Success

How do you define your success? Do you set definite goals and targets for you to meet? Do you need to be somewhere you weren't a year ago? Do you have the need to be recognized as a great person or leader by others? Do you need followers? Do you need people to acknowledge that what you say is good and true and validate your ideas and existence? Do you need to feed or serve to a certain amount to make you a better person? What defines your success?

Do you even know what it is you need to achieve success as? We look at what we want to do and measure our success by worldly standards. If you look at a man like Noah, Noah was an excellent shipbuilder, but that wasn’t his main profession – Noah was a preacher. In worldly standards we would have called him a terrible failure as a preacher, 7 converts in 120 years (all family members) - not a good track record. He was a failure by worldly standards. Also look at Jeremiah, great preacher – no results though. He fell out with all the religious crowds, fell out with royalty and weren’t all too popular with the plain folks either. The only one he seemed to please was God.

Same with Jesus, He was also such a failure by worldly standards – He never printed a book, didn’t build a school for the blind, didn’t organize a church group or a bible study or do any of the things we see as a necessity to ensure our wellbeing and high standing in the world (or even in the church). He preached for 3 years, healed and fed thousands and yet when it was over, He had no one left and appeared to but a few after He was resurrected. He was denied and betrayed by those closest to Him, all men forsook Him and fled. He was a failure by every worldly standard.

But by Godly standard He was GOD. He had a different measure of success than we do as people. Should we not rather try to measure up to His standard of success?

We view people as successful when they can get the job done. We need to figure out by what standard of success we measure our lives and our ministries. 

A pastor I listened to a while ago asked the question, “Is God and end or is He a means?”

And also "Are we serving men in the name of God or serving God in the name of men?"