126 Sermon Illustrations on Success

Reader's Digest wrote of the late Harvey Penick:

Success came late for golf pro Harvey Penick. His first golf book, "Harvey Penick's Little Red Book," has sold more than a million copies, which makes it one of the biggest things in the history of sports books. His second book, "And If You Play Golf, You're My Friend," has already sold nearly three-quarters of a million copies. But anyone who imagines that Penick wrote the books to make money didn't know the man.

In the 1920s Penick bought a red spiral notebook and began jotting down observations about golf. He never showed the book to anyone except his son until 1991, when he shared it with a local writer, Bud Shrake, and asked if

he thought it was worth publishing. Shrake read it and told him yes. He left word with Penick's wife the next evening that Simon & Schuster had greed to an advance of ninety thousand dollars.

When Shrake saw Penick later, the old man seemed troubled. Finally Penick came clean. With all his medical bills, he said, there was just no way he could advance Simon & Schuster that much money. The writer had to explain that Penick would be the one to receive the ninety thousand dollars.

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People often have Penick's reaction to the fabulous gift of salvation offered in Jesus Christ. We ask, "What must I do?" God answers, "Just receive."

-- Eric Hulstrand Binford, North Dakota

On October 18, 1879, a young inventor by the name of Thomas A. Edison sat in his laboratory. He was weary from 13 months of repeated failure in his search for a filament that would stand the stress of electric current. To add to his problems, the men who had backed him financially were now refusing to put up any additional funds. Having tried every known metal in his experiment, Edison was admittedly baffled. Casually picking up a bit of lampblack, he mixed it with tar and rolled it into a thin thread. Suddenly the thought struck him, why not try a carbonized cotton fiber? For five hours he worked on the first filament, but it broke before he could remove the mold.

Two entire spools of thread were used in similar fruitless efforts. At last a perfect strand emerged, only to be ruined when he tried to place it inside a glass tube. Still Edison refused to admit defeat. He continued to work without sleep for two more days and nights. Eventually he managed to insert one of the crude carbonized threads into a vacuum-sealed bulb. "When we turned on the current," he said, "the sight we had so long desired to see finally met our eyes!" His persistence in the face of the most discouraging odds gave the world one of its greatest inventions -- the electric light!

[Suggestions for overcoming the fear of failure by a motivational speaker]

Fear of failure is one of the greatest fears people have. Fear of failure is closely related to fear of criticism and fear of rejection. Successful people overcome their fear of failure. Fear incapacitates unsuccessful people.

The Law of Feedback states: there is no failure; there is only feedback. Successful people look at mistakes as outcomes or results, not as failure. Unsuccessful people look at mistakes as permanent and personal.

Buckminster Fuller wrote, “Whatever humans have learned had to be learned as a consequence only of trial and error experience. Humans have learned only through mistakes.”

Most people self-limit themselves. Most people do not achieve a fraction of what they are capable of achieving because they are afraid to try — because they are afraid they will fail.

Take these steps to overcome your fear of failure and move yourself forward to getting the result you desire:

STEP ONE: TAKE ACTION. Bold, decisive action. Do something scary. Fear of failure immobilizes you. To overcome this fear, you must act. When you act, act boldly.

Action gives you the power to change the circumstances or the situation. You must overcome the inertia by doing something. Dr. Robert Schuller asks, “What would you do if you knew you could not fail?” What could you achieve? Be brave and just do it. If it doesn’t work out the way you want, then do something else. But DO SOMETHING NOW.

STEP TWO: PERSIST. Successful people just don’t give up. They keep trying different approaches to achieving their outcomes until they finally get the results they want. Unsuccessful people try one thing that doesn’t work and then give up. Often people give up when they are on the threshold of succeeding.

STEP THREE: DON’T TAKE FAILURE PERSONALLY. Failure is about behavior, outcomes, and results. Failure is not a personality characteristic. Although what you do may not give you the result you wanted, it doesn’t mean you are a failure. Because you made a mistake, doesn’t mean that you are a failure.

STEP FOUR: DO THINGS DIFFERENTLY. If what you are doing isn’t working, do something else. There is an old saying, “if you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you always got.” If you’re not getting the results you want, then you must do something different. Most people stop doing anything at all, and this guarantees they won’t be successful.

STEP FIVE: DON’T BE SO HARD ON YOURSELF. Hey, if nothing else, you know what doesn’t work. Failure is a judgement or evaluation of behavior. Look at failure as an event or a happening, not as a person.

STEP SIX: TREAT THE EXPERIENCE AS AN OPPORTUNITY TO LEARN. Think of failure as a learning experience. What did you learn from the experience that will help you in the future? How can you use the experience to improve yourself or your situation? Ask yourself these questions:

(1) What was the mistake?

(2) Why did it happen?

(3) How could it have been prevented?

(4) How can I do better next time?

Then use what you learned from the experience to do things differently so you get different results next time. Learn from the experience or ignore it.

STEP SEVEN: LOOK FOR POSSIBLE OPPORTUNITIES THAT RESULT FROM THE EXPERIENCE. Napoleon Hill, author of Think and Grow Rich, says “every adversity, every failure and every heartache carries with it the seed of an equivalent or a greater benefit.” Look for the opportunity and the benefit.

STEP EIGHT: FAIL FORWARD FAST. Tom Peters, the management guru, says that in today’s business world, companies must fail forward fast. What he means is that the way we learn is by making mistakes. So if we want to learn at a faster pace, we must make mistakes at a faster pace. The key is that you must learn from the mistakes so you make so you don’t repeat them.

Although we all make mistakes, fear of failure doesn’t have to cripple you. As self-help author Susan Jeffers says, “feel the fear and do it anyway.”

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©2002 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED TERRY BRAGG•PEACEMAKERS TRAINING

Terry Bragg runs a company called Peacemakers Training in Salt Lake City, Utah, and is the author of the book 31 Days to High Self-Esteem.

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[Original illustration at this number was a duplicate of HolwickID #14064]

Disillusioned by the course of the O.J. Simpson trial, Christopher

Darden doubts he will return to the courtroom immediately. But

success has always been important to him, even as a teenager growing

up in Richmond, California. He explains:

######People who have never been without don't understand the ######

claustrophobia of poverty. I'm not sure I understood it until the end

of ninth grade, waiting for another summer of nothing in our crowded

house. That semester, I'd gotten three A's and three F's - the first

time I'd ever failed anything. I knew that I ######was letting my chance

slip away. One more F and I'd be just another high school dropout,

hanging around the neighborhood. I knew then that I had to ######get out

of there. I wanted to pick out my own clothes, drive my own car, and

be whatever a man could hope to be.

- {In Contempt }(HarperCollins)

"Everything can be taken from a man but...the last of human freedoms -- to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way."

-- Viktor E. Frankl (1905-1997), psychiatrist and Auschwitz survivor, B&P

"This may shock you, but I believe the single most significant decision I can make on a day-to-day basis is my choice of attitude. It is more important than my past, my education, my bankroll, my successes or failures, fame or pain, what other people think of me or say about me, my circumstances, or my position. Attitude is that "single string" that keeps me going or cripples my progress. It alone fuels my fire or assaults my hope. When my attitudes are right, there's no barrier too high, no valley too deep, no dream too extreme, no challenge too great for me."

