Success... What is it ?

The world struggles to define “success” apart from monetary wealth. Even if it recognizes the skill or talent of a man - be he an artist or musician or craftsman - his success is measured in terms of related financial returns.

Success in the Eternal Kingdom is measured by a very different rule than success in the Earthly Kingdom.

Because the Eternal Kingdom and the Earthly Kingdom share a common language , how easily the Earthly meaning of a word is transferred to take on the same meaning in the Eternal Kingdom.

Sometimes it is a good thing to take an about turn, and go back to square one! Clear the mind’s table and take a fresh look at a word and its meaning !
The word to be examined ?
“Success”

What DOES God say about success? How does it look when its meaning is lifted directly off the pages of God’s written Word?

Taking the original Hebrew and Greek word meanings for the words that are translated into our English scripture as synonyms for the word SUCCESS , I paraphrased them - thereby finding a way to clarify my understanding of the word in God’s terms. ( I have included Strong's ref. numbers in brackets)

According to God………

* Success cannot be attained without effort and the effort given must be powered by a will to reach the desired end – which is ‘to do rightly’. No thought of failure can be entertained.
(H202)

* Success shines with the beauty, the joy, the very sweetness of whole-hearted righteousness. (H319)

* Success defines the borders of possessing an ordered place, a place gained by the right of inheritance. (H3423)

* Success demands a high standard. It is found on a highway paved with righteousness itself.
(H3787)

* Success is a worthy goal- obtain it, get it, establish it, make it solid and proclaim it publicly when you attain it ! (H6329, 6965)

* Success is measured by wisdom – the getting of it, the teaching of it, the learning of it. Having an understanding of God’s Word that works itself into the lived-out life , its behaviour and speech and deeds.
(H7919,7922)

* Success evidences itself in a life-style of peace, of a happy, cheerful countenance born out of a place of security and safety.
(H7951)

* Success does also encompass financial blessings, but as a by-product only. Along the life-journey in pursuit of success there may be ‘help along the way’, in the form of monetary blessings to enable you to serve others.
(G2137)

* In the pursuit of success there is the temptation to turn aside – reaching for what has the appearance of substance…but alas the end result will be vanity… empty of all expected gain!
(G3155)

* In the pursuit of true success there is God’s promise to spur the traveller on !! Victory ! The goal reached! Success achieved ! Reward waiting !!
(G3529)

Do the following two verses not clearly reflect God's intended path for us to follow to find 'success' ?
Mat 6:33 “But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.”

Jos 1:8 “This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate in it day and night, that you may observe to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success. “

I think I always knew what I discovered in the above study, but it is really helpful to go over even familiar territory. Re-examining something usually reveals something previously overlooked.
I love how God is clear on what He deems ‘success’ to be. It is seeking righteousness and doing rightly according to His ways.

I really loved this part of ‘success’ ….. Success shines with the beauty, the joy, the very sweetness of whole-hearted righteousness.

I was also surprised by the fact that in God’s definition of ‘success’ , material wealth was a ‘by product’ of the pursuit of success. Isn’t that just like Satan to take what God intended as a by product and make it the main focus ?

Viewing ‘success’ through God’s eyes… the pursuit and attainment of righteousness….. puts us all on a level playing field. We are all in the same starting line, with the same opportunities and abilities to reach our goal of being successful and reaping the eternal rewards that we all desire, along with the praise of God !

Maybe the conclusion of my study is aptly summarized by Paul in II Cor. 10:17 “But He who glories, let him glory in the Lord”.
This is a quote from my favourite passage in Jer. 9:23,24

“Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, let not the mighty man glory in this migh, nor let the rich man glory in his riches, but let him who glories glory in this, that he understands and knows Me, that I am the Lord, exercising lovingkindness, judgment and righteousness in the earth, For in these I delight, says the Lord.”

Faithful

Faithfulness is an attribute I admire most.
I have two plants that make me smile because they picture for me this characteristic .

One is a little pansy plant that I planted last spring. It didn’t really do very well… but I let it struggle along… All the other plants in my planter did their winter thing.. either dying as annuals or going dormant until spring.
All except this little pansy, it held to life and bloom covered in snow , drenched under days-on-end rain, endured the freezing cold.
Then, when spring finally came it exploded with the life it had clung to through difficult times . When I look at it , I have to smile !
I see faithfulness mirrored in each tiny, pansy face.

The other plant is my rabbit’s foot plant. I have had it for 15 years.

