Our significance is found in Christ & our success is found in our obedience to Christ.
If you look for success and significance according to external measures, you’ll always be disappointed. When you choose a path of surrender, sacrifice and submissiveness to God, you’ll have a peace that surpasses all understanding. This is because you’re letting the word of God renew your mind and your definition of success and significance is aligned with Him.
Culture tries to teach us that success is attached to external things like: accolades, titles, promotions, living the American dream, etc.
Success and significance is not attached to titles, accolades, and other people’s opinions. What we tie our heart to becomes what or who we serve. This is where a heart check is needed.
What are you building for? What are your intentions? It is for your own glory? Is it leading you to compromise to build it? Or is it to glorify God and bring more people into His kingdom?
What your heart is tied to is where you’ll find your identity, fulfillment, success and significance from.
If you build anything outside of God, you’ll need to maintain it without God. You need Him to be the firm foundation, the solid rock you build on.
In Jeremiah 17:5-10 we see what the Lord says about the man who trusts in himself versus the man who trusts in Him —
5 Thus says the Lord:
“Cursed is the man who trusts in man
And makes flesh his strength,
Whose heart departs from the Lord.
6 For he shall be like a shrub in the desert,
And shall not see when good comes,
But shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness,
In a salt land which is not inhabited.
7 “Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord,
And whose hope is the Lord.
8 For he shall be like a tree planted by the waters,
Which spreads out its roots by the river,
And will not fear when heat comes;
But its leaf will be green,
And will not be anxious in the year of drought,
Nor will cease from yielding fruit.
9 “The heart is deceitful above all things,
And desperately wicked;
Who can know it?
10 I, the Lord, search the heart,
I test the mind,
Even to give every man according to his ways,
According to the fruit of his doings.”
The content of our lives may change. Where you live will change. Who we’re connected to from season to season can change. Our jobs may change. Our interests change. ONE thing doesn’t change, that’s God and who He is.
Hebrews 13:8 says “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.”
God is looking for men and women who are truly after His heart like David. People who will stay obedient no matter the circumstance, no matter what you’re going through.
This is where we get to renew our mind with the word of God to combat what culture has tried to indoctrinate our minds on what success and significance is.
What might look bad in the physical does not mean that God’s presence isn’t there. There’s always a reason and purpose. God’s not done with you.
For example, with Joseph no matter the circumstance, he committed to being faithful to stewarding his gifts and stewarding the season God had him in.
He went from being thrown in a pit and sold by his brothers (Genesis 37:12-36) to serving Potiphar and being thrown into prison (Genesis 39). Even when he was placed in prison based off false accusations, he still stewarded his gifts and season (Genesis 40). That eventually led to promotion in due season in the palace as Pharaoh’s right hand man where he helped steward all the resources of Egypt. Throughout his process, he never cursed God.
It wasn’t his gifts or connections, it was God’s presence being with him that made him successful. (Genesis 39:2)
The process is where the Lord builds our character, molds and refines us to be the vessels fit to use for His glory
Praise Him through valleys and mountain tops, no matter what the season looks like.
Questions to discern whether you’re building for success in the kingdom or the world:
1. Why am I doing what I’m doing?
2. Who gets the glory out of this?
3. Whose approval am I seeking?
4. Where am I treasuring in my heart?
5. What am i looking at? What am i listening to?
Keys to godly success & significance:
1. Identity - be rooted and grounded in your identity in Christ
2. Intimacy with God daily
3. Instruction from the Lord and godly counsel
Click here to watch the podcast on How to have Godly Success and Significance.
Shop our custom apparel below
