I have been bombarded on the subject of Leadership over the past week. It started when a friend of mine gave me a really good book
It’s a good subject to be concentrating on because everyone is a leader in some way. Whether it is at home in their families, out in the work place, or in their neighborhoods everyone has some level influence and is in fact leading someone somewhere.
The single juiciest nugget I’ve gotten out of all this so far was in our pastor’s message yesterday when he shared his definition of success.
Success is having those closest to me respect me the most.
That’s a really good definition. The people who are closest to us see us more clearly than anyone else. We can fool someone we meet in a business meeting, or the guys in the office, or even (especially?) the folks at church.
But our family and those closest to us see the real us, warts and all. If they respect you in spite of those bumps and warts then you truly are successful, regardless of how others might see you.
How about you, are you successful?
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I think that success is getting the most out of what God has given you.
David, I’m interested in what you mean by “getting the most out of.” Can you elaborate?
One of my pastor’s favorite sayings is “Obedience is Success”. The more I play this concept through, the more I love it. This, of course, is based on the premise that we can hear God. Which I do believe we can (far far easier and more often than we give God credit for). It’s far less mystical and illusive than we make it out to be.
So if we hear God, and do what he says… we are assured success. It costs us less in seminar fees, gives us more time (once we stop watching Dr. Phil for helpful nuggets), now it might put Maxwell out of business, but taking directives from the source ensures success. Since where He is, is where the reward that we’re striving for is kept.
Obedience IS success.
Dave
Dave, I hear you. The Bible seems pretty clear that God likes it when people do what He says.
But let me ask a question.
If obedience = success then how do we keep the way we relate with God from becoming simply following a list of do’s and don’ts?
I mean that’s the way so many people do see Christianity. How is Christianity different than that?
Because in my experience with “hearing God”, what He speaks is more that rules. It’s more than do’s and dont’s. It’s not a “don’t go to the movies… what if I come back?” (STILL ONE OF MY FAV’S!)
It’s vibrant, creative, eye-openning to the spiritual/physical realities within which we live. He guides us into places where we are allowed to take faith steps, that are within His will. And truthfully, where He directs us… is… GET THIS… not always the same. His principles don’t change, but there are times that He offends our minds to reveal our hearts.
In fact, it’s the ultimate in the destruction of Do’s and Dont’s destruction
So obeying God is a lot more than can be boiled down into rule keeping. It’s harder, more interesting, exciting, challenging, unnatural, and sometimes even more frightening than any list of rules ever could be.
And that’s because God is a person, with all the complicated dynamics that come along with relating to another person. Relating to God can be messy and confusing at times, just like relationships with anyone else.
Dave, since you put forward that success comes from obedience to God, how do you respond to someone who does what they hear God saying and yet still meets with failure?
I just wrote put this in my Blog. This is 1 Corinthians 4: 9-13 in The Message
“It seems to me that God has put us who bear his Message on stage in a theater in which no one wants to buy a ticket. We’re something everyone stands around and stares at, like an accident in the street. We’re the Messiah’s misfits. You might be sure of yourselves, but we live in the midst of frailties and uncertainties. You might be well-thought-of by others, but we’re mostly kicked around. Much of the time we don’t have enough to eat, we wear patched and threadbare clothes, we get doors slammed in our faces, and we pick up odd jobs anywhere we can to eke out a living. When they call us names, we say, “God bless you.” When they spread rumors about us, we put in a good word for them. We’re treated like garbage, potato peelings from the culture’s kitchen. And it’s not getting any better.”
Point being that success is not measured with what we measure it with. We’re social misfits that use invisable curency. We only ever see a bit of the picture. Too many of us get discouraged that God’s word came back void because of the perseption of WORLDLY FAILURE… but that’s why success IS obedience… because success has nothing to do with what we can see
Good stuff, Dave, for sure. Folks should head over to your blog and get the rest of that post.
So if success is has nothing to do with what we can see, then how can we measure it? Someone as compettitive as I am needs to have some way to measure how he’s doing.
