Esse quam videri is the Latin phrase meaning “To be, rather than to seem”. Many educational institutions use this phrase (along with the state of North Carolina) as their official motto.

I like this phrase because a core element of orthodox Christianity can be found here. Honesty. Honesty in the realm of thought that one has to ‘be’ real than to portray a lifestyle that ’seems’ to be real. It is how I feel about the concept of limelight where the difference between the reality of ‘be’ becomes compromised, discarded, and/or sold out to the point of living out the fantasy of ’seem’.

Neil Peart of Rush wrote in the chrous of the song “Limelight” (the very end quoted):

Living in the limelight
The universal dream
For those who wish to seem
Those who wish to be
Must put aside the alienation
Get on with the fascination
The real relation
The underlying theme
The real relation
The underlying theme

Many months ago, some people that I know at church was trying their best to get me to pursue an ‘opportunity’ that looked great on paper, in psychology, and in practicality. I will admit that anyone who did not mull numerous hours praying and analyzing about such an opportunity would have jumped and seized the moment without any thought.

However, there was one major issue that as I prayed and analyzed everything became more and more apparent that the issue would be one where negotiability would not be considered. That issue was the fact that there would be a considerable amount of ‘limelight’, ’scrutiny’, ‘observation’, ‘over-analysis’, and ‘impossible expectations of model and perfection’, that would have to be accepted. I am by nature a person who disdains limelight seeing how it has turned many a soul from ‘being’ to ’seeming’ and am more like a ‘hermit’ but have close friends of fidelity and virtue.

After praying about this and just feeling a great discomfort within me, I delayed and delayed to the point of the choice was made for me. I just mulled and mulled and every time I thought about it, I felt great distress and great discomfort to the point of feeling that it was not God’s will at all for me. Some will look at the externals of the opportunity and tell me that I blew a great opportunity and that it will never come again using some obscure Old Testament verse as their basis like Moses’ mistake that cost him the Promised Land. Some would have stated that I needed to take the opportunity to ‘crucify’ the flesh for the ‘great Spiritual growth’ However, even though it appears that one door is closed, I really believe that another door is about to open. The great discomfort was the fact of the ‘limelight’ in and of itself and that If I had decided to pursue this opportunity, limelight was something that could not be eliminated.

I couldn’t deal with limelight. I felt that I would cave in under pressure and turn from ‘being’ to ’seeming’ or that the pressure of limelight and having to appear perfect instead of human would burn me out to the point of making a mistake that would cost me dearly. Being is honesty. Seeming is fallacy.

Living in a fisheye lens
Caught in the camera eye
I have no heart to lie
I cant pretend a stranger
Is a long-awaited friend

This morning, the ‘fruit’ of limelight manifested especially during ‘Worship Bandstand’. It was confirmation and revelation of not having to endure a limelight I disdain, not having to endure constant scrutiny, not having to be portrayed in the public eye feeling that I have to be perfect instead of human. I didn’t ‘escape’ anything. However, I felt in a state of ‘being’ rather than ’seeming’. A resonating within me gave me a sense of deep peace as I thought about the Limelight chorus and graded myself

Those who wish to be – B
Must put aside the alienation – F
Get on with the fascination – C
The real relation – D+
The underlying theme – D-

I’ll admit it. I have done very poorly in the areas of the theme of relationships in my almost 39 years of life. I wanted to ‘be’ rather than to seem and what did I do to be? I alienated myself (in the name of being spiritual trying to ‘justify’ it by correlating it to a character trait of a prophet (it seems all introverted and aloof people are deemed ‘prophets in an apostolic aura but usually it is never in the sense of being). I went with the fascination of life in some areas while numbing down and neutralizing myself in other areas. I didn’t pursue relationship instead turning aloof and downright ‘hermitic’ in most areas of life. I didn’t understand the core foundation between community and relationship (and in many ways still do not).

I feel too much like one of the lines of the ‘Limelight’ song in reference to church life where it states:

Cast in this unlikely role,
Ill-equipped to act
With insufficient tact
One must put up barriers
To keep oneself intact

I will admit to placing ‘barriers’ to keep myself intact but at the same time I alienated, pushed back, and kept to myself. Some days, I feel ill-equipped, unprepared, and ‘without the skills’ to interact with church people and sometimes come across as aloof, hermitic, and reclusive.

Living on a lighted stage
Approaches the unreal
For those who think and feel
In touch with some reality
Beyond the gilded cage

Many people feel as if church is a stage where act a role and live out another role Monday-Saturday. In the bubble mentality of the evangelical mindset, many never leave their utopia of safety and never see the reality outside the stage of life that has became the cage of remnant. I feel in touch with a reality outside the world of church when I go to work. I feel in touch with reality when I go buy groceries. I feel in touch with reality when I get hot wings some Friday nights.

I must learn to further ‘be’ and never ’seem’ without losing touch with reality. i admit, I need more tactful social skills where anointing overcomes anxiety and real relation and not association is lived out. I need to see myself more in the eyes of how God sees me and not within a myopic lens of the ‘cameras of Christianity’ with it’s lenses, apertures, and filters. Real contact via real relation must be with Christ and his fellow believers as the underlying theme that threads itself throughout life.

Is this the ‘deep calling unto deep’?
Being more and seeming less?

The real relation… The underlying theme!!!! There is a legitimate reason why those last two lines were shouted out in that song)