-- Charles R. Swindoll, writer and theologian, cited in BITS & PIECES

Ability is what you're capable of doing. Motivation determines what you do. Attitude determines how well you do it.

-- Lou Holtz

"Any fact facing us is not as important as our attitude toward it, for that determines our success or failure."

-- Norman Vincent Peale

"Whether you think you can or not, you are right."

-- Henry Ford

"Positive thinking will let you do everything better than negative thinking will."

-- Zig Ziglar

Don't say, "If I could, I would." Say, "If I can, I will"

-- Jim Rohn

"Work like you don't need the money. Love like you've never been hurt. Dance like nobody is watching."

-- Mark Twain

"Make a game of finding something positive in every situation -- 95 percent of your emotions are determined by how you interpret events to yourself."

-- Brian Tracy

"Optimists are right. So are pessimists. It's up to you to choose which you will be."

-- Harvey Mackay

"'I can't do it' never yet accomplished anything. 'I will try' has accomplished wonders."

-- George P. Burnham

"All the technology in the world will never replace a positive attitude."

-- Harvey Mackay

"When I hear somebody sigh, 'Life is hard,' I am always tempted to ask, 'Compared to what?'"

-- Sydney Harris

"The greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions, and not on our circumstances."

-- Martha Washington

"There are two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle."

-- Albert Einstein

"Keep your face to the sunshine and you cannot see the shadow. It's what sunflowers do."

-- Helen Keller

"It is not your aptitude, but your attitude, that determines your altitude."

-- Zig Ziglar

"Positive attitudes come in unlimited quantities. Everybody can have one free!"

-- Harvey Mackay

"Always look at what you have left. Never look at what you have lost."

-- Robert H. Schuller

"A pessimist is one who makes difficulties of his opportunities and an optimist is one who makes opportunities of his difficulties."

-- Harry Truman

"To the optimist, the glass is half full. To the pessimist, the glass is half-empty. To the engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be."

-- unknown

"Hardening of the attitudes is the most deadly disease on the face of the earth."

-- Zig Ziglar, motivational speaker and writer, Best of BITS & PIECES

"Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed is more important than any other one thing."

-- Abraham Lincoln, QFTM 9/20/03

"If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself but to your own estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment."

-- Marcus Aurelius, Roman emperor, QFTM 11/22/03

“If you keep on saying that things are going to be bad, you have a good chance of being a prophet.”

-- Isaac Singer

I had the chance to sit down at Jack Murphy Stadium in San Diego with Joe Montana before he went onto the field with the San Francisco 49ers against Denver in Super Bowl XXIV (1989). We didn't know it then, but this would be Joe's last Super Bowl, his fourth championship, yet another high point in one of the most remarkable careers not just in pro football, but in all of sports.

Joe seemed restless. He had already won everything there is in this game - the respect of teammates and opponents, coaches and owners, and especially the fans - plus all the awards: multiple League Most Valuable Player (MVPs), Super Bowls, and Super Bowl MVPs.

I said, "Joe, you can't possibly be scared."

What he said to me is, I believe, the key to his success and the reason I consider him the greatest quarterback of all time. He said, "If you're not afraid of losing, then losing means nothing."

Every time Joe Montana stepped on the field, he was scared. That element of fear kept him sharp through his entire career. If we want to be at our best, we need that same element of fear burning inside of us. It sharpens the focus; keeps the edge.

There isn't a day that goes by that I don't remember what Joe said, realizing the truth of it. It has helped me. I know it will surely help you.

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Joe Theismann (c) 2000, from Chicken Soup for the Sports Fan's Soul by Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, Jim Tunney and Mark and Chrissy Donnelly.

Camels And Gnats

Read: Matthew 23:23-28

You . . . have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. –Matthew 23:23

Jesus had some harsh things to say about the religious leaders of His day. They focused on the details of their religion and missed God's big picture. They even tithed their household spices! (Mt. 23:23). There was nothing particularly wrong with giving attention to these small matters. The problem was that they ignored the bigger issues that matter to God–justice, mercy, and faith.

Jesus called these leaders "blind guides, who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel" (v.24). They weren't able to tell the difference between a gnat issue and a camel issue.

In his book Hey, Wait a Minute! John Madden recalls legendary football coach Vince Lombardi's explanation of the difference between a good coach and a poor one. Lombardi said, "The best coaches know what the end result looks like. . . . The bad coaches don't know what they want. The good coaches do." Or, to say it another way, good coaches know what's important in order to win, and they pursue those priorities. They have the big picture in mind.

Success in the Christian life is much the same. We must be aware of God's "camel issues"–justice and mercy and faith. Then we must put them into practice, asking each day for the Holy Spirit's help. Let's not waste our lives on gnats. –HWR

True religion is to know

The love that Christ imparts;

True religion is to show

This love to burdened hearts. -–DJD

To make the most of your life, make God's goals your goals.

Perspective or Success

Dear Mom and Dad, Just thought I'd drop you a note to clue you in on my

plans. I've fallen in love with a guy called Jim. He quit high school after

grade eleven to get married. About a year ago he got a divorce. We've been

going steady for two months and plan to get married in the fall. Until then,

I've decided to move into his apartment (I think I might be pregnant).At any

rate, I dropped out of school last week, although I'd like to finish college

sometime in the future.

(On the next page the letter continued)

Mom and Dad, I

just want you to know that everything I've written so far in this letter is

false. NONE of it is true. But, Mom and Dad, it IS true that I got a C- in

French and flunked my math class... and it IS true that I'm going to need some

more money for my tuition payments. Failure can sound like success. It just

depends on the perspective. The measuring device we use to evaluate our success

or failure is often more important than the success or failure, for to a large

extent, it determines that success or failure.

(Living with Biblical Tensions, Klyne Snodgrass, 1990, Zondervan, Publishing

House, Page 35)

Even bad news can sound like good news if it is seen from a

certain vantage point. So much in life depends on "where you're

coming from" as you face your circumstances. The secret in this

case and in yours is perspective.

11 WAYS TO MAKE THIS YOUR BEST YEAR EVER

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It is never too late to start a fresh new year. Today is a wonderful time to take stock and reflect on the year gone by, the triumphs you achieved, the time you shared with family and friends, the good choices you made in business. But in order to grow and develop both personally and professionally, you also have to look back at and acknowledge the things that challenged you, the things that did not go so well.

There is nothing wrong with setbacks, in fact, I believe that if we don't have obstacles to overcome along the way we won't learn and grow. Thomas Watson, the founder of IBM, once said, "If you want to increase your rate of success, you better be prepared to increase your rate of failure."

We all have hopes and dreams for the future. Today the slate is wiped clean for all of us as we start afresh. Why not take a few moments to think about your dreams and goals for the year that starts today? In what areas do you want to grow? What is truly important to you? What challenges do you want to take on? Most of us don't realize what we can accomplish when we unleash the hidden talents that we possess. To help you make this year your best ever, take a few moments to ponder these 11 suggestions:

1. CHALLENGE YOURSELF

Have a clear vision and focus of what you want to achieve and set a time frame. Challenge yourself to be the best you can be at all times. Visualize what you want to accomplish. See it in your mind. Write down your goals, have a plan of action, and never doubt you will be successful.

