I encourage you to subscribe for free to have the My Utmost For His Highest by Oswald Chambers to come to your email every day. I am enjoyed a renewed interest in his daily devotionals.

For example the devotional for March 17 was tken from 2 Corinthians 5:⁹ Therefore we also have as our ambition, whether at home or absent, to be pleasing to Him.” The Greek for “ambition is philotimeomai: To strive earnestly, to aspire, to be ambitious. “The verb “philotimeomai” conveys the idea of making it one’s aim or ambition to achieve something honorable or praiseworthy. It reflects a strong desire to accomplish a goal that is considered noble or virtuous. In the New Testament, it is used to describe a commendable pursuit or aspiration, often in the context of living a life that is pleasing to God.” (AI). The word is also translated as “goal” or “aim”, but I think “ambition” is the best translation. “While ambition can be a positive motivator, unchecked or excessive ambition can lead to negative consequences, including unethical behavior, burnout, and neglecting important aspects of life.” There is nothing wrong with having the ambition to climb the corporate ladder, achieve success in your career or field, make a lot of money, or own a lot of possessions as long as that ambition doesn’t become the main goal in life to the neglect of the spiritual or as long as we give God the glory and use our success for Him.

But notice that 2 Corinthians 5:9 says that our ambition should be “to be pleasing to Him”. There is nothing wrong with having spiritual goals, such a converting others, helping build a good church, going on mission trips, being involved in community efforts, etc. But Chambers says that those things should no be out ambition or aim. Our ambition should simply be to be pleasing to God. Yes, that would lead to striving to achieve some spiritual goals, but our ambition is just to be pleasing to God. If we make that our ambition, then the Spirit will guide us into specific spiritual things that God wants us to be to make him happy, to make him be pleased with us. Sometimes we set our own spiritual goals mainly to please ourselves, using our own wisdom and gifts without seeking God to see if he would really be pleased with what we are trying to achieve. I might be wanting to preach somewhere but that might not be what he wants me to do to be pleasing to him. He might have other things that He wants me to do.

That Greek word for “ambition” is only used 3 times in the New Testament: Romans 15:20 where Paul “aspired” to preach the gospel; 2 Corinthings 5:9; and in 1 Thessalonians 4:11. I love the one in 1 Thessalonians 4:¹¹ and to make it your ambition to lead a quiet life and attend to your own business and work with your hands, just as we instructed you, ¹² so that you will behave properly toward outsiders and not be in any need.” I especially like this passage b/c it describes my dad. He was from the “great generation.” AI: “The “Greatest Generation” refers to Americans born roughly between 1901 and 1927, who came of age during the Great Depression and World War II, and are often characterized by their strong work ethic, frugality, and patriotism.” My dad was born in 1918 so he lived through the Great Depression and World War II (although he did not serve b/c of some medical reason I have been told). He was raised country farm dirt poor. I’m not sure he graduated high school before he went to work with a concrete making plant and worked for them for about 50 years. He never made more than minimum wage so he worked a lot of overtime to provide for us. There was no union at his work, so his reward for all those years was a retirment check of about $100 per month! He built a modest house for us to live in comfortably but we never had much money. He took time to carry me fishing a lot and we built a cabin from scratch on Smith Lake and spent many weekends there fishing and swimming. He attended church regularly with our family but never led a prayer in church. He never prayed aloud with me or our family except when my mom would say at the dinner table, “Ambres, lead the prayer”, and he would pray “God is great, God is good, let us thank him for our food”. We never had a spiritual talk. He never said “I love you”, probably b/c his parents never expressed love for each other. The first time he said “I love you” to me was when he was 72 and was told that he had only 2 more years to live due to a lung disease. He spend those last 2 years expressing love, listening to gospel music, and reading the Bible, and died at age 74 in 1992. As you can see, he didn’t do a lot of the things you might expect a spiritual father to do. But what he did do was to make it his ambition or goal in life to fulfill that passage in 1 Thessalonians 4:¹¹ and to make it your ambition to lead a quiet life and attend to your own business and work with your hands, just as we instructed you, ¹² so that you will behave properly toward outsiders and not be in any need.” He did those things all his life! He lived a simple, quiet life. He mided his own business. He worked with his hands. He helped anyone who needed someone to fix something. He did things for a lot of people. When he died, about 500 people signed the register book at his visitation or funeral. Those people were from work, church, family, community, etc. Just a lot of people that he had helped, using his hands and knowledge of how to fix things, all through his life. We tend to think that a “spiritual”man is a Bible quoting, daily Bible reader, prayer leader, elder or deacon in the church, regular church attender, etc. But to me, my dad defines what it means to be spiritual for just a lot of ordinary, hard working, common people.

