©2003 Larry Huntsperger Peninsula Bible Fellowship

03/14/04

True Success

3/14/04 True Success

I was looking over my list of Life’s greatest surprises this week

and noticed that there were at least three items I had included

that were very closely related -

what real success as a Christian means,

my true calling,

and God’s real goals for my life.

I’m going to moosh all three of those together

and use them as the basis for what I share with you this morning.

And I need to warn you, first of all,

that what I do this morning

will at times be more personal in nature

than most of what you hear from me on Sunday mornings.

These are, after all, MY Life’s Greatest Surprises,

and to understand them

you will need a little more information about my past than most of you have.

As a general rule I share very little with you about my distant past.

Some of it would make you question whether I had any business

standing before you now teaching Scripture,

while other bits and pieces were mostly just flesh-driven successes

that contributed nothing to my discovery

of the true life in the Spirit of God.

But before I get personal with all of this

I want to begin by sharing just a few words

about the role of goals in our lives

and why God establishes them for us in the first place.

I want to do this because,

unless we understand why God says what He says to us about these goals,

we could easily miss the power of what is being given to us

and view them not as the remarkable gifts they are

but rather as simply religious platitudes,

or even worse,

as religious duties we are suppose to fulfill.

That will hopefully make more sense to you by the time I finish this morning.

But the first thing I want to point out to us

is that we are, by design, goal-driven creations.

I use to think that there were some personality types

that were fundamentally more goal-driven than others,

people who live with clearly defined daily, weekly, and yearly goals,

and who carefully organize their lives

for the achievement of those goals.

I viewed such people as high achievers,

the real movers and shakers

who quickly surged to the top of the success ladder in our society.

I could respect such people for their accomplishments when I bumped up against them,

but the truth is I never liked most of them very much

because many of the ones I’ve known

have seemed to care far more about their goals

than they did about the people around them,

and as such they were extremely unpleasant folks to be with.

But in recent years I have come to realize

that, in truth, every one of us is by design

a goal-driven creation of God.

Though most of us do not carry our goals around with us at the conscious level,

still, every one of us possesses

a highly refined goal system,

and it is those goals that dictate virtually every conscious choice we make each day.

And not only do those goals dictate our choices,

they also drive our basic life priorities

and, even more important,

if we allow them to

they will determine our morality, our ethics, and our most fundamental values in life.

When each of us walked into this room this morning

we brought with us a clearly defined system of personal goals,

and it is those goals that are powering our lives right now

just as much as that 4 cylinder engin under the hood of my Toyota powers my car.

Your decision to invest a half a day of your life

in sitting here this morning

is a direct result of some underlying goal you possess.

You see this meeting as a means that will hopefully move you closer

to some goal you’re seeking to achieve.

The specific goal itself

will be different with each of us.

Some of you are here

because there is that really cute girl who comes each week

and it’s your only chance to see her

and hopefully to exchange a few words with her.

Some of you are here

because your husband or your wife has been after you to come for weeks

and you’ve shown up today

with the goal of restoring a little harmony in the home,

to prove to your partner that your really are not afraid to “go to that church”,

and hopefully to get your mate to lighten up a bit in the future.

Some of you are here

because right now your spirit is in turmoil,

you’re filled with regret over things you’ve done,

you’re desperately looking for peace with yourself and with your God,

and you’re hoping that maybe the “church thing” might help.

Some of you are here

because during the past seven days

you have once again lost sight of the truth that your God really does love you,

and that He holds your life and your heart in His hands,

and the music and the teaching you receive here

helps you to once again remember the truth.

And there are dozens of other motivations at work in the rest of you.

But with all of us

there is an underlying life goal

that has driven our decision to be here this morning.

Now, in the broadest sense, of course,

we are each driven by the goal of achieving the best possible life we could have.

But, given that goal,

we each then select for ourselves

a number of more specific goals

that we believe will be the means by which can achieve that best possible life.

We may, for example, decide that the “good life” requires us to avoid pain at all costs.

I can remember one time in my life

when physical pain brought me to that point...sort of.

When I was in high school I injured my back on the trampoline in gym class,

and that injury set the stage

for periodic back problems ever since.

When Joni was just 3 years old

Sandee and I and our little girl moved from Alaska to Texas.

It was probably a combination of all of the lifting and carrying involved in the move,

along with the mental and emotional stress of going someplace we had never been,

knowing I had no job waiting for me,

and a family I needed to care for,

but that trip set off the worst back episode of my life.

By the time we flew out of Alaska

there was no position I could find,

either sitting or standing,

where I was not in intense pain.

