Recently, I met an entertaining, older, still in love, married couple. They were discussing home repairs. The wife said their neighbor had a hole in their garage floor. The husband decided a simple patch would work. Innocently enough, the wife asked, “Do you attach it to the concrete?” Without skipping a beat, the husband said “No, it just hovers there in midair.” The room erupted in laughter.
A floating patch? Funny, but absurd. The patch will only be affective if it’s firmly attached to the existing foundation. Some people’s view of success is as absurd as our science-fiction, repair job. They expect success to materialize out of thin air disregarding the need for any underlying foundation.
Society’s beliefs on success are craptastically, ridiculous myths perpetuated by Disney and Hollywood. They peddle the lie that belief, not hard work, is the foundation for accomplishment. Care to petition an astronomical ball of plasma to determine your future? “Wish upon a star” y’all? Keep up! Success doesn’t magically happen. It is rooted in determination and hard work, not in the religion of Wishcraft. The most, high-tech, motion sensing light switch requires movement for activation.
As a kid, I was conditioned to believe that success and a $70,000 salary were synonymous. When I surrendered my life to Jesus as an adult, I was forced to ask myself, “How should I define success as a Christian?” Over the years I tried to answer that question many different ways. It was one simple conversation with God that set me straight. One day, while sitting in front of my house, God spoke to me. “What if life isn’t about your ministry, this house, or what you can do for Me? What if life is about You and I?”
“That IS what it’s all about God,” I said. God was taking me back to basics. It was my Aha moment. More of Him. Less of me, me, me. We were created to be in relationship with God, not enslaved to earthly success. The measure of Christian success is surrender to Jesus. It is a consistent pursuit of obedience leading to the fulfillment of scripture. “Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.”- Matthew 6:33. “Obedience is better than sacrifice.” - 1 Samuel 15:22
Recently, I was chatting with one of the guys I mentor. Our mentoring sessions are loosely written. We catch up, pray for the Holy Spirit to lead and see what He says. This particular day my friend was expressing some disappointment with the level of accomplishment in his life. Disappointment can often result when we compare our lives to others. Sometimes we get caught in crosshairs of worldly success vs. spiritual success. The Holy Spirit gave me an idea. I asked my friend to get his journal. We began dialoguing about what God had done in his life over the past few months. We needed to write it down. Start a list. Create a visual testimony of his spiritual success. As his mentor, I view his accomplishments objectively and en masse, taking note of continuity and growth. He views them in a linear fashion. He finishes one task and he’s on to the next thing. But what if the next thing doesn’t happen for a while? If we have nothing to stand on to get to the next step, we are as stable as that floating patch in the Jetson’s garage.
Initially, he didn’t understood my madness, but as he gained illumination, joy ensued. He realized that I was encouraging him to acknowledge all that God had accomplished in his life. The list served as a physical record of spiritual success: cultivating gratitude toward God, combatting satan’s lies and cataloging my friend’s steps from gay life to God life. If scripture says do it, we do it obediently and scripture is fulfilled. That constitutes spiritual success. Huge success in the Christian walk is measured by the tiniest steps of obedience and surrender.
As we compiled the list, we sought out scripture that testified of my friend’s obedience. When we first begin to meet, my mentee had a strained relationship with his father. He began to pray and take action to strengthen their relationship, fulfilling Malachi 4:6 - “And He will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers”. My friend then shared about an answered prayer for healing and Psalm 34:4 came to mind, “I sought the Lord, and He heard me.” His mom had cancer. He was the only one who could help her. He served her tirelessly and compassionately fulfilling Exodus 20:12, “Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you.”
When I left my gay life for Jesus, success was measured one day at a time. I didn’t have sex today. Success. I didn’t get drunk. Success. I didn’t look at pornography. You get the picture. I was so steeped in sin and sexuality, that stopping bad behavior was my first measure of spiritual success. Success was measured by abstaining from bad deeds, rather than doing good ones.
If the idea of celebrating small, moderate successes seems confusing, head to the bottom of a staircase and look up. Each stair gets you one step closer to the goal of getting upstairs. Each stair is a solid foundation to get to the next. Growth is similar. Every step towards God can be registered as a spiritual success. I remember a song that said, “Count your blessings. Name them ONE BY ONE. Count your many blessings. See what God has done.”
Are you in spiritual limbo my friends? Feel stuck? Has the enemy distracted you from spiritual success with the allure of worldly success? Are you living a lackluster life? Do you compare your accomplishments with everyone else’s? Comparison is like walking yourself to the guillotine and pulling the cord.
Over the next week, create your own list of spiritual successes. Take stock of what God has accomplished through your surrender. Then once you have your list, begin to ask the Holy Spirit for confirmation in scripture. God is at work in your life. Satan wants to convince you otherwise. If you answered yes to any of the questions above, you owe it to yourself to start your list. As my friend Adam would say, count your many blessings precious. See what God has done!
