Feb. 09, 2025

When my daughter was in High School, she wanted to go to college.  So, in her Junior and Senior years, we did college tours.  We visited state schools and private schools, in-state schools and out-of-state schools.  When she graduated High School, she left for college.  She took the risk and went to college.  She moved out.  She took courses.  She made new friends.  You could say her desire to go to college radically changed her life.

I want you to keep that in mind when I read this scripture to you.  Jesus’ brother James wrote this.

James 1:17 So you see, faith by itself isn’t enough. Unless it produces good deeds, it is dead and useless… 19 You say you have faith, for you believe that there is one God. Good for you! Even the demons believe this, and they tremble in terror. 20 How foolish! Can’t you see that faith without good deeds is useless? NLT  

James is saying, that if you believe in God and it doesn’t disrupt your life, demons do that too.  That’s pretty clear.  But isn’t that our temptation in our relationship with God?  Aren’t we tempted to have a belief in God while at the same time struggle to surrender all of our lives to God?  We want to secure a spot in heaven, but we just don’t want to make a lot of intentional choices.  It would be like my daughter saying, ‘I want to go to college’ but she does nothing about it.  Instead, she decides to never leave home.  She tells others about her desire to go to college, but she never takes a class and never makes new friends.  She stays home and never takes the risk to go to college.  That would be weird – right?  I think that’s what it is like when someone says, ‘I’m a Christian but it hasn’t disrupted my life in any way.’

In last week’s talk, Sam shared with us a ferocious quote.

“Beware of presuming you are saved. If your heart is renewed, if you hate the things you once loved and love the things you once hated, if you have really repented, if there is a thorough change of mind within you, then you have reason to rejoice.  But if there is no vital change, no inward godliness, no love to God, no prayer, no work of the Holy Spirit, then the statement, “I am saved” is only your own assertion, and it may delude you, but it will not deliver you.” Charles Spurgeon

We must wrestle with the question, has my love, my faith, for Jesus disrupted my life?  Specifically, over the last couple of weeks we have asked, ‘Has my faith in Jesus disrupted my view of the Bible, God’s grace, worship, and choices?’  Today I’m excited to ask you a new question.  ‘Has my faith in Jesus disrupted my view of success?’  One of the challenges we face as Christians is, we live in a culture that is radically different than God’s kingdom.  Today, I want you to wrestle with the question, ‘What is success to me?’  Here’s why.  How you answer that question will determine how you live.  If you think success is how the world describes it, you will pursue what the world has to offer.  If you think success is the way Jesus defines it, you will pursue the things of God.

I want us to stop and read scripture and think through, what is success in the kingdom of God?  Three scriptures.

Matthew 20:26 If one of you wants to be great, you must be the servant of the rest; 27 and if one of you wants to be first, you must be the slave of the others - 28 like the Son of Man, who did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life to redeem many people. GNT

Philippians 2:3 Don't do anything from selfish ambition or from a cheap desire to boast, but be humble toward one another, always considering others better than yourselves. 4 And look out for one another's interests, not just for your own. 5 The attitude you should have is the one that Christ Jesus had:

6 He always had the nature of God, but he did not think that by force he should try to remain equal with God. 7 Instead of this, of his own free will he gave up all he had, and took the nature of a servant. He became like a human being and appeared in human likeness. 8 He was humble and walked the path of obedience all the way to death - his death on the cross. 9 For this reason God raised him to the highest place above and gave him the name that is greater than any other name. GNT

Matthew 10:21-23 When people realize it is the living God you are presenting and not some idol that makes them feel good, they are going to turn on you, even people in your own family. There is a great irony here: proclaiming so much love, experiencing so much hate! But don’t quit. Don’t cave in. It is all well worth it in the end. It is not success you are after in such times but survival. Be survivors! MSG

After hearing those verses, how do you think the kingdom of God defines success?  Jesus taught in Matthew 20, in the kingdom of God, greatness is giving up your life to help others.  Paul wrote in Philippians 2, Jesus modeled success for us.  Jesus was God but gave up his life as God for us all and God honored Jesus because of what He did.  Jesus when He trained his disciples in Matthew 10 said, in this world, people may turn on you so don’t focus on success but try to survive.  Success in the kingdom of God seems to be internal.  That means it’s a personal choice deep inside ourselves to surrender our lives to love God and love others regardless of the hardships we walk through.

Now let’s think through how our world defines success.  What I am about to tell you, you already know.  It won’t come as a surprise to you.  We live in a culture that pursues popularity, fun, wealth, comfort, and security.  And in our culture, if you have those things, you are successful.  When it comes to companies, churches, organizations, and fundraisers, bigger, better, and more exciting are always viewed as more successful.  Success in this world seems to be external.  That means success is getting everything our world can offer us.  Things like satisfying every desire we have, getting everything for ourselves, and wanting to appear important to others.

Success in the kingdom of God is radically different than success in this world.  And when Jesus came to earth, both kingdoms clashed.  Do you remember the temptations of Jesus?  I want to read for you the second temptation.

Luke 4:5 Then the Devil took him up and showed him in a second all the kingdoms of the world. 6 “I will give you all this power and all this wealth,” the Devil told him. “It has all been handed over to me, and I can give it to anyone I choose. 7 All this will be yours, then, if you worship me.” 8 Jesus answered, “The scripture says, ‘Worship the Lord your God and serve only him!’” GNT

What was the temptation?  Success.  Success the way the world defines it.  Satan rules this world and tempts Jesus with everything this world has to offer.  Satan is telling Jesus, I can give you everything you want, power and wealth, and you will never have to go to the cross and die.  How did Jesus respond?  Jesus’ answer was ‘No’, I am going to the cross.  I will focus on and serve God only.  Success for me isn’t power and wealth, its obedience, I’m going to the cross.   

