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A Ambition
From Aesop's Fables:
THE COCK AND THE JEWEL
A Rooster, scratching for food for himself and his hens, found a precious stone on the ground instead. He exclaimed to the jewel: “If your owner had found thee, and not I, he would have taken thee up, and have set thee in thy first estate; but I have found thee for no purpose. I would rather have one barleycorn than all the jewels in the world.”
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How many of the goals and rewards we focus our efforts toward are also "for no purpose"?
Source: SAGE Digital Library
Topics/Tags: Ambition; Riches; Worldliness
In 1968 Albert Carr wrote in the Harvard Business Review:
"No one expects poker to be played on the ethical principles preached in churches. In poker it is right and proper to bluff a friend out of the rewards of being dealt a good hand . . . To be a winner, a man must play to win . . . From time to time every businessman, like every poker player, is offered the choice between certain loss or bluffing within the rules of the game. If he is not resigned to losing, if he wants to rise in his company and industry, then is such a crisis he will bluff—and bluff hard."
An "expert" in his field, Carr suggests that no hard-and-fast rules—not the rules of humankind, and certainly not the rules of God—are as important as winning and "rising."
Do we make the mistake of adopting the secular world's business priorities?
Source: Chewning, Richard C., et al, Business Through the Eyes of Faith, pp. 235-236
"The world would be better off if people tried to become better. And people would become better if they stopped trying to become better off. For when everybody tries to become better off, nobody becomes better off. But when everybody tries to become better, everybody is better off."
— Peter Maurin
Source: Leadership, Vol. 5, no. 4.
Topics/Tags: Ambition; Improvement
A scenario, from a 1995 poll of 198 sprinters, swimmers, powerlifters and other athletes, most of them U.S. Olympians or aspiring Olympians: You are offered a banned performance-enhancing substance, with two guarantees: (1) you will not be caught, and (2) you will win. Would you take the substance? 195 athletes said yes; 3 said no.
Scenario II: You are offered a banned performance-enhancing substance that comes with two guarantees: (1) you will not be caught, and (2) you will win every competition you enter for the next five years, and then you will die from the side effects of the substance. Would you take it? More than half the athletes said yes.
Source: Sports Illustrated, 4/14/1997.
In Sold Out (Word, 1997), Promise Keepers founder Bill McCartney writes:
Recently I spoke at a large arena. The moment I stepped off the stage, I began asking friends and associates how I'd done. There were high fives, back slaps, encouraging compliments to the effect that I'd "hit a home run." I went back to the hotel quite pleased with myself.
The next morning, early, I went to my knees. God wasn't to be found. I asked, "Lord, where are You? I rose early to meet with You. I spoke of Your wonder and glory last night. I praised You with all of my heart. I thought You would be pleased. What have I done? Where are You?"
In that very instant, I sensed God was asking me a direct question: "Last night, when you finished your message, why didn't you ask Me how you did? You came to Me for anointing to speak, but you went to your friends seeking their opinions. Why did you not seek Mine first?"
It broke my heart to hear it. But it was true. I'd spent weeks seeking God's heart for that message. And it was a home run; the power of the Holy Spirit fell upon that arena--not because of anything I said, but because God showed up. And yet I didn't seek God's affirmation first. I sought the approval of men. I confessed my sin and repented. Immediately God's sweetness returned. It shocked me into seeing that the only One I've ever needed to please is God.
Source: Bill McCartney, Sold Out
Topics/Tags: Ministry; Ambition; Fellowship, with god; Approval
"Discontent is something that follows ambition like a shadow."
- Henry H. Haskins
Source: Instant Quotation Dictionary, p. 99.
Topics/Tags: Discontent; Ambition; Satisfaction
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