One of my favorite websites is a thing called Successories. They used to have stores
now they only have the website. This company started as a
mail-order business featuring beautiful posters and plaques that had success
oriented themes. As I said for many years it was very successful in opening stores
across the America that provided every kind of stationary and knick-knack and
poster and gadget that had printed on them a message that gave the
buyer an insight into how someone could obtain success. So on beautiful posters
for example they had things that said 'attitude is a little thing that
makes a big difference' or 'the speed of the leader determines the rate of the
pack' or 'success is a journey not a destination' and all these things on
beautiful posters. Now there's a great demand for these products because the
need to succeed to reach goals to feel a sense of accomplishment is basic to
every person, even Paul the Apostle was eager to succeed in evangelizing
places where no one had been before and he talks about that in Romans chapter 15
verse 20. And so to desire success is natural and it's a good thing. How we as
Christians obtain success is another matter. Like all good things success can
become an occasion of sinfulness, a way to cause us to stumble in our walk of
faith with the Lord. If we're not careful the striving for success can lead us
into sin and in three main ways and I want to share that with you this morning.
First of all, we make success our God. 'Where your treasure is there will
be your heart also' Jesus said Matthew 6:21. In other words the thing that
you value the most will be what you worship and serve and so if
succeeding is what your life is about then succeeding in your job or
succeeding in your hobbies are succeeding and winning at whatever all
your emotions and time and energy will be wrapped up in obtaining success. I had
an elder I worked in a church where there was an elder who once visited a
member who had not been coming to services for several months and so one
of the elders went out to visit with that family with that particular
individual to find out is there something wrong I mean you know you're
sick whatever you know you hadn't been there in a long time, and the reply that
he received, it was a man, was that his time was devoted to schoolwork
so he could get ahead in his job he was taking courses and he was also coaching
on the weekend so his team could get to the championship and he said I just
don't have any time for church. Jesus said we cannot serve two masters
if success is our master than God in Christ is not and we found a new God for
ourselves and that God is called success.
Success can cause us to sin in other ways for example we make success our
standard. This is a more subtle trap but an easy one to fall into. When success is
very important to us we begin to believe that it should be important to everybody
else that everyone should be success oriented like we are. As Christians James
tells us not to make distinctions between men in other words giving the
rich man a favorite position and place in the church and treating the poor man
with contempt James 2:1-4. The danger here and the sin according to
James is to judge the value and the worthiness of a person based on how they
have succeeded in life. Jesus said life is more than food or clothing, Matthew
6:25. In other words there's more to person than what they eat and the
quality of what they eat or what they wear and the quality of what they wear
yet some people will judge others simply by the appearance of success that they
may have and this judgment will usually guide the way that they treat them.
Therein lies the sin of insincerity and selfishness caused by our false notion
that a successful person is more worthy of our love than one who is not.
I'm asking you to go back in your memory here how many men how many people
remember the monkeys remember the monkeys yeah hey hey we're the Monkees
so Micky Dolenz he was a member of this boyband back in the 70s they had they've
had boy bands for a long time sorry to disappoint you younger people, and so the
Monkees were the boy band of the 70s and Micky Dolenz said that when he was
famous and successful everybody wanted to give him stuff for free, they wanted
to give him free stuff and then after his fame and much of his wealth was gone
when he actually needed help no one would give him the time of day imagine.
Jesus died for everybody irrespective of personal success and so
our judgment therefore should not be more exclusive than His. I think that's a
basic thing don't you think? And then another way that we can be trapped by
the success idea, success at all costs. Now there are two strategies for success
in the world there's the high way if you wish to success, this is represented and
encouraged by companies likes Successories that I was mentioning before,
they promote teamwork excellence in work and product innovation in approach and a
continual motivation of individuals with incentives encouragement and self-image
builders that this company provided through their product.
Another method is found in Stephen Covey's book a little while back, Seven
Habits of Highly Effective People and in this book he stresses character and he
says that the development of one's character is the key to effective
successful living, in other words it's not what you do it's who you are that
determines your success. And then there's the low way to success and the low way
says do whatever it takes do whatever it takes to get ahead. The low ways
philosophy is that the end justifies the means.
