Success – An Introduction

How can I be more successful?

(This is part 1 of our multipart study on Success in the Bible)

How can I define success? Is it in reaching the pinnacle of my career? Is it in having the most friends, the most money, the most kids? Is success having the largest boat and RV, or is success in giving more away than your neighbor?

Maybe success is retiring before you are 50. Success might be planning out your goals and your dreams, and then meeting them in systematic fashion, on time, under budget.

We are a success driven society. Christian or not, our bookstores are filled with ‘living’ books to guide you to a more successful you. I just did a search on one of my local Christian bookstores, and this is just some items from the first page of results (there are 24 pages of results for ‘success’)

• Favor- the road to success.
• The Heart of Success
• Grooming the Next Generation for Success
• Practical Prayer Keys to Business Success
• 101 Success Secrets for Women

We are a society who measures success – we are conditioned to naturally look towards success in our lives, success in our careers, success in our relationships. We are conditioned to look towards those who we deem successful, and try and emulate them. We look at the keys that they followed and try and apply them to our lives. We read their books, go to their seminars, follow them on facebook and hope that God will bless us in the same way.

But what is success?

I want to spend the next few posts looking at successful people in the Bible, and see what we find. Since I personally claim the Bible is central to not only my faith but also my life, what does it say?

Before we get started, it may help to take some time to consider what success is to you. How would you define success, right now?

Maybe you will be challenged, or maybe you will just be reinforced, but the key is to be honest with yourself – and with God – then let’s see where this one takes us.

Lastly, remember that God has made every one of us different. We all have different personalities, different talents, different strengths, different weaknesses and different callings. But through all of that, I believe the Bible offers us some specific guidance that if we take the time to read, will guide us to be more successful than even we imagine we can be.

Success Despite Yourself – Jonah

Jonah 1:1-2 (ESV)
Now the word of the LORD came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying, “Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and call out against it, for their evil has come up before me.”

(This is part 2 of our multipart study on Success in the Bible)

The first figure we will look at in regard to success is Jonah. We all have heard the story of ‘Jonah and the Big Fish’ I am sure. But here is a person who was successful beyond what he could have dreamed – despite not wanting to be!

First – he tried to run away from what he was called to do…. and failed. The reason we all know of Jonah is that God had a plan, and God was going to use Jonah – no matter what Jonah himself thought about it! Being swallowed by a Big Fish and spat back out three days later is a pretty extreme reminder to Jonah of Who is in control.

God called Jonah to preach to the city of Nineveh, to tell them about God and what He thought of their city. But Jonah didn’t want to go – he was a prophet in Israel, and wanted nothing to do with the ‘gentiles’. He wanted to continue in his role with Israel, and leave the others to destruction.

After Jonah preached in Nineveh, he didn’t just get a small home group. He didn’t just get 10 or 15 people to hear his message and believe.

Jonah 3:5-9 (ESV)
And the people of Nineveh believed God. They called for a fast and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them to the least of them.

The word reached the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, removed his robe, covered himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And he issued a proclamation and published through Nineveh, “By the decree of the king and his nobles: Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything. Let them not feed or drink water, but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and let them call out mightily to God. Let everyone turn from his evil way and from the violence that is in his hands. Who knows? God may turn and relent and turn from his fierce anger, so that we may not perish.”

Much of the city believed and repented, all the way up to the King.

In his preaching, Jonah was wildly successful. This was no tent meeting, this was no false revival. This was a turning and repentance of a whole city. To this day preachers dream of a response like this! So as a prophet of the Most High God, what did Jonah think of this?

Jonah 4:1-3 (ESV)
But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was angry. And he prayed to the LORD and said, “O LORD, is not this what I said when I was yet in my country? That is why I made haste to flee to Tarshish; for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and relenting from disaster. Therefore now, O LORD, please take my life from me, for it is better for me to die than to live.”

Jonah hated it. Hated it so much that he said he would rather die than be a part of this success! Given the choice, Jonah would have preached for 40 days and then called fire from Heaven to destroy the city. Instead, a city of over 120,000 people heard the Word of God and repented!

From our standpoint now, we would call Jonah successful. From the standpoint of any preacher, Jonah was wildly successful.

According to God, Jonah was successful – he was called to preach repentance and that is what happened.

So in the end, God called, Jonah obeyed, and was successful despite himself.

What can we learn from this?

Success comes in many forms and measures. What one person calls success, another may call failure or not measure at all. So in order to talk more about success, we first need to look at what we are measuring.

In our next post, we will look more into this measure with another figure from Biblical history.

Success for a time – John the Baptist

(This is part 3 of our multipart study on Success in the Bible)

Everyone in Judea at the time of Jesus also knew of John the Baptist. From the conception of John, the local people knew he would be someone special – since his Father had been made mute by the angel Gabriel. And then when he was born and named, his Father could again speak – there was no doubt that he was going to something BIG.