I admired a older friend’s plant and she , pleased that I liked a plant her daughters hated , gave me two little cuttings she had started in pots. She has since gone to be with the Lord, but I still have the plants she gave me and I love them reminding me of her !
They also remind me of faithfulness. This fern is amazing. I do NOT have a green thumb so if plants thrive under my care .. it is IN SPITE of me and not BECAUSE of me.
At times I have forgotten to water this fern to the point of it having no fronds on it at all.. It really looks completely dead ! But I , feeling guilt ridden , water it anyway and it always comes back.. bigger and more beautiful than before !! How faithful to its God-given life!

I was thinking about the word ‘faithful’ the other day .... and my thoughts formed an acrostic of the word expressing the whys of why 'faithful' is so important to me.

1. It has a quality of ‘Forever’. If faithful is temporary then it is no longer faithful. I love things that are solid and trustworthy and ‘without end’. Faithful is that to me… be it in marriage relationships, friendships, or family. And how wonderful that our God calls Himself the Faithful One.

Deu 7:9 "Know therefore that the LORD thy God, he is God, the faithful God, which keepeth covenant and mercy with them that love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations"

2. I love the word ‘Abiding’ connected to faithful. Here we have the picture of something ever-present. Isn’t that what Jesus is to us ?

Joh 15:10 "If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father's commandments, and abide in his love."

3. Faithful encompasses ‘Intimacy’. Faithful means committed to – as in knowing- being compassionately heart-connected !

Heb 5:2 "Who (Jesus) can have compassion on the ignorant, and on them that are out of the way; for that he himself also is compassed with infirmity."

4. For something/someone to be faithful, it has to be built on something solid, something that can be Trusted. How sweet to know that we can trust in the ‘character’, the Name of Jesus.

Mat 12:21 "And in his name shall the Gentiles trust."

5. Have you ever thought that for faithful to be true it must be Humble? Think of it…. would not the slightest hint of pride not tempt the faithful one to turn away from the one he was faithful to and toward himself?
Jesus came as the humble servant of man to show us the way we should live .. and He leaves us His promise.

Jas 4:10 "Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up."

6. The beauty of faithful is such that it is ‘Faultless’. Have you ever seen a bird sitting on the road beside its fallen mate? Does your heart not wrench in sorrowful compassion for the faithful bird so reluctant to desert its mate even in death? Could you find fault with the bird ? I don’t know how you could…. Faithful encompasses a quality of faultless, because faithful is so directly focused on that to which it is faithful !
If we are faithful to Jesus and to His Word, shall we not also stand faultless before Him ?

Jud 1:24 "Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy"

7. Faithful is tenacious.. it is ‘Undeterred’. No evil may tempt it, no pleasure deceive it, no changing circumstances alter it . It is forever true ! Our God will not change.. He is forever the same .. and His Words are forever faithful and true !!!!

Rev 22:6 "And he said unto me, These sayings are faithful and true"

8. What good would faithful be if it were not the expression of Love ? Faithful expresses the proof of love .. expresses the depth of love … expresses the security of love.

1Co 13:4 "Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up;
does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil;
does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth;
bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never fails" It is faithful !

Have you checked the level of your faithfulness lately?
Is it the forever kind? The kind built on love?
Can your loved ones – spouse, friends, family count on you to be faithful? Can God?

A Day of Broken Connections

I thought yesterday was going to be an ordinary day ! In fact, I was looking forward to it because I had no commitments or appointments. It was a free-day!

By morning, I knew I had come down with a miserable cold… my throat hurt, I had a hacking cough, my sinuses were stuffed, and my nose was running !

I got up, slipped into my comfy chair to enjoy the pleasurable distraction of my computer.
What greeted me was a black screen. Nothing I did would entice it be anything but unresponsive !

I could not turn on the TV instead. We are in the process of switching our TV signal from satellite back to cable….as a result do not at present have access to TV programming.

Radio signals here are blocked by the mountains so the static crackling reception of the few stations we get is far too aggravating to listen to.

I wanted to make some phone calls .. and was told that the numbers could not be reached. This has never happened before, but I learned that the private company with which we have our long distance plan was having problems with its systems and consequently I could make only local calls. Most of my calls are long distance.

Hmmmm… mix the above ingredients and stew for five minutes and you come up with a miserable day !! Right ?? Wrong !!

I have learned in my years of walking with the Lord that if I look into my cup and see that it is at best only half full… I know the Lord just isn’t finished pouring yet !!!

I placed an SOS phone call to my tech friends in Mississippi and Benji said it was most probably the video card that had failed.

My dear husband was quite willing to go buy me another one and came home with a high end graphics card that was marked down from $235.00 to $69.00. We really needed a better video card than we had because we wanted to connect our TV to our computer. I was thrilled with the ‘deal’ !! But alas it was a faulty card and kept shutting my computer down. So back it went and Vic bought an even better card !! By this afternoon, a day and a half later, my computer was up and running again, better than it was before !