We stopped in Seattle for a few days to visit family,

and I remember the day after we arrived

getting up after a horrible night and thinking to myself,

“I will do anything I have to do to make this pain stop!”

I’d never been at that point before.

As I recall

we had about a thousand dollars we were taking along with us,

our entire life savings to keep us alive until I could find a job,

and I remember thinking,

“I don’t care what it costs,

I don’t care what kind of surgery is involved,

I don’t care if I’m in debt for the rest of my life,

I will do anything I have to do to make this pain stop.”

It was by far the most dominant, driving, conscious goal I had at that point.

Fortunately the Lord put me in contact with a skilled, ethical doctor

who correctly diagnosed my problem as severe muscle spasms,

(a diagnosis that, at the time I felt didn’t even begin to adequately communicate the kind of pain I was in),

and who then took an approach to treatment

that had me nearly pain-free within a few days.

But I do understand the natural tendency within us

to establish an underlying life goal of avoiding pain at all cost.

The problem with that particular goal, of course,

is that God frequently uses pain

as the key indicator of some underlying problem that needs to be corrected in our lives,

and if the avoidance of pain is held as one of our primary life goals

we can easily blind ourselves to issues that,

if they are not addressed and corrected,

will ultimately bring about devastating consequences.

This is especially true of the emotional pain that is so much a part of human experience.

The pain is not the problem,

it is only the symptom, the indicator of issues our Lord knows we need to face

before true healing can take place within us.

But there are all sorts of other goals each of us have established in our lives right now,

goals that we have accepted because we believe

they are the keys that will unlock those doors through which we can then find true fulfillment and happiness in life.

Unless we consciously fight against it,

all of us start out our adult lives

accepting those goals that have been handed to us by the culture in which we live.

Our society tells us

that greater fulfillment in life

will come from greater popularity,

or greater power,

or more freedom,

or more money and all that money can bring.

And to the degree that we accept those goals as valid,

to that degree those goals become the forces that drive our lives,

and even the forces that shape our concept of morality.

Without realizing it,

we begin to think that what is “moral”,

what is truly right for us

is whatever will move us closer to those goals

that we believe we must achieve

in order to achieve happiness in life.

Some of our most powerful life goals

are those that are rooted in our need for love

and our longing for peace with ourselves.

Loneliness,

or fear of rejection,

or a longing for affirmation especially from a father or father figure or from those in authority over us,

or guilt,

or a sense of shame and the longing for some way to atone for past failures,

all of these can become powerful motivational goals in our lives,

goals that have tremendous influence over our lives each day.

Of course I have no idea what goals each of you brought with you this morning,

but I do know that, whatever they are,

it is those goals that have dictated how you both earned and spent your money this past week,

how you interacted with those in your family,

and with your coworkers, and with your boss,

and with virtually every other person you met.

Each of the hundreds of choices we make each day

are simply the outward expressions

of the underlying goals we have already selected

that we believe will move us toward the greatest fulfillment and satisfaction in life we can know.

All of which is to say

that the goals we select

are among the most important choices we will ever make.

And given what most of us here this morning have already learned about our God,

and given our understanding of His clearly stated love for us,

and of the way in which He demonstrated that love

through dying in our place for our sins on the cross,

given the fact that He has given us Himself,

it will not surprise most of you to know

that He has also given us clear insight

into those goals that will truly deliver what they promise,

goals that we can select

that will lead us into a life that brings true fulfillment.

And some of the greatest and most rewarding surprises in my life,

have been in the discovery of what some of those goals are.

I am now 56 years old.

For the past twenty years I have pastored this church,

and there is every reason to believe

that I will very likely continue to pastor it

for as long as I am involved in public teaching.

I love our church very much,

and I love the work my Lord has given me to do,

and the people he’s given me to take care of,

and the people who take care of me.

But I will also tell you

that, if you would have told me 35 years ago

that I would spend most of my life

as the pastor of a relatively small church

in a small town in Alaska,

I would have told you that that simply could not be true.

I was never an impressive student in school.

I did OK,

but nobody ever handed me awards for my academic achievements.

But, even as early as Jr. High School,

I discovered that I could do something

that very few of my fellow students seemed to be able to do -

I could get up in front of a group of people and talk.

That one ability

allowed me not just to survive in school,

but, especially in high school and college,

to achieve some measure of social prominence.

And then, in my early 20's,

when my Christian life began to take shape

and I discovered that the Lord had chosen to give me a teaching gift,

the combination of that gift

and my ability to stand before people and speak

resulted in some major assumptions being created within me

about what I could expect in the way of “success”

as I looked toward the future.