Read what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 12:¹⁴ For the body is not one part, but many. ¹⁵ If the foot says, “Because I am not a hand, I am not a part of the body,” it is not for this reason any less a part of the body. ¹⁶ And if the ear says, “Because I am not an eye, I am not a part of the body,” it is not for this reason any less a part of the body. ¹⁷ If the whole body were an eye, where would the hearing be? If the whole body were hearing, where would the sense of smell be? ¹⁸ But now God has arranged the parts, each one of them in the body, just as He desired. ¹⁹ If they were all one part, where would the body be? ²⁰ But now there are many parts, but one body. ²¹ And the eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you”; or again, the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” ²² On the contrary, it is much truer that the parts of the body which seem to be weaker are necessary; ²³ and those parts of the body which we consider less honorable, on these we bestow greater honor, and our less presentable parts become much more presentable, ²⁴ whereas our more presentable parts have no need of it. But God has so composed the body, giving more abundant honor to that part which lacked, ²⁵ so that there may be no division in the body, but that the parts may have the same care for one another. ²⁶ And if one part of the body suffers, all the parts suffer with it; if a part is honored, all the parts rejoice with it.”

Think about what Paul said. We tend to give the most honor to the more gifted in the church, the leaders, the preacher, the elders, the youth ministers, the ones who seem to be more important. But Paul says that those people know that they are more gifted and more visible, and they do not need to constantly be told how important they are. they don’t need special attention to buld them up, to show how badly they are needed in the body. Often times they are inflated with their own gifts and importance, as was teh case in the Corinthian church where some of the more gifted members had become arrogant. Instead it is the less noticeable who we need to give special attention and honor to. We need to constantly be telling them how important they are in the body. There is someone like my dad who got very little notice in the church activities, but the church is the people, not the organized church business model. He was important to the body in what he was doing to use his hands to help a lot of people outside of the church assembly, men’s business meetings, Bible classes, or visitation programs. We tend to think of the church in the church business model and what the members visibly do for the church business. Instead we should think of the church as the people using their gifts 24/7 at home, at work, in their friendships, in taking care of their kids and/or elderly parents. We sometimes say “10% of the members do 90% of the church work”, but that usually means church work taking care of the building, being involved in the visitation program, attending Sunday night as well as Sunday morning, attending Wednesday evening Bible classes, doing projects around the building, taking care of assembly preparations, etc. Maybe not all, but many of those 90% that we criticize are people like my dad who are fulfilling 1 Thessalonians 4:11 every day. They are doing “church work”. Or maybe some unassuming, humble, barely noticeable lady member who takes food to the poor every Saturday, or takes care of elderly parents, or takes care of some widows in the church or takes care of foster children. That is “church work”. We tend to give honor to those more visible in the church busines work instead of the real church work. We need to keep giving special honor to the less noticeable members doing the less noticeable church work.

I guess I got sidetracked! Just make it your ambition to be pleasing to God and He will guide you on what He wants you to do. It might not be what you want to do, but that doesn’t matter! Ask yourself every moment today: “Does what I am doing, thinking, or saying please the Father?

Adios y Dios los bendiga! Goodbye and God bless you.