I have found that I don’t really miss the TV, or the radio too much and I could probably live with restricted phone lines but I cannot live without my computer! So being able to get back online today more than delighted me.

And my cold ? Oh yes… it is miserable and I had to postpone an anticipated visit today with a dear friend … but when you have a chronic disease that you will have for the rest of your life.. having a cold that lasts a few days and is gone, is hardly worth griping about !!

But something really grabbed me when I stood in my kitchen yesterday and realized that I had no computer, no TV, no radio and no phone. I felt so totally disconnected. I thought back to what it was like before we had all these technical resouces connecting us with the whole world. If we had to go back to only snail mail... how limited we would be .. how totally cut off !!

Our world has become very small and we have more options to stay connected to one another today than at any other time in history !

I thought about how eager I was to get everything fixed. It was, in fact, the most consuming focus of my day.

Then I wondered …………

We are immediately distraught when we lose our connection with each other.
But do we feel the same about losing our connection with God?
There are several ways God provided for us to be 'connected' - if any one of them is broken do we immediately notice and focus on 'fixing' it?

Are we careful to keep our Christian fellowships strong?
Heb 10:25 "Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching."


Do we keep our heart in a constant prayer mode ??
1Th 5:17 "Pray without ceasing."

Do we remember to be thankful in everything??
Th 5:18 "In everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you."

Do we love to read God’s Words to us as eagerly as we read our e-mails?
Jos 1:8 "This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate in it day and night, that you may observe to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success."

Do we feel that we are in ‘peril’ when we realize our communication with God is interrupted ? Do we panic and immediately make every effort to reconnect as quickly as possible ?
Jud 1:21 "Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life."

Let's remind ourselves today how important it is to take every care to keep our 'Eternal Kingdom' connections strong and secure.
God created us to be in fellowship with each other… but first of all to be in close fellowship with Him !

God's Links of Purpose

Two fathers were walking through a park, that was filled with the things that delight a child’s eyes …..brightly painted rides, games and play stations. As the fathers walked through the park, each was followed by a child. One child was easily distracted , his eyes big at the sights and sounds around him. He was pulled to the right and the left. The other child was blind.
Which child do you think would still be following closely at his father’s heals when the father reached the other end of the park?
The blind child, of course, right?

In a very real sense we are blind as we follow our Shepherd Guide through the mazes of this life. We cannot see into the future and often cannot make sense of the past. But I believe God hinders us for our own good. It is easier to follow when we do not know where we are going. But how quickly we sometimes become discouraged wondering if there is a purpose to the things we experience.
Once in a while God parts the curtains and gives us a glimpse ….and sometimes lets us see more than just bits and pieces…He lets us see the connecting links of our experiences and how the thread of them weaves into His story, His purpose and plan.

I have such a story to tell. I tell it because it is through sharing our experiences that we encourage one another….. and I LOVE to encourage YOU !!!

My story’s first link ….. or perhaps I should rephrase that - I doubt there is a first link in God’s woven masterpiece that covers all of time.
The first link in my story as God has allowed me to see it - revealed itself in the fall of 2006.
I got a surprise phone call from a cousin I had not spoken to in several years. Even though we grew up knowing each other because our mothers were sisters, she was much younger than I and that of course meant we never ‘played together’ and had never developed a relationship as adults.
Lovella had a purpose in her call. Not only did she want to inform me of her newly found passion – blogging – but she was quite convinced that I should start a blog too. The thought scared me… open myself up to the big bad world in outer space? I tried to put her off , but she was rather insistent. Finally, just to satisfy her I said I would think about it and maybe start one at the end of the year. She seemed satisfied with that and I hung up thinking that was the end of it.
The thought did intrigue me though, since I was missing teaching ….and needed an outlet for my thoughts. An idea of doing a devotional blog began to grow but I was too nervous about the technical aspects about it to seriously consider it.
Lovella called me again around Christmas time . She wasted no time in getting to the point. “Well, it’s the end of the year. Have you started your blog yet?”
I was caught. I couldn’t go back on my word. I said I didn’t know how to start it. She very quickly told her she would help me.
So… she did and I did and I managed to publish one post a couple of days before 2006 closed.

How much I enjoyed the opportunity of having an outlet for my thoughts and my blog quickly became my passion.

The next link clicked into place in July of 2007. We had gone on vacation to Jasper and I left a little note on my blog invited my blog friends to make themselves at home while I was away to help themselves to the tea I had left. I apologized that it was cold. There was a little comment left on that post about how being from the deep south, cold tea was her forte. I smiled and immediately felt drawn to the commenter… Tammie. She somehow had stumbled on my blog – how exactly we have never been able to determine.