2. FIND THE LOVE FACTOR

Surround yourself with loving, supportive people. Stay away from the dream stealers, the people who would bring you down. Cherish the special people in your life and let them know you cherish them.

3. DEDICATE QUALITY TIME

Life is so precious; make the most of each and every day. Rise early, spend some quality time by yourself as well as with those you care about. Go for a walk, workout, read a book. Value not only the time you spend with your loved ones, but also the time you spend by yourself.

4. STRETCH YOUR COMFORT ZONE

Do at least one thing a day, which makes you feel uncomfortable. Push yourself; you will be amazed how far you can go. Remember: on the other side of fear is freedom. To remain stagnant is not to grow. To reach your full potential, you must rise above the fray and soar like an eagle.

5. BE PASSIONATE

Show passion in everything you do. Let it show in your body language, in your smile, in your voice. Let your eyes sparkle. Let the world see and hear your enthusiasm and let it feel your passion.

6. SERVE OTHERS

Be a role model and mentor for people. Volunteer in your community and help others achieve their goals. Your world will be enriched and a better place for sharing your talents and giving freely of your time. Leave a lasting legacy.

7. DON'T SWEAT THE SMALL STUFF

Let go of the little things you can't control. Don't take yourself so seriously. Recognize that perfection isn't always the only option. Don't let life's imperfections bother you. Lighten up and see the funny side of things when they go wrong, the learning in them. Be tolerant, smile...don't waste your energies on the small stuff, you have much bigger fish to fry.

8. LIVE WITH INTEGRITY

Always be true to yourself. Take pride in whatever you do. Be proud of who you are and what you represent. Accept others with all their flaws. Show compassion and goodwill to your fellow human beings. Be dignified. Lead a life of purpose and be proud of your values.

9. SHOW GRATITUDE

Show gratitude and say thank-you to the people who have helped you along the way. Send a handwritten letter to someone who has touched you. Call up a friend or loved one and tell them how much they mean to you. Compliment a colleague or business associate on a job well done. Show people you appreciate and care about them. Acts of kindness cost nothing but mean everything.

10. CELEBRATE SUCCESS

Be proud of your achievements. Take time to recognize yourself and others for even the small successes. But also be humble and dignified, sensitive to people who are not as fortunate as you.

11. EXUDE A POSITIVE ATTITUDE

I cannot express enough the importance of having a positive attitude and believing in yourself. Yes, you can be well intentioned, you can be determined, but without a positive attitude about yourself and about life, you will not succeed. Dreams will die, goals will fade, and gloom and darkness will replace clear blue skies and sunshine in your mind and heart.

Remember people will sometimes forget what you say to them or do for them, but they will never forget how you made them feel in their hearts. Make yourself a commitment for this year not only to have the best year ever, but to help others that you care about accomplish this goal as well.

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Charles M. Marcus is a professional speaker, trainer and writer based in Toronto, Canada. Charles works with organizations and corporations internationally that want to ignite and maximize performance potential. For more information please call 416-467-6025 or e-mail at charles@cmarcus.com. Copyright by Charles M. Marcus 2000. All Rights Reserved

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Attributes of successful people, by a motivational expert:

1. They are HARD WORKING. There is no such thing as easy money. Success takes hard work and people who are willing to do it.

2. They are HONEST. Those who are successful long-term are the honest ones. Dishonest people may get the first sale, but honest people will get all the rest!

3. They PERSEVERE. How many success stories will go untold because they never happened? And all because someone quit. Successful people outlast everybody else.

4. They are FRIENDLY. Have you noticed that most successful people are friendly and people oriented? This endears them to others and enables them to lead others to accomplish the task.

5. They are LIFELONG LEARNERS. Successful people are people who stretch themselves and grow continually, learning from all areas of life, including from their mistakes.

6. They OVER-DELIVER. The old statement of under-promise and over-deliver became famous because it made a lot of people successful, including the richest man in the world - Bill Gates

7. They SEEK SOLUTIONS in the face of problems. Problems are opportunities to do the impossible, not just complain. Successful people are the ones who find solutions.

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It happens a lot in sports – especially when there’s one of those games they like to call “The Big Game”. Two rivals go at it in a game that’s really important in the standings – and one team blows out the other team with a huge, lopsided victory. You can almost predict what’s going to happen to the winning team in their next game – even if they play some pitiful team that loses a lot more than they win. The guys who totally dominated their rivals in the Big Game may very well lose the little game that follows. You win big – and then, for some reason, you lose big.

Well, I’m Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have a WORD WITH YOU today about “The Most Dangerous Season Of All.”

When you’ve really won big, it’s easy to let down, get overconfident, or just get careless. When you’ve been the champion for a while, you can tend to coast – and suddenly not be the champion anymore. That doesn’t just happen in sports – it happens in life. In fact, it happened many times in the Bible – like what happened to the Jewish king Uzziah, as recorded in 2 Chronicles 26, our word for today from the Word of God.

From this story, and many others like it, we can conclude that a season of success in your life may actually be the most dangerous season of all. Uzziah led his nation to new levels of economic prosperity, military dominance, and international respect. The Bible says, “As long as he sought the Lord, God gave him success." Notice, God gave him success – success is not your achievement, it’s God’s gift.

Now in II Chronicles 26:15 we read, “His fame spread far and wide, for he was greatly helped until he became powerful. But after Uzziah became powerful, his pride led to his downfall." What follows is the tragic account of a king who becomes arrogant, self-willed, a man who starts doing it His way, not God’s way. And ultimately a man who dies the horrible death of leprosy.

Uzziah’s story is, unfortunately, not unique. The truth is that few of us are able to handle success. If you’re experiencing a time of success and pretty smooth sailing right now, it’s important to realize that you may be in the spiritual danger zone. When you’re flying high, it’s all too easy to forget how you got there. Or, more importantly, Who (capital “W”!) got you there. The ancient Jews were given a solemn warning from God when they went from the wilderness to the wealth of the Promised Land – “Be careful that you do not forget the Lord” – and, sure enough, they did.

So if this is a good season of your life, don’t ruin it by getting careless. Have you allowed your success to inflate you? Are you thinking, “Hey, I’m really something” instead of “He’s really something”? Have you moved from the desperate praying of the hard times to less frequent, less fervent prayers now in the good times? Have you started to rely on your gifts, your cleverness, your experience or your strength instead of totally depending on God? Are you becoming more self-focused? Are you taking more things into your own hands instead of leaving them in God’s hands?

Those are some of the great dangers of success. Don’t make God remind you who is the source of everything you’ve got. Success that costs you the blessing of your Lord is success you can’t afford.

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Copyright © Ron Hutchcraft Ministries, Inc., PO Box 400, Harrison, AR 72602. Used by permission. Written by Ron Hutchcraft. "Practical Answers to Real Life Issues"

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Baseball superstar Hank Aaron said, "It took me 17 years to get 3,000 hits in baseball. In golf, it took one afternoon."

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[Holwick - the following is a self-help expert's advice on values to instill in your children.]

Working with adults (as well as children and teens) for the past 12 years, I have noticed that there are just a few primary struggles that most adults face. I also see how better training as a child and teen could have given them the skills and attitudes that would have prevented the problems that they now face.

The primary areas adults struggle with are:

1. Money, primarily debt

2. Lack of discipline, or the inability to do what they want to be,

be it weight, money, work, etc.

