{"id":4594,"date":"2025-05-01T08:52:59","date_gmt":"2025-05-01T12:52:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/js1cd06kre.onrocket.site\/?p=4594"},"modified":"2025-05-01T08:52:59","modified_gmt":"2025-05-01T12:52:59","slug":"more-than-mediocrity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2025\/05\/01\/more-than-mediocrity\/","title":{"rendered":"More Than Mediocrity"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast,\u00a0<\/em>click here<\/a>

When challenged to name an influential president, most Americans gravitate to those four granite heads on Mount Rushmore.

Washington, Lincoln, Jefferson, and Teddy Roosevelt, after all, were undeniably key difference-makers in our nation\u2019s history.

But it\u2019s likely that the president who will most influence your speech <\/em>today will be America\u2019s eighth chief executive, Martin Van Buren.

When Van Buren was trying to win a second White House term in 1840, his supporters began looking for a catchy slogan.

Since he hailed from the village of Kinderhook in eastern New York, the aging politician who seemed to be suffering a never-ending bad hair day was identified as \u201cOld Kinderhook.\u201d\u00a0That became shortened to O.K.\u00a0Soon enough the Democratic Party began hosting \u201cOK balls\u201d and established \u201cOK clubs.\u201d

Vote for Martin Van Buren.\u00a0He\u2019s OK!<\/em>

As it turned out, Van Buren lost the election. His opponent, Wiliam Henry Harrison, also made a lasting contribution to American slang. The president-elect\u2019s supporters crafted huge balls that they rolled from village to village, shouting, \u201cKeep the Harrison ball rolling!\u201d The next time you urge someone to keep the ball rolling, you\u2019re hearkening back to a \u201chigh tech\u201d campaign innovation that predates the Civil War.

Van Buren may have disappeared from the national stage, but OK lives on.\u00a0

Almost two centuries later, it will no doubt be spoken, typed, texted, or hand-signaled billions of times today.

What\u2019s fascinating is that OK \u2013 which was originally intended to signify the highest grade presidential material \u2013 is now synonymous with mediocrity. It\u2019s come to mean \u201cfairly average.\u201d

So how was your spring break trip?\u00a0Oh, it was OK.\u00a0What do you think of that new restaurant?\u00a0OK, I guess.\u00a0The food was meh.\u00a0<\/em>

If you\u2019re evaluating an experience on a scale that has total despair at one end and pure bliss at the other, \u201cOK\u201d falls somewhere in the middle.

Nobody wants to come to the finish line of their one-and-only shot at life on earth and have to say, \u201cAll things considered, I guess I had an OK life.\u201d

God has such a deeper dream for all of us.

God longs for us to know shalom<\/em>, a Hebrew word that is usually translated \u201cpeace.\u201d\u00a0But shalom is far more than merely the absence of chaos or noise.

Shalom is the comprehensive human experience of wholeness, health, security, tranquility, fullness, rest, harmony, and completeness that can become ours, in its deepest sense, only through a heartfelt dependence on God through Jesus Christ.

Shalom springs from a joyful awareness of God\u2019s presence \u2013 even when life hurts.\u00a0

Think of the one thing that is most likely to keep you awake tonight.\u00a0Who or what are you counting on to help you face that worry or fear?

\u201cYou will keep in perfect peace [shalom<\/em>] those whose minds are set on You, because they are always counting on You\u201d (Isaiah 26:3).

Generations have discovered, from experience, that that promise is A-OK.
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To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast,\u00a0click here When challenged to name an influential president, most Americans gravitate to those four granite heads on Mount Rushmore. Washington, Lincoln, Jefferson, and Teddy Roosevelt, after all, were undeniably key difference-makers in our nation\u2019s history. But it\u2019s likely that the president who will most influence your speech today will be America\u2019s eighth… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4595,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[920,851],"class_list":["post-4594","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-ok","tag-presidents"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4594","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=4594"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4594\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4596,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4594\/revisions\/4596"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4595"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4594"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4594"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4594"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}