Each Christian lives in a different context, has different gifts, and is at a different point of sanctification. This being the case, we all need wisdom to know what we should do. Some should not become pastors, some should, and others should, but not right now. The dangers of building a platform are numerous. For many, it will be wise to avoid a platform, at least for now. But it is also possible that many should be speaking or writing, but have falsely reckoned themselves unworthy of the task. This is where magnanimity comes in.

On September 29th, Mark Driscoll tweeted: “God has bypassed the church pulpit and given his gospel to influencers, politicians, and podcasters, and it’s because most pastors have become useless motivational speakers.”¹ That tweet alone might give us justifiable reason to launch Twitter into the sun. However, though the irony is especially thick coming from a man who wrecked his own church, the sentiment is hardly unusual. Many online influencers have taken it upon themselves to condemn real-life churches and pastors, appointing themselves as God’s spokesmen. What is more concerning are the large audiences these men attract. Apparently, many people are interested in what they have to say. But there are also some who have checked out. For these people, influence and platforms are something to be avoided. The specter of Driscoll looms, along with the seemingly endless stream of pastors and leaders who were corrupted by fame and influence. Why not avoid it altogether? After all, Paul said, “aspire to live quietly, and to mind your own affairs, and to work with your hands, as we instructed you” (1 Ths. 4:11).

Derek Rishmawy captured this feeling well in a recent article, but he suggests that there has been an overcorrection. He writes: “There is a way of embracing the local, shunning the spotlight, avoiding the lure of Evangelicalism’s celebrityism, platform-obsession, and so on, of cultivating your own garden in hope because you know that God really is in the day of small things (Zech. 4:10). But there is also a way of doing so because you lack hope…. This is not humility. This is faithlessness. This is burying your talent because you have believed hard things about your heavenly Father.”² He goes on to ask a poignant question: “Are we operating truly out of a humble desire to be faithful to the call to which he has given us, or out of a fearful sense that he will not back us in anything else?”³

How might we answer that question? Is it possible that you should try to build a bigger platform? By platform, I only mean some position of influence. This broad sense of the word would include a social media following or a podcast, as well as publishing a book or even taking a pastorate. Building a platform would include things we normally think of (like tweeting), but might also include planting a church or getting a PhD to publish or teach. To be clear, this essay cannot answer these questions for you. Every individual is unique, as are the various sorts of platforms you might be interested in building (being a pastor is very different from being a YouTuber!). If you need specific direction, you should talk to your spouse and your pastors. But this essay can provide some categories for self-examination. With some help from Thomas Aquinas, I will name some vices to avoid and a virtue to cultivate: magnanimity. Though platforms are fraught with perils and temptations, shrinking back from the good God has gifted you to do is also vicious. The virtuous life is often quiet, but not always. Sometimes, virtue requires us to attempt great things.

Naming the Usual Suspects: Presumption, Ambition, and Vainglory

Magnanimity, according to Aquinas, must deal with honor, namely, in having a right assessment of oneself and doing the good that lies within one’s power. ⁴ I will return to magnanimity after considering the vices opposed to it. If magnanimity is a golden mean, then on the side of excess Thomas places presumption, ambition, and vainglory. I call these the usual suspects because they are usually quite visible. When you think of someone who has been corrupted by a platform, presumption, ambition, and vainglory probably played some role.

Presumption is the tendency to attempt what is beyond one’s power because of a faulty self-understanding. Aquinas names two ways one might be presumptuous. The first is simply thinking you have more excellence than you really have (like knowledge or virtue). The second is thinking that you are great for reasons that do not make you great (like being rich). ⁵ It is a good thing to pastor a church (1 Tim. 3:1), but it is presumptuous to insist that you are called by God to do so without the approval of your church, or, worse, against their warnings that you are not gifted or qualified for such work. It is likewise presumptuous for a man to assume that he ought to be an elder because he is a wealthy donor. Many people desire platforms presumptuously. Whether they seek influence in their church or online, they assume that their opinion ought to be heard, but without good reason. Unfortunately, the internet, especially, is all too eager to award an audience to people with no track record of intellectual rigor, ecclesial faithfulness, or personal integrity.

Though ambition does not carry any sinful connotations in most modern usage, Aquinas used the term to refer to an inordinate desire for honor. ⁶ Honor is a “witnessing to a person’s excellence.” ⁷ It is not evil to be honored for an excellent quality, but honor must be used properly. The excellence for which a person is honored is a gift from God, so all honor should ultimately be referred to God. Further, excellence is given by God to be used for the benefit of others, so honor must also be used for the good of one’s neighbor. ⁸

Based on these observations, Aquinas says that the desire for honor can go astray in three ways. First, when we desire honor for an excellence we do not have, second, when we do not refer the honor we receive toward God, and third, when we crave honor for ourselves without using it for the benefit of our neighbor.⁹ Regarding the first error, the issue is not that the person believes they have an excellence they do not actually have; that would be presumption. In this case, they are aware that they do not have an excellence, but they want honor anyway. It is like a student who is so desperate for academic honors that they use AI to summarize books or write portions of their essays; he seeks an honor he knows he has not earned. The other errors are self-centered failures of love.

The common root of all three is a disordered love for honor. An ambitious person will often do what is right so long as it earns them praise, but they simply cannot tolerate obscurity. For example, consider a man who aspires to be a good pastor—surely a noble aim! Good pastors ought to be honored, and it is fine for them to accept such honor, so long as they use it to bring glory to God and point their neighbor toward Him. But what if being a good pastor earns the man criticism rather than honor, as it so often does? For many pastors, these moments reveal that they have not desired to be a good pastor as much as they have desired the honor of being one. Such pastors are guilty of ambition and cannot persevere when their praise dries up. By contrast, the virtuous pastor sees his honor as a tool to honor God and help his congregation. If what is God-honoring and beneficial to the congregation costs him the praise of people, so be it.

Last of all is vainglory. Vainglory, as the name suggests, is the desire for vain glory. ¹⁰ It has long been considered a capital vice, meaning it is a fountainhead of other sins and vices.¹¹ Vainglory is easily confused with pride, and the two are often present together.¹² Rebecca Konyndyk DeYoung helpfully distinguishes the two: “Pride excessively concerns excellence itself (i.e., my excelling others); vainglory, by contrast, concerns primarily the display or manifestation of my excellence… What makes vainglory distinct from pride, then, is love of ‘the show.’… The vainglorious, on the other hand, seek whatever will bring in the most attention and applause, whether it is excellent and deserving or not.”¹³ If it was not already obvious that vainglory permeates social media, Aquinas says that the daughters of this vice are disobedience, boastfulness, hypocrisy, contention, obstinacy, discord, and love of novelties.¹⁴ This is surely a serious and common vice!

Again, Aquinas notes multiple ways that the desire for glory can err. First, one may seek glory for something that is unworthy of glory. Second, one may seek glory from a person they should not seek glory from (i.e., a man of poor judgment). Third, one may fail to use his glory to honor God and tend to the spiritual welfare of his neighbor.¹⁵ Whereas the ambitious at least pretends to be something that is genuinely worthy of honor, the vainglorious may accept praise for something that is not worthy of praise from people whose praise should not matter.

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