We don’t hear much of John’s life up to about a year before Jesus own ministry began. But we know that ‘The Word of God’ came to John, and he began to preach in earnest.

A quick aside into history, since Malachi there had been no prophet in Israel. That was now over 400 years, and yet some people were expecting something to happen, waiting for the ‘office’ of prophet to again be filled by someone. And when John came on the scene, judging by the reaction of the crowds who went to see him, people thought a prophet had finally returned. In fact, people wondered aloud whether he was the Messiah himself.

He wasn’t a popular preacher by his message, but it was obvious he was a prophet, like the ‘prophets of old’. Take a look at the message he preached – it wasn’t one for the light hearted!

Matthew 3:7-12 (ESV)
But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit in keeping with repentance. And do not presume to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father,’ for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham. Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.

“I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”

John’s popularity and success skyrocketed – he was the talk of all Judea. But this success didn’t last!

John 3:22-30 (ESV)
After this Jesus and his disciples went into the Judean countryside, and he remained there with them and was baptizing. John also was baptizing at Aenon near Salim, because water was plentiful there, and people were coming and being baptized (for John had not yet been put in prison).

Now a discussion arose between some of John’s disciples and a Jew over purification. And they came to John and said to him, “Rabbi, he who was with you across the Jordan, to whom you bore witness—look, he is baptizing, and all are going to him.” John answered, “A person cannot receive even one thing unless it is given him from heaven. You yourselves bear me witness, that I said, ‘I am not the Christ, but I have been sent before him.’ The one who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom’s voice. Therefore this joy of mine is now complete. He must increase, but I must decrease.”

What perspective! John knew that he was here for a time – for a season. There was a reason he was called, there was a reason he grew successful. And yet now that the reason had passed, he was content, as he had been successful.

His measure of success was that he did what he was called to do – then got out of the way.

In the same situation now, many of us would wonder – was that success truly from God? When we are successful in our lives but it ‘moves on’ from us, and we descend back to where we came from, what are our thoughts? Do we struggle and look around for what sin might have caused our fall (which may be the case, but it also may not)? Do we try and change things just a little that our success might continue? Do we run around, looking for help, advice, assistance all in the wrong places, that we might try and bring back the success we once lived? Do we sit back and condemn ourselves for failure, or become depressed because our moment of glory has passed?

Or do we accept that the success was for a time, and it is now time to move on.

What can we learn from John?

Sometimes, success is for a season – it is not any ‘fault’ of ours that the time of success has passed, it is just that the time has passed.

And in truth, sometimes a full measure of success is knowing when the season has ended, and rather than striving against God by trying to become ‘successful’ in our own eyes again, we should accept our new station and move on.

Philippians 4:11-13 (ESV)
Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me.

Philippians 4:4-7 (ESV)
Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand; do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Success – Doing Things the Right Way – The Ark

1 Chronicles 13:5-14 (ESV)

So David assembled all Israel from the Nile of Egypt to Lebo-hamath, to bring the ark of God from Kiriath-jearim. And David and all Israel went up to Baalah, that is, to Kiriath-jearim that belongs to Judah, to bring up from there the ark of God, which is called by the name of the LORD who sits enthroned above the cherubim. And they carried the ark of God on a new cart, from the house of Abinadab, and Uzzah and Ahio were driving the cart. And David and all Israel were celebrating before God with all their might, with song and lyres and harps and tambourines and cymbals and trumpets.

And when they came to the threshing floor of Chidon, Uzzah put out his hand to take hold of the ark, for the oxen stumbled. And the anger of the LORD was kindled against Uzzah, and he struck him down because he put out his hand to the ark, and he died there before God. And David was angry because the LORD had broken out against Uzzah. And that place is called Perez-uzza to this day. And David was afraid of God that day, and he said, “How can I bring the ark of God home to me?” So David did not take the ark home into the city of David, but took it aside to the house of Obed-edom the Gittite. And the ark of God remained with the household of Obed-edom in his house three months. And the LORD blessed the household of Obed-edom and all that he had.

(This is part 4 of our multipart study on Success in the Bible)

When David had ascended to be King of Israel, and moved into Jerusalem as his ‘capital’, he determined to bring the Ark of God to the City.

The Ark was the most Holy symbol in the nation of Israel – it contained the staff of Moses that had budded, the original copy of the 10 commandments and a gold jar of manna. It was a symbol to Israel of who God was, and what He had done for them. It was in essence a visible representation of God on this earth, and when the temple was completed, the Ark was in the holiest place.