3. Relationships

As I see it, much of the way we live our lives is groomed as we grow up. And while we can certainly change, it is harder to do the older we get. This can cut both ways: If we are taught correctly, we have a high chance of succeeding as adults and if we are taught poorly, there is a high chance that we will continue those poor habits into adulthood and face many difficulties.

The good news? We can put our kids on the fast track to success by diligently applying some basic success skills. To get you started, I've brainstormed some ways you can head off your children's problems years before they face them. Here we go!

To have successful relationships:

SHOW THEM UNCONDITIONAL LOVE. No matter what, we are to welcome and love our children. This does not mean that we won't get mad at them from time to time or that we won't discipline them when they cross the line. It means that we will always accept them and treat them with the respect they deserve as human beings, no matter what they have done. It means we do not hold grudges against them. We can disagree or even verbally tangle, but then we bury the hatchet and accept one another.

TEACH THEM MANNERS. There are acceptable ways of behaving. Unfortunately, many people today do not know them! Teach your children how to behave so that others are treated well and do not have to put up with our misbehavior. Why? Because they won't put up with it anyway. Many people will simply write you off and never tell you why.

HELP THEM LEARN TO FORGIVE. Most of the relationship problems I work with boil down to this: The people simply will not forgive one another and continue to hold past wrongs against the other person. Here is the fact, and you have to teach this to your kids: People will wrong you. It is what we do with that and how we react that will determine the health of the relationship in the future.

HELP THEM TO BE ABLE TO FOCUS ON AND SERVE OTHERS. Many parents make their kid feel like they are the center of the universe. One problem with this: They aren't! The world doesn't revolve around your kids and they can't get their way all of the time. What happens later on in life when little Johnny (who was the center of the universe growing up) marries little Suzie (the center of another universe growing up)? You got it, problems! Now they have to share a universe! Instead we should teach our children to help others. We should teach them to consider other people's interests as more important than our own.

To have successful finances:

MAKE THEM EARN MONEY. Sure you can give your kids money - we do. But we should also teach them to earn money. We should give them opportunity to earn money. I don't think a kid should get an allowance for doing chores. Chores are the responsibility of being part of the family. But you can give them extra jobs so they can understand fully the hard work they put in and appreciate the value of the money they receive. This will cause them to handle it better.

HAVE THEM GIVE MONEY AWAY. Greed works its wonders on some of the nicest people. That is what I have found. And the best way to break greed is to give money away. Our children give away 10% of every dollar they get. This builds generosity into their hearts. We have been doing it so long that it is just a part of them. How can you be greedy about something you are giving away? And when you give it away you can see the good that it does to the people and organizations you help. (One side story: When my son was younger and got one dollar a week in allowance he would give a dime away. He suggested it would be a good thing if he started getting two dollars - because then he would be able to give two dimes away. I don't know if he was being generous or shrewd!)

TEACH THEM ABOUT INVESTING. Yesterday I sat in the car explaining the law of supply and demand with my ten-year-old. Now he knows what something is "worth." Now he knows why Beanie Babies are so expensive, but a very efficient way of separating poor investors from their money. My kids hear about the old guns and butter theory. (Guns represent items that appreciate and butter represents the things that melt away. Invest in appreciating assets and you can have all the butter you want later on. Invest in butter and you won't ever have the guns.) These are basic principles that will allow your kids to be financially secure and not strapped later on. They will be the lender and not the borrower.

TEACH THEM TO DELAY SELF-GRATIFICATION. I touched on this in the last point. If we teach our kids to delay gratification, they can put themselves into a financial position wherein they can actually afford the item they want rather than put themselves into debt or a precarious position to get it. Besides, half the time when they wait, they don't want it in three weeks!

TEACH THEM TO NEVER HAVE ANY DEBT! No debt. Never. Period. Nada. Never, ever, ever. Pay cash or wait. Okay, did I get that through? Now let me be a little more temperate. Debt has created more problems I have dealt with than just about any other issue. Marriage problems, emotional problems, work problems, spiritual problems, and physical problems. We should engrain it into our kid's heads that the only acceptable debt is a home mortgage and they should be conservative with that and even pay cash if they can! I hear you, "But I can't get the car I want!" Too bad! See the guns and butter theory above! Your kids will visit your grave every week with flowers after you are gone if you love them and teach them to avoid debt.

To help them be successful in discipline:

HAVE THEM DO CERTAIN TASKS/CHORES ON A REGULARLY SCHEDULED BASIS. Discipline is, well, a discipline. Teach your kids to make their beds every morning. Or do wash every Monday. Or mow the lawn every Saturday morning. Building schedules builds disciplined people who do not procrastinate, who are methodical and who are diligent. These are the people who succeed.

LET THEM EXPERIENCE DISCIPLINE AND CONSEQUENCES. Consequences are the greatest teachers! Many people who I see fail are people who have never suffered consequences. I know a gentleman who couldn't hold a job. His employers were going to fire him. He was always late and couldn't be relied upon - even by his friends. You never knew if he was telling the truth. One day I was talking to him and he said that he had never been punished or disciplined! The light went on! I finally understood. You know the old saying, "Spare the rod and spoil the child?" I say, spare the rod and you'll raise a criminal! You may not want to let little Johnny experience the pain of consequences, but his boss will let him feel it 20 years from now! Prepare him for success now by making him realize that if he doesn't do what is right, he will spend a lot of time in his room or he will miss out on special things. He will grow up to be the most relied upon person in his office and he'll be the boss one day.

DON'T PROTECT THEM FROM LOSING. I coached little league football one year. It just so happens we were the youngest team in the league and we were terrible. One game we were getting beat 55-0 with about five minutes to play, and I was getting screamed at by an irate parent. I turned to them and said, "You know. I learned some of my best lessons in 55-0 losses. I took a few of them in my athletic career, and I handed a few out too!" Sometimes we win in life, sometimes we lose. We need to learn what it feels like to lose and then get right back out there. It will prepare your kids much better to lose until they win legitimately than to win all the time. I remember one basketball game when I was on my way to about thirty points and a parent from the other team was screaming about it. My brother, who is 13 years older than me, told the guy to sit down because I had earned all those points because of how many basketball thrashings I had taken at his hands through the years. Losing made me better!

TEACH THEM TO EAT RIGHT AND EXERCISE. Many people struggle with their weight and it is usually because we learned bad habits as kids. We weren't that overweight when we were younger, but as our metabolism slows it catches up with us. Teach your kids basic nutritional information. Teach them how candy bars plus milk shakes plus no exercise equals trouble! When we go to the health club, our kids can swim and play all they want in the pool - as soon as they finish their laps!

TEACH THEM TO MAKE TOUGH DECISIONS AND LEARN TO SAY "NO." The most powerful word in the world! We should teach our children to understand what is the most important - their priorities - and say "no" to everything else. So many people get themselves into trouble and overextended because they do not have the discipline to say "no." The reality is that you will act on an agenda - either yours or someone else's. Saying "no" enables you to stay on track. Teach them to make tough decisions because it is what is right or because it will be better in the long run, rather than on how it will make them feel.

