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Sunday, September 19, 2010
Achievement
By Rev. Jerry Herships
Scripture: Phillipians4:5-9
5Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. 6Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. 7And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. 8Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. 9Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you.
Every year Vanity Fair magazine prints a list of what it calls, “The New Establishment.” This year the list is topped by a 28 year old. This is the list of the most influential people in the world. His name is Mark Zuckerberg. Does he sound familiar to anyone? He is the creator of Facebook. His website is valued at 25 billion dollars. His website has more banner ads than any other website, 176 billion…a quarter. Revenues this year could top two billion.
Other people in the top ten of this list include some slouch named Steve Jobs, as well as Jeff Bezos the head of Amazon and Larry Ellison, the head of Oracle. Johnny Depp is way down at number twenty.
This is the kind of list everyone wants to be on. It screams to the world, “Look what I’ve done. Look what I’ve accomplished. I am someone important. I HAVE MADE IT.”
Granted everyone’s measurement of achievement is a bit different. I think of Steve Martin in THE JERK getting so excited that the new phone book arrived and that he was in it. “I’m SOMBODY NOW!”
Isn’t that all we want to be? Somebody? We want to, in varying degrees, stand out. We want people to see our achievements and what we have accomplished. I don’t think there is anything wrong with wanting to be acknowledged for our hard work. The challenge is that achievement can be like a drug. The more we get, the more we want. When it is bad, we want a wider and wider circle of people to know what we have done and how much better it is than the average person.
We do this in a wide variety of ways. Some people will do it through sports. Athletes get paid millions of dollars in endorsement deals when they are at the top…and have those deals taken away if they fall off the top…just ask Tiger Woods.
Others mark their achievements through academic’s. How many letters can I get after or before my name? Into what schools was I able to make it? What were my GPA and SAT scores? Still others made their way by climbing the corporate ladder. How quick can I make it to VP? Do I have a corner office? What company do I work for? Do people take notice when I mention my place of work?
Laura and I had a number of friends who worked for Disney when we lived in Orlando and one of the people that left the company came back once for a visit. I will never forget what he said about leaving the company. He said his new job was great. There was more money, better hours and it was closer to home. He said that the only thing he missed were the times when he would travel and the person on the plane with him would say, what do you do, and he would get to say, “I work for Disney.” He would watch the whole demeanor of the person change. Now he said that when he mentions his new company’s name the conversation usually fades away. Ironically, he did the same thing at both companies but his “achievement” was working for Disney.
We want to win. We want to be the best. We are a society that applauds the victor and does everything we can to reward those that make it to the top. It is important to always do our best. The question is…WHY?
Why is it so important to achieve? The more interesting question is: Would we want to do all we do if we couldn’t tell another soul? Would we achieve as much if we had to keep it to ourselves? My gut tells me no. I think a big part of wanting to achieve more is so that others can know.
Achievement is about striving, constantly working for that next thing. It’s about believing that we have to prove our worth and value to the world. It is using the present to chase the future. It is thinking that “when that happens…” I will have achieved what I need to achieve. The problem is that the finish line is always moving.
I know I felt this for years going through the ordination process. It seemed like it would never end. Year after year of getting approved and RE approved, passing from committees to BOARDS. I worked through three years of study to get a Masters degree, to then get to serving two years ON PROBATION. I was constantly striving for the next thing. I thought for SURE once I got ordained that would be over. I would have my achievement. Wrong.
We get through ordination and then the topic becomes, “what church are you going to serve?” There is a hierarchy, you know, and St. Andrew is at the top. Then it is, what programs are we going to do and what services to lead and how many people are showing up. The list of achievements is never ending.
Most people reach a point in their life where they move from achievement to serving. The focus moves from “me” focused to “other” focused. There is a huge desire to get off the Merry-go-round and start doing for others. The applause and awards begin to fade. There is more comfort in being still and quiet. Stress drops. Anxiety drops. Peace arrives.
It is often at these moments when we understand Jesus’ words. “Peace be with you, my peace I give you.” When we accept that peace, we recognize that we are not our title or our GPA or our credentials or our resume. We rest in knowing that we are enough RIGHT NOW. To think otherwise is to say God isn’t enough.
Peace and Surrender go hand in hand. Striving and surrender rarely end up in the same sentence. By giving up outcome and results we are saying to God, “I trust you on this. I know your hand is at work.” It is a place of immediate release. This release goes for all parts of our lives; our work, our love life, our family. We stop trying to MAKE things be and just LET things be.
Contrary to what some people think, we will not become lazy good for nothings. We will find our focus gets sharper for the things that really matter. When we release our striving for achievements and awards and accolades, we find we have a lot more brain space to think about what we are truly passionate about. We never have to strive towards our passion, it is already inside of us. And it was put there by God.
We live in a time of off the chart stress and anxiety. While there are some things that are very real, like our health and keeping a roof over our heads, much of pain comes from striving in a world that uses false measurements to determine value. We are enough from the day we are born. Everything else is extra.
I see so many people who don’t think they are worthy of any good at all. They have forgotten that they are children of God. They have forgotten that God is not only with them but God is within them as well. This alone should give us peace. Peace is a wonderful achievement….as long as we don’t make it a goal and an award and an achievement that we strive for….LOOK AT ME I’M STRIVING FOR INNER PEACE…AND TOTALLY STRESSED OUT! This is not what we are shooting for. We cannot get caught up in striving for any achievement, even inner peace.
So if striving is the wrong way to go, if looking for achievement at every corner, if the constant pull of trying to prove ourselves isn’t the way, what is? Releasing it to God. We see it in today’s scripture. The Lord is near. Don’t worry and ask God for what you want. For me, I want peace. I want that gentle peace that as the scripture tells us surpasses all understanding.
To truly follow this passage we have to do everything is says. It tells us how to behave. When it says, “Let your gentleness be known to everyone,” gentleness doesn’t mean what we think it means. The Greek term is more positive than that. Generosity towards others and consideration towards others is closer to what the passage is shooting for. Remember if we are not occupying our minds with striving and running and pursuing the things of tomorrow, today; if we aren’t doing that, we have some brain space to fill. And this scripture tells us just what to fill it with: truth, honor, justice, purity, excellence. These are the things to fill our minds with and as we get more and more in the habit of doing that we will find, more and more, that we will feel the God of peace being with us and in us.
This peace is also not exactly what we might think of as peace. It does not simply mean “lack of conflict.” Again, it is more than that. Its meaning is closer to total well being. It is a sharing of Christ’s attitude. Christ’s mind and heart becomes yours.
Some of you might be fine fighting along and making your way in the world. I was for a long time. I liked fighting for it. For years I had a “rugged individualist” vibe about me…at least I thought I did in my head. The problem was that I got tired. I got tired of striving and pushing and constantly trying to achieve, achieve, achieve.
Don’t misunderstand, goals are good for the right reasons. If it is for the betterment of yourself and for the world around you, go for it. But if it is just so you have one more award to impress the world with, that will never bring you joy…and it certainly won’t bring you peace.
Let the striving go. Release outcome. Be thankful and focus on the good in the world. Focus on truth and justice and excellence. DO NOT WORRY ABOUT ANYTHING. If we do these things we will find ourselves with more joy, more peace and more God in our life.
We probably won’t find ourselves on the next Vanity Fair list but if we have more joy, peace and God…do we really care?