Another link clicked into place a month later when Carolanne in Australia decided to have a contest for her readers, a post on a place we would like to take her. Carolanne awarded me one of the prizes – the choice of one of her professional quality photos, enlarged and mailed to me.
As I pondered over the difficult decision of which photo to choose, my choice was focused on which one I could tie into a devotional post. As I prayerfully considered, one photo suddenly jumped out at me and the devotional thought with it. Without hesitation I choose the photo of a bridge.


The resulting post connected to the next link … Tammie was struggling with something in her life that that post gave an answer too and she left me a very sweet comment. That comment in turn so encouraged me … because I had been wondering if my humble words had any worth attached to them. Isn’t it neat that when you are doing what God wants you to do, He will not let you get too discouraged? Always He brings something across your path that gives you strength to continue !!
Because her comment so encouraged me I followed her to her blog and her e-mail address and left her a personal note.

From the very first we felt a strong out-of-the-ordinary drawing one to the other . We began an e-mail correspondence that quickly revealed to us how much we had in common even though we came from very different worlds. I was so disappointed when I found that she lived in the far south eastern corner of the USA in Mississippi and I lived in the south western corner of BC--- we were 3000 miles apart.
We quickly discovered that we both loved to study the scriptures and that began many hours of studying it together on line .. first by e-mail then by live chat. When we discovered that Tammie could call for free.. we also added the telephone to our lines of communication.
To our ongoing surprise we found that we thought and felt the same about many things and shared many life experiences. Early on in our budding friendship, we both suspected the other of playing copycat in her responses.
Then, we began to talk about wishing we could meet in person . At first it was only an impossible dream …. But then one day Tammie said… “I think I know a way !”
It was their 25th wedding anniversary year and she decided that instead of the cruise her husband offered her , she would rather come to Canada, a place they had never visited.
To make a long story short …. That is what happened … The pieces miraculously fell into place and we began to look forward to May, which was the only time that all necessary pieces fit. So we took it God had His hand on those two weeks !!

Then…. the links continued ….. We joyfully accepted the two weeks shared vacation as an usual gift from our Father’s hand .. but very quickly the ‘links’ continued far beyond our personal interest.


Benji and Tammie have had a ministry for some time – working in revivals with Benji both speaking and providing special music.
I ..began to wonder if Benji would be willing to sing in our church the first Sunday they would be in Canada. I contacted our home church and told them we had friends visiting from Mississippi and directed them to their ministry web page .
I received a very favourable affirmative reply and the details were worked out.

For some God-reason (smile) Tammie was struck with the idea that perhaps there might be some outreach missions work in our area that they could connect with while they were here.
To our great surprise Tammie discovered that indeed there is a work in Vancouver supported financially and hands-on by the Southern Baptist churches in her home area. The outreach director in Mississippi put her in contact with Janet , the contact person in Vancouver. In speaking with Tammie , Janet immediately put her in touch with Pastor Rick in Surrey. Pastor Rick responded by inviting Benji to minister in his church by leading the music part of the service and singing the second Sunday of their time in BC.

We had many excited conversations about our impending time together… I remember the day I off handed asked Tammie what Rick’s last name was.
When she told me, I almost fell off my chair… Stunned, I realized that we knew Rick personally. We knew him as a friend of my then not-yet son-in-law, before Rick was even a Christian . Years and a wife and children later, Rick was ordained as the pastor of Gateway Baptist Church . We were there at his ordination, but had not seen him since.

Now years later , we were being connected again.
How we enjoyed the Sunday in his church. We were so blessed and so enjoyed the multi-cultural diversity of his flock. And yet we were so connected by one Spirit. The Lord was so present that morning.

There was also a day arranged by Janet to tour the work going on in Vancouver. Benji and Tammie both were moved and feel that God is opening doors for them that they never would have dreamed of !! There are decisions to make and a time of waiting to see what God has in mind but definitely God is calling them to broaden their ministry.

There were sooo many indications the two weeks we were together that this was not just a vacation, but a time planned by God for things we do not yet fully see.

What is abundantly clear is that God had far reaching thoughts and plans when Lovella made that phone call to a cousin she had not spoken to in years. We are all watching … God certainly has our awed attention !!
There were sooo many indications the two weeks we were together that this was not just a vacation, but a time planned by God for things we do not yet fully see.

One thing that I love about how God’s kingdom works is that every person who supplies a link in His plan or purposes has an equal reward. How that knowledge should motivate us toward being diligent and faithful to be the link that God has need of .. be it ever so seemingly insignificant at the time.

“ And he who reaps receives wages, and gathers fruit for eternal life, that both he who sows and he who reaps may rejoice together.
For in this the saying is true: 'One sows and another reaps. “ (John 4:26,27)