:53:47","date_gmt":"2025-01-09T12:53:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/js1cd06kre.onrocket.site\/?p=4332"},"modified":"2025-01-09T07:53:47","modified_gmt":"2025-01-09T12:53:47","slug":"why-not-the-best","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2025\/01\/09\/why-not-the-best\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Not the Best?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast,\u00a0<\/em>click here<\/a>

Jimmy Carter, whose life will be celebrated today at his funeral at the National Cathedral, has always been an anomaly among U.S. presidents.

His one term in the Oval Office (1977-1981) ended in apparent disgrace. Voters, weary of stagflation and the Iran hostage crisis, rewarded his opponent Ronald Reagan with a landslide victory.

He quietly retreated to his home state of Georgia, where he began restoration of a rustic house. Johnny Carson joked, \u201cPoor Jimmy. He always got things backwards. He\u2019s the only president who started out in the White House and ended up in a log cabin.\u201d

Carter, however, got the last laugh. He will almost certainly be remembered as the chief executive with the most remarkable post-presidency. He brokered international treaties, won the Nobel Peace Prize, elevated Habitat for Humanity to national prominence, and faithfully taught an adult Sunday School class into the last (100th<\/sup>) year of his life. \u00a0

He also wrote 33 books. The first one, Why Not the Best?<\/em> (1975) was a memoir of his successful run for the governorship of Georgia.

Its title sprang from one of the hinge-point moments of his life \u2013 an intense interview in 1952 with Admiral Hyman Rickover, who was pioneering America\u2019s fledgling nuclear submarine program.

Carter, a graduate of the US Naval Academy, dreamed of commanding a sub.

Rickover was a genius. He was also a hyper-driven micromanager, choosing to personally conduct every interview of potential skippers. Over the course of two to three hours, he would drill deeply into each\u2019s candidate\u2019s grasp of strategy, tactics, physics, literature, and history. Such sessions were not for the faint of heart.

In preparation, Carter crammed for weeks. His interview seemed to be going well when Rickover asked, \u201cWhere were you ranked in your class at the Naval Academy?\u201d

This would surely be a good moment. Jimmy answered with pride, \u201cI was ranked 59th<\/sup> in a class of 840, sir.\u201d Boom<\/em>. Score one for the future president.

Instead of offering a word of congratulations, however, Rickover asked a follow-up question: \u201cDid you always do your best?\u201d

At that moment, for Carter, the world stood still. He almost went for the obvious default answer: \u201cYes, of course, sir, I always did my best.\u201d But that wasn\u2019t true. He knew he hadn\u2019t always done his best. \u201cI recalled several of the many times at the Academy when I could have learned more about our allies, our enemies, weapons, strategy, and so forth.\u201d

He said with honesty, \u201cNo, sir, I didn\u2019t always do my best.\u201d

His words hung in the air. There was a long moment of silence. Rickover finally asked, \u201cWhy not?\u201d Then, without a further word, he stood up and left the room. The interview was over.

Was Carter accepted into the nuclear submarine program? Yes.

But he never got over that question. The quest for excellence became his ever-present North Star. Carter later said that, aside from his mother and father, Rickover exerted the greatest long-term influence on his life.

So, how about you? Do you always do your best?

We must be careful how we answer this question. If we immediately try to square our lives with Jesus\u2019 words in the Sermon on the Mount, \u201cTherefore be perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect\u201d (Matthew 5:48), it\u2019s game over. None of us in this broken world has ever met that standard, and none of us ever will.

Nevertheless, the Bible isn\u2019t sentencing us to a lifetime of self-loathing. \u201cNot-good-enoughness\u201d is not our identity in Christ.

Instead, the apostle Paul counsels us to \u201cforget what lies behind and strain toward what is ahead, pressing on toward the goal\u201d of spiritual maturity (Philippians 3:13-14). \u00a0And what does that look like? With the Spirit\u2019s help, we strive to fix our minds on \u201cwhatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise\u2026\u201d (Philippians 4:8).

Our watchword must be excellence.

In his book Life in the Negative World: Confronting Challenges in an Anti-Christian World<\/em>, Aaron Renn points out that American followers of Jesus, by and large, do not have a reputation for unusual competence in their work, exemplary character in their relationships, or praiseworthy integrity in their sexuality. Few people look at Christians and say, \u201cNow there\u2019s a group of people who are always doing their best.\u201d\u00a0

How can we ever stand out as the light of the world and a city set on a hill?

We must pursue excellence in telling the truth. In keeping promises. In working without cutting corners. In courageously standing up for those in need. In patiently enduring tough times.

By God\u2019s grace, we must resolve to do our best.

Or as Oswald Chambers put it a century ago, every day is a new day to do Our Utmost for his Highest<\/em>.
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To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast,\u00a0click here Jimmy Carter, whose life will be celebrated today at his funeral at the National Cathedral, has always been an anomaly among U.S. presidents. His one term in the Oval Office (1977-1981) ended in apparent disgrace. Voters, weary of stagflation and the Iran hostage crisis, rewarded his opponent Ronald Reagan with a… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4333,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[832,851],"class_list":["post-4332","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-excellence","tag-presidents"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4332","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4332"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4332\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4334,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4332\/revisions\/4334"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4333"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4332"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}