And we aren’t free from that battle.  You and I will always be tempted to believe in and chase what this world has to offer.  And that temptation will rage against you.  It will seem so obvious, it will seem like common sense, that we must chase success the way the world defines it.  And because we live in our culture, without us even realizing it, it can deeply influence us.  It’s in our music, our movies, our social media, financial reports, it’s everywhere we go.  The message from our culture is, ‘Get popularity, fun, wealth, comfort, and security.  Make sure it’s bigger, better, and more exciting.’ 

Do you know what happens to a frog in the water?  I am told this; I have never tried this.  If you place a frog in water at room temperature, it won’t move, it will stay comfortable.  If you place a frog in boiling water, it will immediately respond and jump away.  However, did you know, that if you place a frog in water at room temperature and slowly increase the water temperature to boiling, the frog will never know the difference and it will die?  That’s what it looks like when we live in our culture, and it begins to influence how we follow Jesus.  It becomes normal to pursue what the world defines as success.

I want you to hear how scripture talks about our culture.

Romans 12:1-2 So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life - your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life - and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you. MSG

Do you see that line?  Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking.  If we live in our culture and we are not living on purpose and focusing on our relationship with God, we can become like our culture.  We will pursue what our culture pursues.  We can be the frog in room temperature water and as the temperature slowly increases, we will never realize it.  We will conclude that success is the way the world defines success.  Give me popularity, fun, wealth, comfort, and security.  And when it comes to spiritual things like church and Jesus, we will want God to give us those things.  If God doesn’t give us those things, we can think, God is a bad God.

So, I ask you, has your faith in Jesus disrupted your view of success?  I ask because how our culture defines success and how God’s kingdom defines success, clash.

Quick time out here.  We aren’t saying popularity, fun, wealth, comfort, and security are wrong.  We are saying that those things aren’t success.  Based on scripture, being a disciple of Jesus will probably mean you won’t be popular.  It may mean life isn’t always fun.  It may mean we aren’t as wealthy as we could be.  It may mean we aren’t comfortable all the time.  It may mean I don’t have the security others have.    

We encourage you to live a life deeply connected to Jesus.  Make right choices.  Work hard.  Get an education.  Be wise with your time, your money, and your priorities.  As you live life have fun, enjoy life.  As you save, enjoy vacations and retirement.  But understand, what this world offers, those external things, aren’t success in the kingdom of God.  Success in the kingdom of God is internal.  That deep personal choice to surrender your life to love God and others regardless of hardships you walk through. 

Back to Jesus.  Remember how the kingdoms clashed when Jesus was tempted?  It became even more intense when Jesus taught about God’s kingdom.  What Jesus said was so radical to the religious leaders, it made them furious.  How Jesus explained success offended the religious leaders.  Why?  Because the Pharisees defined success the way the world defined success.  Jesus shows up and unapologetically confronts their ideas of success.  Jesus says, ‘What this world honors is detestable in the sight of God.’ 

Let’s jump right into Jesus teaching.

Luke 16:11 And if you are untrustworthy about worldly wealth, who will trust you with the true riches of heaven? 12 And if you are not faithful with other people’s things, why should you be trusted with things of your own? 13 “No one can serve two masters. For you will hate one and love the other; you will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and be enslaved to money.”

14 The Pharisees, who dearly loved their money, heard all this and scoffed at him. 15 Then he said to them, “You like to appear righteous in public, but God knows your hearts. What this world honors is detestable in the sight of God.” NLT

Jesus was clear and unapologetic.  Do you see it?  Two kingdoms are colliding.  Two ideas of success are smashing together.  And Jesus says, ‘What you think is success, God thinks is detestable.’  In this story, think about this question.  How did the people, the Pharisees, who value this world and what it offers respond to Jesus?  They scoffed at Him.  They heard Jesus and concluded, that He was hopelessly out of touch. 

Let me ask you, if you heard Jesus say that, would you think Jesus was hopelessly out of touch?  Does what Jesus said offend you like it offended the Pharisees?  What does it do inside of you that the things we may be chasing are detestable to God?  Does it make sense to you that the things this world craves are detestable to God?  Does that make you think, I might need to change how I view success?  Does it make you think, I might need to change what I pursue in life? 

Do you remember when I started this talk, I said how you define success is important because it will determine how you live?  It’s true. I wish I had more time to talk about this but I don’t so I will make this quick.

Six characteristics when we chase what the world offers.

1.       Happiness is found in having things.

2.       Get all you can for yourself as quickly as you can.

3.       Security is found in money, power, status, and good health.

4.       Above all, you should seek all the pleasure, convenience, and comfort you can.

5.       God is irrelevant to everyday life, there are no moral absolutes.

6.       It’s normal to feel like ‘I don’t add up’.

Six characteristics when we chase the kingdom of God.

1.       Surrendering to God’s love for us.

2.       Understanding our time on earth is a journey of transformation to be with God.

3.       Learning how to love and be kind to others – well.

4.       Growing passion for God’s kingdom [spiritual family].

5.       Growing passion for people who haven’t experienced God’s love.

6.       Normal to feel relaxed because God loves me even when I don’t like myself.

Let’s walk through a couple of questions.

What is success to you?

Do you see how the kingdom of God and this world clash?

Do you think Jesus’ definition of success is hopelessly out of touch?

What do you think when you hear Jesus say, what the world values, God detests?

Do you see how living in this world, like the frog, may influence you so much you can become like the world?

Like the temptation of Jesus, do you feel the pull of this world?  Does power or wealth pull on you so much, it seems like common sense to chase those things?

Do you see how necessary it is to focus on God as we walk in this world?

If success to Jesus is giving up your life to love God and others, do you need to make any changes?

Lastly, has your faith in Jesus disrupted your view of success?