ENCOURAGE THEM TO RISK FAILURE AND TRY NEW THINGS. I have met so many people who were always taught to play it safe. And guess what? They are playing it safe, leading, as the quote says, "Lives of quiet desperation." Teach your kids to try new things and give them the opportunity to do so. Help them see the bigger picture when they fail, like what they can learn from the situation so they can win the next time. It is the people who risk failure and try new things who change the world and lead the lives they want to!

PITCH THE TV. Okay, my soapbox: Get rid of the television. If you have to have the one-eyed monster in the house, just get a monitor so you can watch videos from time to time. I haven't had a TV for 12 years - and I LOVE IT! My kids are healthy, sociable, well-adjusted, smart kids. They have creative imaginations because they have to picture everything themselves rather than rely on someone else's interpretation. They read many grade levels above where they are. They have time to do all sorts of things that they want to because they have an extra 20 hours a week (1040 hours a year) that other kids their age don't! Someday I am going to write a book on benefits and reasons to get rid of the TV because the fact is you will be much better off without it than you are with it! And so will your kids!

___________________________

Chris Widener is a popular speaker and writer; chris@madeforsuccess.com

*

It's boring to achieve the pinnacle of success and have no more heights to climb.

It's also frightening.

"I had to cling to the walls just to walk down the hallways," said John Tatterson, who was highly respected as a dentist and a businessman before he walked away from it all and into the arms of God.

He and his wife, Doris, built the practice from three employees to 22 in 25 years. In addition to all the trappings of material success, Tatterson was the envy of his peers for his business acumen.

But success in business was a hollow victory for the man who now is an energized member of the missions committee and co-chairman of the deacons at Riva Trace Baptist Church in Annapolis, Maryland.

"No matter how much I accomplished, I always strived for a little more," Tatterson said. "It was pride. It was futile."

Tatterson took time to change the rolls of toilet paper at the office and to fluff pillows in the waiting room, but neglected his son and daughter.

"Our children paid the price for our success," Tatterson said. "We were not there. They were latchkey kids after they were 10 and 13."

The family attended church, but Tatterson now confesses he daydreamed about his business during Sunday morning worship, and he never joined in congregational singing.

Then came the staff meeting Dec. 7, 1994, when he suffered what at first was thought to be a heart attack.

"My ability to support myself was taken away in a moment," Tatterson said. "For a person so much in control, this was devastating."

Doctors at Johns Hopkins diagnosed Tatterson with severe clinical depression. Depression is anger turned inward, Tatterson said. Anger at not having any more mountains to climb; anger at not having a sense of fulfillment from the success he'd worked so hard to achieve; anger at his inability to maintain the sense of control that was so important to him.

One morning Tatterson got in his Lincoln, comforted by his sense of control over the high-dollar vehicle, and drove eight hours to his parents' home, where he stayed for 10 days.

A package came in the mail.

"Here, son, I think this is for you," his dad said. In actuality, it was a gift for a donation his parents had made to a ministry, and inside the package was a copy of "The Message" by Eugene Peterson, a translation of the Bible in contemporary language.

"I'd read the Bible before. I had a stack of them this tall," Tatterson said, raising his hand about two feet. "This time, my heart was ready for it. I read it and things began to make sense."

He returned home and for the first time at church listened to the pastor's message.

"I wept," Tatterson said. "I sang a song. I knew something was going on."

That was three months after his collapse.

That summer, during a revival meeting with a guest evangelist, "in a room of 200 people, I was the only one he was talking to," Tatterson said. "When the invitation was given I popped up like a bobbin on the water. I prayed the sinner's prayer and all the pressure I'd been under was relieved," as he accepted forgiveness of sin and invited Christ into his heart.

"I guess we all know what we are inside," Tatterson said. "Deep down I knew I was going through the motions. As I prayed the sinners' prayer I realized not only that my sins were forgiven, but that God loved me. I felt a sense of joy and hope so long absent in my being.

"All those years of trusting in myself, doing good works, and being a moral person melted away," Tatterson said. "It was God's grace that saved me. It was not until my knowledge of Jesus traveled from my head to my heart did I realize what eternal life was really about and that I had received it. I wept with joy."

Tatterson acquired an insatiable appetite for reading the Bible. "The words of Scripture I had read for so many years now became real and insightful," he said. "They pierced my heart."

He read the One-Year Bible in six months. He joined Bible Study Fellowship with a group of men. He said he was also blessed to be in an adult Sunday school class at Riva Trace Baptist, where the teacher brought the Scriptures alive.

Over time, Tatterson became convicted that he had not had a scriptural baptism when he became a Southern Baptist as a new father in 1968. He received believer's baptism on July 30, 2000.

"It was a joyful experience for me, for in the audience I saw tearful and joyful eyes looking back at me," Tatterson said.

One pair of eyes were those of his daughter, now pregnant with her fourth child. Years earlier, Leigh was 14 and excitedly talking with him upon returning from her first mission trip when she determined from his responses that he wasn't a Christian. Another pair of eyes watching Tatterson's believer's baptism was his son's. That formerly stormy relationship also has been healed since dad became a Christian.

Within months of Tatterson's conversion, he was introduced to Evangelism Explosion, an uncomplicated way to lead people to the Lord.

"The Great Commission was ringing in my ears," Tatterson said. "I felt it very important we witness."

While still in Evangelism Explosion training, and never having gone through the entire presentation, Tatterson was given the opportunity to go to Keiv, Ukraine, to train others in what popularly is known as "EE."

His first day there, Tatterson led a woman to the Lord.

"It was the easiest five minutes of my life," Tatterson said. "When we went in her house, she was sitting in the dark -- it was twilight. I watched her eyes and it was like Christmas lights coming on -- from despair to hope to joy."

That woman was the first of 20 or more people Tatterson has led to the Lord in 10 trips to four nations -- Ukraine, China, Cuba and Romania -- in addition to the ones he has led to the Lord in the United States.

"As I have continued in my walk with the Lord, I have found the more obedient I am in serving Christ, the less complicated my life becomes," Tatterson said. "Each time I go someplace the Lord provides an outstanding opportunity to be a witness -- for me to see how the Lord changes lives."

His wife said John Tatterson is an example of the life-giving change the Lord makes in a person's life.

"I thought he was a Christian before," she said. "He certainly looked and acted the part of a Christian. He's a very strong, self-made man, a good man. He's been a man who honored his wife and family. We always tithed. If you could get to heaven because you're a good person, John would have made it.

"But from the day he prayed the sinner's prayer, it's like he had a heart transplant," Doris Tatterson continued. "I've seen how God takes somebody and puts in a new heart. Now there's a spiritual side of him there never was before."

For three years after his breakdown, Tatterson sought the counsel of psychiatrists and the relief promised from a variety of prescription medications -- which gave him side effects without benefits -- to counteract the depression that would come and go like an oppressive fog despite his newfound faith and the hours he spent in Bible reading, the weeks each year he spent on short-term evangelistic mission projects, and the service he gave through his church.

He felt powerless over the symptoms that would wash over him: extreme fatigue, panic attacks, shortness of breath, inability to focus thoughts or make decisions, and more.

On May 14, 1998, he woke in the middle of the night and couldn't go back to sleep. Though he didn't usually do so when he couldn't sleep, on that night he picked up his Bible and started reading the New Testament Book of Acts.