It could easily be said that bringing the Ark to Jerusalem was the right thing to do – it was still sitting in ‘limbo’ after it had been captured by the Philistines and returned on a cart. The Ark was always kept with the King, and before that, in the tabernacle of God, all the way back to Moses. Not only David, but all the people of Israel agreed it was the right thing to do. Interestingly, it is specifically noted that Saul (who had shown he liked to do things his own way), did not seek to bring the Ark to its rightful place.

1 Chronicles 13:3-4 (ESV)
Then let us bring again the ark of our God to us, for we did not seek it in the days of Saul.” All the assembly agreed to do so, for the thing was right in the eyes of all the people.

So what was wrong then? The people, with a good heart and clear conscience decided to do the right thing, gathered, and bring the ark to themselves. But they failed. To find out why, let’s see what happened when they finally succeeded….

1 Chronicles 15:11-15 (ESV)
Then David summoned the priests Zadok and Abiathar, and the Levites Uriel, Asaiah, Joel, Shemaiah, Eliel, and Amminadab, and said to them, “You are the heads of the fathers’ houses of the Levites. Consecrate yourselves, you and your brothers, so that you may bring up the ark of the LORD, the God of Israel, to the place that I have prepared for it. Because you did not carry it the first time, the LORD our God broke out against us, because we did not seek him according to the rule.” So the priests and the Levites consecrated themselves to bring up the ark of the LORD, the God of Israel. And the Levites carried the ark of God on their shoulders with the poles, as Moses had commanded according to the word of the LORD.

Why did they fail the first time? Because there was a specific way the Ark was meant to be treated. There was a specific procedure. In their first attempt, whilst they had the zeal to bring the Ark, they took no regard for how it was to be taken. They decided to do things their own way – and ironically, they did it the same way the Philistines had dealt with the Ark, rather than how God had specified they move it.

So when they finally did it the right way, they were successful.

What does this mean for me?

There is often a right and wrong way to do things. I am sure you can think of things in your life you could do and fix right now – but you would have to cut corners. You would have to not do things the right way, but your own.

Let me share from my own life right now. I have a small amount of credit card debt – it’s not massive, but I wish it wasn’t there none the less. In fact, I could have paid it off easily last year, with change, had I reduced my giving to God. But I believe I am called to tithe – to give out of the first fruits of what I earn to God, as recognition that He is in control, and He is the one to provide. Maybe some would argue the debt is bad and I should deal with it – but I would also argue that it is right I do it the right way, by continuing to honor God first, and deal with my own self-created problems second… I know God will ensure that it gets dealt with, properly, in his time. I will be successful – but I need to do it right.

So. If you want God to be on your side, you need to first do it right. How can you apply this to your life?

Success in all the Wrong Places

Philippians 3:4-6 (ESV)
Though I myself have reason for confidence in the flesh also. If anyone else thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless.

Sometimes we can have amazing success – but in all the wrong places.

(This is part 5 of our multipart study on Success in the Bible)

Many of you will know the story of Saul of Tarsus – the same Saul we know as Paul the Apostle to the gentiles. Saul had significant ‘worldly’ success in his chosen field, that of being a Jewish Pharisee.

For a start, he was born of the tribe of Benjamin – the only tribe other than Judah that stayed faithful to King David when Israel was splintered. Sometimes being born into the right place or in the right family can make all the difference – Saul was. Not only was he a Pharisee, the most ‘strict’ sect of the Jewish religion, he was from a family of Pharisees (Acts 23:6). He was educated not in Tarsus where he was born, not in some outskirts of Judea, but in Jerusalem, under the renowned teacher Gamaliel – one of the most influential Rabbis of his time (he also appears in Acts 5).

So Saul had the birth, the upbringing, the lineage and the education to be a success. Added to that, he was zealous for his ‘religion’, to the point that he was one of the key persecutors of the early Christian Church.

Yes, Saul of Tarsus was a successful Pharisee. Even had he not been converted, I have no doubt he would still be remembered for his zeal and success in persecution of the church.

But, Saul of Tarsus met Jesus. After all this success as a Pharisee, he finally realised that his success was not in the right places, but in the wrong. Let’s take a look at what Paul the Apostle continued to write after his testimony above.

Philippians 3:8-14 (ESV)
Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.

Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect, but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

Paul realized his success was in the wrong places, and counted all of that success ‘as loss’. He then made it is goal to have true success, by aligning his life to what God wanted.

And you know what? After that, I am sure he was thought a failure by his old buddies back among the Pharisees. But we know he wasn’t – he reached thousands in his life for Jesus personally, thousands more directly with his letters, and finally millions upon millions with the record of that in the Bible. Depending on how you count it, Paul wrote 13 or 14 of the 27 books in the New Testament – an amazing testimony of success in two places – firstly in the wrong place, then finally in the right place.