Cheat lie compromise yourself where your values just make sure you win. Seems
there's a lot of that going around today if you look at the news. Of course the
higher way is to be recommended but one must be careful not to fall into the
mindset of success and that's what I've been talking about, where everything is
calculated for maximum effect for success, where character development and
encouragement where friendship and contacts are all weighed out against
their usefulness for our success. It's one of the reasons that I've always been
wary of some not all mind you but some you know these multi-level marketing
schemes, the idea of seeing everybody as
a potential customer and a stepping stone to greater personal success. I
don't know about you but the world gets awfully small and one-dimensional when
the only reason everyone and everything exists is to provide me with the
resources for my own success I don't know I don't want that life. Now the
ideas of Christianity and success are not in opposition to one another,
that it's somehow unchristian to succeed in the world that's not a true
statement. Our God is a God of success, He succeeded in creating the world that He
intended to create, our Lord Jesus succeeded in His very
difficult mission to come here and die for our sins and resurrect and send out
Apostles, and the Apostles succeeded in spreading the gospel and establishing
the church in the Roman Empire against tremendous odds, and the Lord's Church
has succeeded in lasting 2,000 years despite constant attacks from every
quarter and it is stronger than ever, and of course the Bible God's Word has
remained unchanged and unmoved and continues to save and encourage and
teach and correct every new generation of believers, I think that that counts as
success, and Christians and Christianity have a pretty strong record of success
better than any nation or government or philosophy or product. I think I hold
against Successories that company however is that it does not acknowledge
God as the author of success in any way it is only focused on success in this
world. So Christians have a long track record of success and the Bible provides
some principles that help us understand why they have succeeded and how we can
succeed not only in our religious life but in every aspect of our lives as well.
In other words the Bible teaches us how to succeed not only spiritually but
physically as well. Much of what the success gurus preach comes from basic
ideas that are found in the Bible, so you'll probably recognize a lot of the
concepts I just want to make sure that we realize that the things that I'll
share with you actually come from God and not from man. So here it is five ways
to succeed as Christians: number one, take a risk take a risk. There's no faith
without risk, if what you do for God has no risk in it at all then
you don't need any faith you're walking by sight. Faith is all about taking a
step not knowing if that step will lead you to where you want to go. Noah risked
his reputation in building a boat in the desert,
Abraham risked his family in leaving for an unknown land, Moses risked his freedom
in going back before the Pharaoh, David risked his life fighting Goliath,
Apostles risked everything in following this young rabbi from Nazareth. A recent
survey of men over 90 years of age asked them what they would have changed if
they could do everything over again and they answered that they would have
risked more. I would have stepped out more I would have gone for
it. The Bible doesn't say to take foolish risks or sinful risks but in order to
get to somewhere or something else we always have to risk what we have in hand.
One of the Successory posters says the following
'you cannot discover new oceans unless you're willing to lose sight of the
shore.' You want to succeed as a Christian: take responsibility.
No one ever succeeded on somebody else's hard work. Success in any endeavor
requires that a person take the responsibility for failure and for
success because nobody succeeds by accident, sure some people win the
lottery or publishing Clearing House or they buy a ticket, some folks
inherit money but the number of these people are tiny in comparison to the
ones who succeed because they aim for it and they work hard to achieve it. Reminds
me of the story of the farmer had a huge barn
red barn had these you know bull's-eyes on it and in these bull's-eyes there was
was a bullet hole right smack in the middle of every bullseye must had 50
bull's-eyes drawn on his barn and it was a bullet in the middle of it so as his
friend came over said man you must be a terrific shot you must be a terrific
marksman how do you do that? So that no problem the barns
about a hundred yards from your house so he we didn't got his rifle he aimed it
at the barn bang you know then he walked over to the barn with the chalk and he
drew a bull's-eye around the around the bullet. This story reflects how some
people wander aimlessly until they reach a certain spot and then they circle
their lives around it and they call themselves a success. Paul said in
I Corinthians 15:10, 'I labored even more than all of them.' He was explaining his
response to God's grace and how it motivated him to work very hard in order
to succeed in accomplishing all that he did in mission work, he knew where he was
going his gains were not by accident.