He stopped turning pages when he got to Acts 3, where Peter encountered the cripple and said, "I do not possess silver and gold, but what I do have I give to you: in the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene -- walk."

Tatterson takes a deep breath as he recalls the significance of that moment.

"I read that. I read that again," he said. "I read it again, and at that moment my body had a warmth and a lightness it had never had before. I heard a voice in my mind: 'You're healed."

Three hours later he was out cutting his lawn -- the fog was gone; the fatigue was gone; all symptoms of his depression gone; and they haven't returned, except for an inability to practice dentistry. Each time he has tried, the panic attacks return.

"God healed me for his purpose, not mine," Tatterson said. "God has shown me through this that the things I strived for in the past were so unimportant. Dentistry helped me not one bit. What I've learned from my own life and from going overseas is that people who have nothing but the love of Christ, they're rich beyond comprehension."

*

Fastest man on earth is an unflappable Englishman

By Adrian Croft

GERLACH, Nev. (Reuters) - Andy Green, who made history by smashing the sound barrier on land Monday, is the very model of the unflappable Englishman, not turning a hair at driving at over 700 mph.

The 35-year-old Royal Air Force fighter pilot became the first person to drive a car at supersonic speed only one day short of 50 years after American test pilot Chuck Yeager made the first supersonic flight.

"He's the greatest land speed record driver ever -- it's as simple as that," Thrust team leader Richard Noble said.

Green drove the British Thrust SuperSonic Car across Nevada's remote Black Rock Desert at 764.2 mph, or 0.7 percent above the speed of sound. The achievement defied critics who said breaking the sound barrier on land was impossible because the car would take off.

He made another supersonic run 61 minutes after the first one but failed to set the world's first supersonic world land speed record because the turnaround time was one minute more than allowed under international rules.

The breaking of the sound barrier on land, however, is expected to be recognized by the official Federation Internationale Automobiliste.

Noble, who held the land speed record of 633 mph for 14 years until Green clocked 714 mph Sept. 25, has been impressed by his colleague's ability to drive to the speeds requested by the design team.

"He drives it accurately time after time after time. He's extremely cool. It's just a brilliant job," Noble said.

Green has said that the speed of sound was the last great challenge in land speed recordbreaking. "There have been 63 official records in the last 99 years, but at the end of the day, there will only be one sound barrier," he said recently.

He became involved in the Thrust project after reading in a newspaper that Noble was looking for a driver for his new supersonic car. Chosen from among 30 candidates, he is not paid for his work.

He is also the only person ever to drive Thrust -- on test drives in England and Jordan before coming to Nevada. He is here with his girlfriend, Jayne Millington, an RAF fighter controller in charge of the car's radio communications.

Green says he is not afraid of or nervous about driving the black jet car at speeds never before reached on land.

"Should I be? People keep asking me this. I'm afraid I'm missing something," he joked.

A squadron leader who took leave from the RAF to drive Thrust SSC, Green says his holiday job is much safer than his normal duties: flying Phantom and Tornado fighter jets.

Unlike in the Royal Air Force, with Thrust there is no need to balance safety with necessity. "If there's any question of safety, we just don't run. You don't have to go over and intercept Russians over the North Sea," he said.

Born in Atherstone, Warwickshire, Green entered the RAF in 1983 after gaining a first-class degree in mathematics from Oxford University. He has served with the RAF in Britain and Germany and on peacekeeping duties over Bosnia.

A keen sportsman, he rowed for Oxford University at the Henley regatta. He runs regularly and finished the Berlin marathon in 1988 in under three hours.

^REUTERS@

"The spirit, the will to win, and the will to excel are the things that endure. These qualities are so much more important than the events that occur."

-- Vince Lombardi, football coach

"Let us not be content to wait and see what will happen, but give us the determination to make the right things happen."

-- Peter Marshall, minister, QFTM 6/28/03

An outstanding high wire performer was explaining how he executed a breathtaking triple somersault: "To catch the swing, you must time your dive perfectly! It takes much practice!" "It must also take lots of courage!" the listener commented. "The secret is to throw your heart over the bar", he answered. "When you do, your body will follow!"

The same could be said for many other difficult tasks in life. Once we've decided our goal, prepared and practiced for it, the essential thing is to throw yourself into the endeavour with body, mind and soul. When we really want something worthwhile, with our whole being, we can achieve it provided we throw our heart over the bar. Then, as day follows night, our body will follow. (Daily Gems)

Outline by Dr. J. B. Williams

Why Do We Fail ?

Judges 16:20

"And she said, 'The Philistines be upon, thee, Samson.' And he

awoke out of his sleep, and said, 'I will go out as before and

shake myself.' And he wist not that the Lord was departed from

him."

There are always reasons for the success of successful people.

Go back in their life and somewhere we will find a basis for

their progress and advancement in life.

There are principles that are followed and discipline that is

exercised. That is their secret of success.

The same can be said regarding those who make failures of their

lives.

Samson was a man with a Godly heritage. He had good Godly parents.

He abused his privileges.

Why did a child with such a good background make such a failure?

His failure is a lesson for all of us, and it is so simple to

see.

There are certain principles a child of God must follow if he

is to march in the front lines of the Lord's army.

Failure to follow these principles for success and advancement

in the christian life and service, spells disaster. It did for

Samson, and will for all who follow in his train.

We must look at some of the reasons for Samson's failure, and

see to it that we do not make the same mistakes.

Until we follow the principles for spiritual growth, we cannot

enjoy the blessings of christian progress. Notice;

I. SAMSON FAILED TO DISCIPLINE HIS INNER LIFE.

The lesson we learn from him is, we must discipline our inner

life. Sadly, christian discipline is not observed by most

christians.

Strangely enough,this results in the lack of christian maturity.

Christian maturity includes both spiritual maturity as well as

emotional maturity.

It is amazing how in one generation old-fashioned home discipl-

ine has dissipated. That generation was taught self-discipline.

How do we discipline our inner lives ?

1. By saying "no" to the wrong things, and "yes" to the right.

2. By observing the principles of growth, without which there

can be no spiritual growth. These are:

[1] An organized study of God's Word. I Peter 2:2.

"As new born babes desire the sincere ( pure-unadult-

rated ) word of God, that ye may grow thereby."

Biblical truth is the spiritual diet. Studying requires

discipline.

This study includes sunday school attendance, other

church provided means of study, in worship services and

prayer meetings, etc.

[2] Application of these truths [exercise] for spiritual

growth. John 13:7. Again discipline is required.

3. Regular attendance at church services. Discipline re-

quired.

4. Giving of our means to the Lord's work. This requires dis-

cipline as to how we spend our income.

5. Set the correct priorities in life. First things first.

Samson failed because he tried to satisfy the desires of the

flesh in the forbidden way.

II. SAMSON FAILED TO DISCIPLINE HIS OUTWARD BEHAVIOR.

He failed to watch his conduct. Negligent about his outward

behavior.

1. He was not careful about the Places to which he went.

He went to Timnah, a border town of the Philistines.

Had he not gone there, he would not have been subjected to

temptations and fallen into sin.

Wrong places leads to real problems.

2. He was not careful about the People with whom he associated.

He became involved with three women that he should have

shunned.

[1] One of the daughters of the Philistines, whom he married.

[2] A harlot in Gaza.

[3] Delilah, who brought the final ruin upon him.