And it wasn’t long before those assumptions

took shape within me as significant life goals.

Fulfillment in life would come from succeeding in my public teaching,

and success would be measured by the size of the church

and the number of people I taught.

It never ceases to amaze me

how skillfully we import the values of our society

into our walk with God.

Success in “Christian ministry”

can surly be measured by the same standards

as success in any other field of endeavor.

More people,

bigger buildings,

more money,

broader outreach certainly means more success.

Teaching before a crowd of five thousand

is obviously of far more value

than spending an afternoon with one child.

But then, once again, God’s Word began to mess everything up.

When I was writing up my notes for this morning

I tried to remember when some of these changes took place within me.

Though I didn’t realize it at the time,

I think a lot of it was accomplished

during the first year I spent in Trinidad in my early 20's,

though I didn’t begin to consciously realize what had happened

until several years later.

I began to see things in Scripture

that I’d never seen before,

life goals offered to us by our God,

goals that were so very different from the ones I’d been hanging onto.

I saw them in Paul’s words to the Corinthians...

2CO 11:3 But I am afraid, lest as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds should be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ.

I saw them in the words of our Lord when He said, MAT 6:32-33 "For all these things the Gentiles eagerly seek; for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added to you.”

I saw them in the words of Paul to the Philippians.

PHI 3:8-15 More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish in order that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead. Not that I have already obtained it, or have already become perfect, but I press on in order that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus. Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Let us therefore, as many as are perfect, have this attitude...

What I saw over and over again

was my Lord telling me

that there is only one correct measure for success in life,

and only one ultimate goal

that has the power to deliver the quality of life we long for -

it is the goal of our own personal growth

in our relationship with our Lord Jesus Christ,

and in our trust in Him,

and our faithfulness to His leadership in life.

If we see success there,

then He will use our growing understanding of Him

to touch the lives of others in ways that He knows is right,

and He will do it in ways

that protect and guard us

from influences and attacks that we are not equipped to handle.

But what He chooses to do through us

is entirely up to Him.

Our security,

our solid ground is always, only found

in keeping our eyes focused exclusively on what’s going on between us and our Lord.

I even came up with a one line phrase

that I used to communicate to myself what I was seeing.

“If I focus on my character growth,

He will take care of my career.”

I didn’t consciously realize what was going on inside me until about a year after I returned from Trinidad.

I was working in the Public Relations office at the college I’d graduated from a year earlier,

and we had a fellow come to campus

to help us start an outreach program to the inner city in Seattle.

He was only a couple of years older than I was,

but he already had an earned doctorate in theology

and he was already in the inner circle of big-name Christians in our nation.

His dad had been associated with Billy Graham in some way,

and now this realatively young man was clearly on the fast track to success in the Christian world.

He had the speaking gifts,

he had the contacts,

he had the education,

he had the charisma,

he had the drive,

and he was well on his way.

I was assigned to him as his guide during his stay on campus,

and I remember him mentioning during one of our conversations

that on several occasions already

“Billy” had lined him up to fill in at crusades he himself could not attend.

He and I built a friendship during his few days on campus,

and toward the end of his visit he asked me what my plans for the future were.

I told him about my most recent trip to Trinidad

and then said I was hoping to get back there as soon as possible.

I’ll never forget his response.

He said,

“Larry, you’re way too good for Trinidad. Anyone can be a missionary in Trinidad. You need to stay here in the states where you can really make it big.”

I never said anything to him in response,

but his words made my furious.

In an instant I saw

and then was repulsed by that whole Christian success mentality.

I thought about those precious Trinidadians I’d grown to love so much -

Tony,

and Nigel,

and Little Barry,

and Three Cents...

And here was this guy trying to tell me

that “making it big in America”

was more important,

and more rewarding than those kids,

and I knew this Dr. Somebody was really Dr. Nobody,

a sad young fool who had chosen a path that might make him famous

but could never make him fulfilled.

When I finally began to really understand the Lord’s goals for my life

I will admit that at first I was surprised by them

because they were so very different from what I had expected.

But even though I have been surprised by them,

I have never been disappointed by the life they have lead me into,

and now, 35 years later, I wouldn’t trade the life I have for anything.

I don’t know what goals you are holding to right now

in the hope that they will bring you true fulfillment in life,

but if you’ve found they are not delivering what you’d hoped for

allow me to offer you one that I can promise will deliver the goods.

It’s not a platitude,

it’s not a religious duty,

it is a promise given to us by God Himself,

and God always keeps His promises.

But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added to you.