Success – who wants it?

Success in the world's eyes is more than achieving what you want - it's achieving things other people will admire: the look, the logo, the body, the house, the perfect partner. For a high-flyer, it's the dream job, the corporate car, the business jaunts to California, the pension at 50. At a simpler level, success is the word we use to describe achieving the result we wanted - when we're pleased with our performance, it's a success. And this applies to life in general. Still, we can sometimes be surprised by what we really consider important. For example, stop a moment and think of three people whose lives you rate as successful. Who comes to mind? Probably the people were not very different from the ones at the beginning of this article - successful by contemporary standards certainly, but successful according to Biblical criteria? What indeed would be a Biblical definition of success? And would Christ's life rate as a success?

Obviously, from an eternal perspective, Christ did not fail. He conquered sin, defeated death and, as a result, made it possible for us to have new life. In sum, He accomplished the task God gave Him to do. Moreover, His success is confirmed by the fact that He now sits at the right hand of the Father and that one day every knee will bow before Him. Christ did what His father wanted him to do and, although He did enjoy obvious instant acclamation for His teaching and healing ministry in His earthly lifetime, His supreme success lay in the eternal significance of what His faithfulness achieved. Biblical success is doing what God calls us to do in His way.

Paul's focus on faithfulness is similar. In 2 Timothy 4:7, as he sees the end of his life approaching, he writes, "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness..." This is certainly not the language of failure. Paul does not see his reward as a result of the number of churches he has planted but simply as the fruit of his faithfulness to Christ. Similarly, in the parable of the talents in Luke 12 and Matthew 25, we see servants commended or berated depending on how well they'd invested the wealth that had been entrusted to them by their master. Obviously, this is a parable and not strictly applicable to contemporary investment bankers. Nevertheless, the issue is clear. Two servants do what their master wants. They are good stewards of what their master has given them. Similarly, success for each one of us is a function of obedience and good stewardship of what the master has entrusted to us. As the parable makes clear, there is nothing inherently wrong with the creation of wealth but there would have been if the servants were not focused on their master's agenda. Contrast that with the parable of the barns in Luke 12:13-21 where one man's agri-business is so successful that he decides to build new barns to store his ever-burgeoning harvest, with a view to stopping in due course to enjoy a long and prosperous retirement. God, however, ends his life that very night. The issue was not the man's material wealth, but the poverty of his regard for God. He had built up his fortune on earth, but ignored his heavenly bank account. Jesus is fully aware that the material concerns of this life are very real for all His followers: "Life is more than food, and the body more than clothes... Do not set your heart on what you will eat or drink; do not worry about it." (Luke 12:23). However, He calls us to put these concerns in their proper perspective: they are the Father's responsibility, and He is faithful in meeting His promises. This frees us to live for the Father and His kingdom, according to His kingdom values - because we already have its riches. "Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom."(Luke 12:32)

Overall, Biblical success includes:

- Loving God with every aspect of our being (Luke 10:25-29).
- Loving our neighbours as ourselves (Luke 10:30-37).
- Maintaining Christ like priorities (Luke 10:38-42).
- Regarding all we have as a blessing from God (Luke 12:22-34).
- Living as if Jesus will return tomorrow (Luke 12:35-48).
- Using all God has given us to serve Him in this world
(Luke 19:11-27).
- Returning to Jesus again and again, even when we feel we've let Him down terribly (Luke 22:54-62 & 24:12).
- Being prepared to take the Gospel to the world in the power of God's Spirit (Acts 2).

If this is a general picture of success, what specifically does success at work look like?

Success at work

Success at work is to be defined in terms of our relationship with Christ. What does He want me to do? And in what way? As such, success at work stems from the knowledge that God is our ultimate boss (Colossians 3:23), and that our success or failure at work must be judged against His priorities and His standards. So it is that the Bible's judgment on two very wealthy and powerful men differs so markedly. On the one hand there's David: great warrior king, adulterer and murderer, but nevertheless a man after God's own heart - a success. On the other hand, Solomon, the wisest man on earth, who started so well, accrued so much fame and so much wealth, but whose heart turned towards the pagan gods of his myriad wives. It was an apostasy that was to lead to the division of Israel, and the first step on the road to exile and the destruction of the Temple that Solomon had constructed. If, then, worldly success is not necessarily an indicator of faithfulness towards God, then it is also true that faithfulness is no guarantee of worldly success or even comfort. Certainly, it's often the case, as Proverbs counsels, that "Lazy hands make a man poor, but diligent hands bring wealth" (10:4). Diligence, however, is not always rewarded by wealth and power - just look at how hard so many people in the two-thirds world have to work to eke out an existence. What then of the good things God may give us which are normally associated with worldly success - riches, status, good health? The Bible is clear that such 'blessings' come from God and are in his power to bestow or withhold. Joseph (see Gen 39ff) achieved significant material success and political power against the odds, but he knew that his success was a direct result of God helping him. Indeed, although there have been many insightful studies of the positive aspects of Joseph's character, the dominant refrain of that section of Genesis is "The Lord was with him." Job similarly enjoyed God's favour: he had vast numbers of sheep, camels, oxen and donkeys, and had a large number of servants under him. Yet God allowed Satan to destroy Job's wealth, property and family, leaving him with nothing but his life (and diseased at that). Job humbly puts it this way: "Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked I shall depart. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised" (Job 1:21). We need to apply these same values to work - especially in dealing with the benefits we receive from our jobs. When Christ tells us not to make big barns to store our plenty, He's talking about the value we place on our salary package, or our pension, or that promotion. Being generous toward God with these earthly riches doesn't necessarily mean giving it all away, but it does mean placing them all at His disposal. And trusting Him in times of plenty, as well as in times of need. Indeed, when the threat of redundancy looms in times of economic uncertainty, the balance in our spiritual deposit account becomes very clear: do we really believe that God knows our needs and will care for us and our family? Of course, biblical success at work involves far more than simply the faithful stewardship of the fruits of our labours, it involves being a good steward of our talents. Indeed, there is great joy in using our God-given talents, and great joy too in developing them, joy in a joint well welded, a ball well kicked, a letter beautifully written, a race run to the limit of our endurance, a mentally disabled eleven year old helped to read the word 'cat', joy as we, as creatures, succeed in doing something He has created us to do. And there's joy too in helping others succeed, joy in being a good servant of those we work for and those who work for us. Joy in taking opportunities to 'love', in "selflessly seeking to promote the growth of others." There's joy in sharing Christ in tenderness and truth. And occasionally great pain - as they reject Him, or ridicule us. Success at work also involves living a life that shows others that success does not consist in being No. 1, in being 'great'. Success for each of us will be different. And in a world where so many people judge their own worth, as well as the worth of their friends and colleagues by external factors, the Christian community must demonstrate the infinite value of every individual. As Philip Yancey puts it in Soul Survivor, "By elevating the rich, the beautiful, the powerful, what have we done to the dignity of those who don't measure up?" How easy not to see other people through their Creator's eyes of grace. How easy not to see our own work as valuable in God's eyes. How easy to forget that: "Whatever" we "work at" we can "work at it with all our heart, as working for the Lord, not for people..." And what a joy it would be to look back on our time on earth and be able to say with Paul: "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith." And what an extraordinary delight it would be if we were to hear our Saviour welcome us into heaven with these words: "Well done, my good and faithful servant" (Mt 25.23). May it be so.

Tim Vickers Key resource

Most introductory Christian books on work deal with success but for something deeper Richard Foster's, Money, Sex and Power, Hodder & Stoughton, £6.99 is excellent.

Mark Greene

Archive...

Comments

There are currently no comments for this article.

Leave a comment