We must be careful with the people with whom we mix.

They may "clip our wings", as well as "cut our hair".

3. Samson was a Nazarite and did not faithfully discharge his

duties to the Lord.

He was careless about his testimony before the world.

He took lightly his responsibilities of sacred things.

Likewise, we must watch our conduct. This is where Samson

failed.

III. SAMSON FAILED TO DISASSOCIATE HIMSELF FROM GOD'S ENEMIES.

Samson played the fool because he constantly flirted with

sin.

He should have resisted temptations and lived in God's will.

He should not have allowed the lusts of the flesh to deter-

mine his conduct.

He allowed lust instead of love to be the basis of his

choice of a girl friend.

Samson failed to build his inner life to maturity, conse-

quently, he failed to pick the right places and people in

his life.

He failed in spite of the help he could have received from

heaven.

I Cor. 10:13. "There hath no temptation taken you but as

such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not

suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will

with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be

able to bear it."

Deliverance is available to all you seek it.

There is another very important principle that must be rec-

ognized from this tragic waste of life;

Separation from the enemies of God.

Samson failed to separate from the lusts of the flesh and

evil companions in his Conduct, but he also failed to sep-

arate in Creed.

He failed to disassociate himself from the enemies of God.

The Philistines had a different religion from the Jews.

Their concept of God and a relationship with Him was wrong.

Samson should have disassociated himself from them.

This is an important principle that God has required in

all the ages.

At the turn of the present century there were those who, in

opposition, separated from the enemies of God.

These true servants of God, have for almost 100 years opposed

liberalism, false religions [even those who claim to base

their religion on the Bible], apostasy, new age movement,

inclusiveism, the compromise of the truth, and have stood

upon the principles of the purity of doctrines, of purity of

conduct, and separation from the enemies of God.

God does not desire His people to associate with His

enemies, and to separate from those who do not separate

of their own accord.

In the plan of God, ecclesiastical separation is an obligation

just as binding as is personal separation. 2 Cor. 6:17-18.

"Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate,

saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will

receive you, And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be

my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty."

END

A television commercial I saw recently portrays a man in a car talking on his cell phone — with the devil. The man and the Devil banter back and forth, the Devil offering the man riches and power and so on. But the smiling driver refuses each of these offers as he accelerates around a mountainous curve. Admiring his car, he says, “I have all that” and hangs up. We now understand what the ad is selling. But I wonder if it is also, not so subtly, selling something else. The commercial seems to say, pleasure is not a spiritual matter; it is something in which you alone are the driver.

King Solomon was a man who had every pleasure the human eye has ever desired, yet he came to a strikingly different conclusion. In the book of Ecclesiastes he wrestles with a question any pleasure driven culture would do well to ponder. He asks, “What does pleasure really accomplish?”

Solomon sets out to find the answer to that question, using pleasure as his vehicle. He writes, “I denied myself nothing my eyes desired. I refused my heart no pleasure.” King Solomon embraced the pleasures of success and power, wine and women, servants and entertainers. He built buildings, expanded his territory and possessed more wealth than any kingdom. And he observes, “My heart took delight in all my work and yet this was the reward for all my labor — when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a mere chasing after the wind. Nothing was gained under the sun.”

Jack Higgins, an accomplished author, was once asked in an interview, “What is it you know now that you wish you'd known as a younger man?” Without even batting an eyelid, he said, “I wish I had known that when you get to the top, there is nothing there.”

To borrow from our earlier illustration, when you alone are the driver in your pursuit of pleasure, pleasure will ultimately end up driving you. It will drive you from pleasure to pleasure — each time with the hope of fulfillment. Weariness comes when you realize this seemingly looming fulfillment is quite simply an empty mirage.

Solomon pointedly describes this when he proclaims over and over, “Nothing was gained under the sun.” It is that qualifier, “under the sun” which unlocks the answer. It is a Hebraism literally meaning, “Outside of God.” You see, when you lock God out of your pursuits everything becomes a chasing of the wind.

Pleasure “under the sun” exudes the promise of refreshing, but in the end is only exhausting, an endless chase of emptiness. Dear friends, the satisfaction you and I seek is fulfilled along the road to Christ. When He is what drives you, pleasure yields new meaning.

____________

Copyright © 2002 Ravi Zacharias International Ministries (RZIM). Reprinted with permission. "A Slice of Infinity" is a radio ministry of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries.

”Success is not to be pursued; it is to be attracted by the person you become.” — Jim Rohn

“Success is 20% skills and 80% strategy. You might know how to read, but more importantly, what’s your plan to read?” — Jim Rohn

“Failure is not a single, cataclysmic event. You don’t fail overnight. Instead, failure is a few errors in judgment, repeated every day.” — Jim Rohn

“When you know what you want, and you want it bad enough, you will find a way to get it.” — Jim Rohn

“Without a sense of urgency, desire loses its value.” — Jim Rohn

Since studies tell us that only three percent of people have a complete goals program, what better time than now, the start of a new year, and a new century, to review goal setting?

We think that more than three percent of our readers have a complete goals program, simply because of the type of people you are. However, even if most of our readers have a complete goals program, we’d like to boost that percentage closer to 100 percent. We know from experience that a written goals program makes a huge difference in life. So we encourage you to follow these steps from the Personal Development module of Training Ziggets.

1. Put your goals in writing. Ask yourself: What do I want to be, do and have? Write your answers on a sheet of paper or in a journal. Come on now, work with us, do it right now!

2. List the benefits of achieving these goals. Answer the question: What’s in it for me? You say you want to lose 20 pounds? What are the benefits of dropping that weight? You say you want to buy a new house? What are the benefits of doing so? You say you want to get closer to your spouse? What are the benefits of a better relationship? Record these benefits on paper. Write down as many of them as you can. Think about them. Try to experience them.

3. Next step, think about the obstacles or challenges that stand between you and your goal. You say you want to improve your spiritual life. What’s keeping you from doing so? Perhaps you don’t know other spiritual people and it would help to meet them. Perhaps you don’t belong to a Bible study, but it would help if you did. Perhaps you could benefit by reading numerous books of a spiritual nature. Think of what’s in your way and then think about how to remove that obstacle.

4. What skills or knowledge will you need to reach each goal? You want to master e-commerce so you can earn more money in your business? What will you need to know? Where can you get this information? Can you sign up for a college course? Can you gain enough knowledge by reading about this subject, or attending seminars? Identify the skills and knowledge you’ll need, and then find solutions to what you need.

5. Who can help you achieve your goals? There are individuals as well as groups, companies and organizations that may help you reach your goal. Do you need a tutor? A coach? Is there a support group that can help you? Ask around. Look around. These resources are available.

6. Develop a plan of action to reach your goals. It’s well and good to think about the future, but until you actually create a fulfillment plan, you probably won’t realize your goals. How are you going to get there? By now, you have some of those answers. When will you arrive at this goal? How long will it take? Keep in mind that some goals require more than a few days or even months to complete. You will have short-term as well as long-term goals. All the same, you must develop action plans to reach these goals.

7. Set the dates for reaching your goals. If you say, “Some day I’m going to buy a new car,” there’s a good chance “some day” will always be another day, and not ever today. “Some day” just doesn’t arrive. So set dates for achieving your goals. That way, you can build your action plan around these dates. You can watch your progress. You can pick up speed whenever necessary. Keep those dates in mind and your mind is more likely to focus on helping you move towards your goals.