It's an old story but it's true, no pain no gain. Like everybody else
Christians need to visualize their goals and be willing to sacrifice in order to
achieve them. My success is my responsibility, if I achieve it I will
rejoice and I will give thanks, and if I fail I will blame no one or nothing else
except myself unless it's my responsibility it'll
never be my success. You want to be successful: take a risk, take
responsibility, expect opposition. The reason so many people fail is because
they quit the moment there is opposition or difficulty or pain. They think that
opposition is God's way of telling them to stop or that if God
wanted them to do something He would give them a smooth ride as a sign. People
who think that have not read carefully the Bible. With every opportunity
there comes opposition that's why the mountaintop is up there and not down
there. I didn't say that one has to like opposition and trouble and trials I said
if you want to succeed in business in marriage in ministry in personal conduct
in whatever expect obstacles and adversaries unexpected things to go
wrong at the worst possible moment. Paul wrote to the Corinthians about a great
opportunity to bring the gospel to Asia Minor but listen to how he described
this opportunity he said, but I shall remain in Ephesus until Pentecost for a
wide door of effective service has opened to me and there are many
adversaries. Notice that he says I've got this great opportunity and there are
many adversaries. When we know there's going to be opposition we can be calm
not discouraged and ready to deal with it when it happens.
Successful Christians understand that opposition is simply part of the cost of
obtaining success. An open door of opportunity is never without some form
of obstacles otherwise everybody would be bold and courageous and successful.
Want to succeed: be prepared to lose it all. Job was able to bear under
his great suffering because he was prepared to lose it all if it came to
that, he said naked I came from my mother's
womb and naked I shall return the Lord gave and the Lord taketh away blessed be
the name of the Lord. If success is your God your only gain your one motivation
in life you're in a bad bargaining position if your whole life is wrapped
been just pursuing success. If you lose you lose everything and you can be
easily tempted to sell your soul for it. When success is part of your life but
not the focal point you have the strength to start over when defeated and
you have the ability to find peace and joy regardless of your rate of success.
And then finally do you really really want to succeed as a Christian yeah of
course, depend on God, of course depend on God. This is the key element that
separates the Christian struggle for success and the rest of the world and
what they do for success. For Christian success is simply another way of
expressing what is at the center of his or her life and that is to glorify God.
The goal for a Christian is to honor God and serve Him in Jesus Christ, the goal
or this goal rather is perfectly reached through faith and obedience to Christ
worldly success simply provides another avenue to honor the Lord. My success
gives me greater opportunity to praise God. Education and skill money character
contacts hard work all of these are useful tools in obtaining success but a
Christian knows that his ultimate success depends on God and so he does
his best but depends on God for the outcome. What does Solomon say about all
of this, "Commit your works to the Lord and your plans will be established." The
wise man the wise woman who seeks success seeks success through Christ. If
your hearts desire is to please and honor God, He will delight. Solomon
is saying He'll be happy to give you success. So in closing just let me say my
prayer is that every godly dream and hope and goal that you have will succeed
for each of you as you pursue these regardless of the
risk as you invest your energy into your goals as you overcome every obstacle
ready to lose it all if it's God's will and as you put your full confidence in
the Lord for final success. If you pursue success in this way the Lord will surely
bless you. My hope also for you is that every
person in this congregation is ready when the Lord comes, that we all go to
heaven will be the ultimate success, that all of you and I of course will be in
heaven together this eclipses any other success that we might have here on earth.
This is my hope this is what I pray for for each of you each of your family each
of your children. If you're not ready to fulfill that success because you've not
obeyed the gospel in repentance and baptism or perhaps you've been sinful or
unfaithful whatever that is, guarantee that final success, you can do that now
as we stand as we sing our song of encouragement.