When I’m in an environment where there is no standard by which to rate my efforts I quickly lose interest.
Likewise if I were to calculate my success based solely on my obedience to the things of God I would get overwhelmingly discouraged because I never quite measure up to a perfect standard. It would very quickly turn to heartless, hopeless drudgery for me.
What would you say to someone who is compettitive and hungers for a challenge, but one that has a hope of actually being met? What should equal success for people like that?
Ha… not to hog the “comments” portion of your blog here Chris, but I find this line of discussion fascinating.
First of all, I believe this is an area that I thrive in, because of my own personal gifting. I function strongly in the Apostolic and the Prophet areas of ministry. So to me, speaking what isn’t into creation and going where other’s havn’t is spiritually fullfilling… even though I see no physical results. It’s fullfilling because I’m hard wired that way.
The same that an Evangelist gets giddy at Salavation. I know those that would call BOTH of us heritics (I’m exaggerating of course) for not saying that success was about how many you’ve brought into the kingdom. To Pastors, see people comforted and grow is a measuring stick… and so forth.
I also think that since God knows who we are… He’ll show us enough to sustain us. He knows and gives us the desires of our hearts. But even if we go back to what you had written in your origional blog that “Success is having those closest to me respect me the most”, that is a by-product of obedience. We see the world through the “Gifting Goggles”. What drives us is different, what satisfy’s is different, what encourages us is different.
Don’t worry about hogging comments. Blogging is about conversation!
I’m just thinking about someone who might be reading and wants to learn about success but doesn’t know diddly about Jesus or Christianity. How would that person understand what you said? i.e. obedience IS success. Would he look at is as meaning a following a list of rules?
I like to see things explained without all the “churchy” words, so I keep asking questions. I can get a bit obnoxious about it.
I meant to toss out a link to your blog, Big Ear Creations (Catchy name!). You’ve got a buch of stuff to make a person think there.
What I mean is that we all have a certain number of days on this earth. By maximizing those moments and walking in line with what God has for us to do is successful living to me.
It can’t be defined by money or status. It is truly making the impact that only we can make.
What has He placed you on this earth for?
If you never find out you’ll never really be successful
So David, you measure success by how effectively we do what we were meant to do in the limited time we have here, right?
I agree with you that everyone can make a difference in their world.
But why is it so few ever find what they were meant to do and really make that impact?
Two months ago I hired a business coach. I left my job at a university a year ago after 10 years of service. In this year I have been trying to figure out what my purpose in life is and how to fulfill it. My business coach gave me the assignment to define success. Thus, in my search for how others define it, I came across this site.
When looking at others I define it by the clothes they wear, cars they drive, houses they own and socio-economic status. I guess that is why the thought of being a stay at home mom has not appealed to me.
I am now being challenged to determine how I determine success for myself in order that I might have a measuring stick for my life and a way to determine if my next career step will bring me this elusive feeling.
I am undergoing a paradigm shift. I suppose that it could be summed up from the Chariots of Fire dialog when Eric says, “but God made me to run fast, and when I run I feel His pleasure.” Perhaps success is doing that which God purposed for us to do that we might experience His pleasure and thereby glorify Him. If our work truly is our worship, I guess I ought to be about the business of not searching out financial gain, thought it may follow, but of seeking that which pleasures the King and makes me feel most alive.
Jennifer, I think you are very much on to something. Finding that thing that brings pleasure to the King and makes us feel most alive, and doing it to our utmost seems to me to be a really good definition of success.
And I agree that our financial status should not be a defining measure of our success. Solomon was successful and extraordinarily wealthy. The nation of Israel expanded to its furthest unified reach under him.
In contrast John the Baptist was extremely poor yet Jesus said he was the greatest prophet who ever lived.
I guess it all depends on what God has called us personally to.
I started a new blog this week to explore the subject of success in more depth. If you want to check it out you can go over to SuccessCREEations.com.