Are you still with us? If so, please take time now to write your goals program. If you’ve already done so, congratulations. You’re among the small percentage of people who will surely realize your dreams and get ahead in life.

“Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works which were done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes” Mat 11:21

There’s something about success that brings arrogance. I guess it comes naturally. If you are the best, then you are the best and no one can deny that. The problem with arrogance is that it breeds contempt. Contempt is an attitude that says “I’m the best and you are nothing.” Obviously, that is a dangerous position to take. No one likes to associate with a contemptuous person — they just seem to make you feel small. But it doesn’t stop there. Contempt gives way to complacency. Complacency is that position which says “I’m the best. No one can touch me. Therefore I will lean back and take it easy.”

If I recall my childhood stories correctly, it was complacency that brought an end to the rabbit’s reign as the fastest of the animals of the field. You may remember the story of the race between the tortoise and the hare. Mr. Rabbit was so far ahead that he though he could take a nap — so he did. Mr. Turtle knew he was not fast, but he kept plodding along at his slow but steady pace. Eventually he slipped by Mr. Rabbit who was cutting a few “z’s”. At the last moment the rabbit awoke, realized what had happened and cut in the afterburners — all to no avail. The tortoise won by a “hair” (sorry for the pun!)

What’s the point? Israel was “so far ahead” of all other nations that they thought God would never turn on them — after all they were the “chosen of God!” Jesus pulls their heads out of the sand by saying that Tyre and Sidon — two very ungodly city-states destroyed generations before by God, would have repented of their sins with great mourning if they had seen what Israel had seen in the form and actions of Jesus. God would bring destruction upon Israel again if they didn’t repent and accept Jesus as their Savior! (And so He did in 70 AD when the Roman army breached the walls of Jerusalem and destroyed the Temple — which has not been rebuilt to this day.)

The Church is in much the same position — especially the American Church. We have seen so many “moves of God,” we have participated in so much world evangelism, we have been so close to God, that we feel invincible. “Because of all we have done, it is inconceivable that God would ever turn His back on us,” is the common thought. The problem is that this is an inaccurate statement. When God sends Jesus to collect His bride, He will come for a purified bride — one that is spotless and pure — not one that had compromised and played the part of the unrepentant harlot. That “bride” will be shunned. Jesus is trying to “clean us up,” but the Church often refuses. Instead she continues to be “inclusive” towards those who are in direct opposition to what we read in God’s Word. She defers to popular opinion rather than God’s Truth. She waters down the Gospel we preach so no one will be offended. Jesus is calling the Church to repent! Let it begin with me — and you!

If your religion doesn’t take you to church, it won’t take you to heaven.

Dave Longaberger graduated from high school at age 20. He repeated first grade and three-peated fifth grade. He reads at the eighth-grade level, stutters, and has epilepsy. In 1996, his company, The Longaberger Company, sold more than $525 million in handmade baskets, pottery, fabric, and other home décor items through 36,000 independent sales consultants. How did it happen?

Dave possesses an entrepreneurial spirit. As a child working in a grocery store, he learned that the way to please the boss was to figure out what the boss wanted and get it done. He studied people and learned that work could be fun and he did a better job when he enjoyed his work. In the army Dave learned about uniformity, control, consistency and Central Headquarters. He also learned to be a risk-taker and not a gambler.

Eventually Dave bought a grocery store and ran it very successfully. All the time he was preparing for bigger and better things. His optimism, patience and hard work enabled him to overcome many difficulties. We all can learn from the lessons that Dave learned on the way to the top.

Readers' Digest carried an article called “Seven Secrets of Peak Performance” by Dr. Charles Garfield. He's the head of a research institute called Peak Performance Center. They studied 1,500 outstanding achievers in all walks of life - business, athletics, education, every area of life. They were looking for common denominators.

What is it that makes the difference between a person who's a super-success and another person who tries their best but they just get mediocre results? Are there any characteristics, common denominators of peak performance people?

Yes, there are seven of them. The number one characteristic of the top achievers in the world is that they lead a well-rounded life. They're balanced.

High achievers, we often hear, are extremists. They spend all their time on one thing. Garfield says that's a misconception. High performers, in contrast, are willing to work hard but within strict limits. For them, work is not everything.

When Garfield interviewed top executives in ten major industries he found that they knew how to relax and they could leave their work at the office. They also prized close friends and family life, and they spent a healthy amount of time with their children. They were balanced.

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When you're five years old, you have a number of those milestone experiences - lots of “firsts.” Like your first soccer game - which our five-year old grandson had not long ago. I reminded our daughter that she has just joined that much-talked about tribe called “soccer moms.” Well, our grandson had never played soccer before, and he doesn't have an older brother or sister to learn from. So his first game was a great learning experience. And he did a good job. But not good enough for the kind of performance most firstborns expect of themselves. Though he got the ball several times for his team and moved it down the field, he didn't score any goals - and he was bothered that he missed one. Right after the game, he gave his mom his two word summary of how he thought he did. He just said, “I tried.”

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about “It Really Is 'How You Play The Game.'“

Well, at least on God's team. That's why Jesus' finish line commendation for His players will be, “Well done, good and faithful servant” (Matthew 25:21), not “Well done, good and successful servant.” What God cares about - what God rewards - is an all-out effort. The results are in His hands. The effort is in yours.

What impresses God about His players is clear in our word for today from the Word of God. He says in Colossians 3:23 and 24: “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving.” You're not playing for the applause of the crowd or even the approval of your teammates. As far as you're concerned, there's only one Person in that stadium - Jesus, your Coach. If you've got His smile, you're winning - not if you're winning, you've got His smile. He wants you to be able to honestly say, “Coach, I really tried.”

If you're playing your position with all your heart, you are pleasing Jesus. Your wholehearted effort may mean you get A's or it may mean you get C's, that you're the best one they've got or just considered average, or that you get amazing results or you seldom see results. You can't give any more than all your heart. And though we live in a world that cares only if you score, only if you look good, only if you win, you can be free inside knowing you're playing for the One who gives the biggest rewards. And Jesus rewards relentless faithfulness. That means you're still in there fighting when everybody else has dropped out.

Maybe God has assigned you to play a position on His team that's behind the scenes, doing things for Him that few people notice or value. And even you feel like what you do doesn't matter much - even to God. Surely, it doesn't matter as much as the big, public things some of your brothers and sisters are doing for God. But remember who gets the Super Bowl ring - every member of the team, not just the guys who scored the points. That's how God looks at all of us. Your part, your reward, matters just as much to Him as that of some great pastor or evangelist. In fact, the less glory you get on earth, the more He will give you in heaven for your all-out effort for Him.

So hold your head high, no matter what position you play. Don't let that discouragement wear you down any more - not if you're giving it all you've got. If you are, then in God's eyes - the only opinion that ultimately matters - you are a champion. Earth may not have many rewards for you. But God's gold medal will one day hang around your neck!

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Copyright © Ron Hutchcraft Ministries, Inc., PO Box 400, Harrison, AR 72602. Used by permission. Written by Ron Hutchcraft. "Practical Answers to Real Life Issues"

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