The God of heaven is the one who will give us success. Nehemiah 2:20.

Success, n., a favourable result, a wished-for ending, good fortune… Was Christ on the cross a success or a failure?

We do not easily survive either success or failure. We (Western) humans have an inordinate need to demonstrate our worth by performance. We strive to be luminaries, rather than letting our light shine. We are what we do and achieve. And we have an insatiable appetite for approval: much of the way we behave is a veiled means of soliciting compliments. Paul Tournier describes a universal comedy of innumerable individuals all motivated by the intense desire to appear in the best possible light. ‘They are always on the watch, lest their weaknesses, their faults, their ignorance be discovered; anxious to distinguish themselves, to be noticed, to be admired, to be commiserated with. The people who fail are those who try hardest to succeed.’

Success and/or failure may produce spiritual health – or they may not. As Kipling said, they’re both imposters. Winning isn’t everything; we need the faith to face failure: ‘When I am weak, then I am strong’. I can do all things – even fail – through Christ who strengthens me. Aim to be faithful. It’s up to God whether he grants you success.

Lord, these two ideas, ‘success’, ‘failure’ are very slippery indeed. One almost inevitably leads to pride, the other to despair. So grant me whatever will make me a better servant, a better person. Amen.

IS SUCCESS ALWAYS A SIGN OF GOD’S BLESSING?

The Lord will send his angel with you and make your way successful. Genesis 24:40.

The Puritans preached that success results from God’s blessing, or God’s testing, or God’s abandonment and judgment, or the devil’s seduction. Only one in four was God’s prospering.

The ‘possibility thinking’ movement offers some wisdom about success: ‘You may not be what you think you are, but what you think, you are!’ (Sports stars talk about ‘imaging’). ‘I don’t know the secret of success, but I do know the secret of failure – try to please everybody’. ‘Success is not permanent. The same is also true of failure’. Here’s one I don’t like: ‘The haves and have-nots can often be traced back to the dids and did-nots’. That’s not true in half the world…

A.W. Tozer wrote somewhere: ‘God may allow his servant to succeed when he has disciplined him or her to a point where success is not necessary for happiness. The one elated by success and cast down by failure is still a carnal person’.

So Lord, I want to do your will your way. If you grant me success I promise to praise you; if I fail, I will pick myself up and try to learn whatever lessons well you want to teach me. Amen.