A Different Scoreboard

This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate in it day and night, that you may observe to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success. Joshua 1:8, NKJV

Chuck Noll believed success wasn’t always reflected on the scoreboard. I think he would rather have seen his team play well and lose than play poorly and win. Obviously, the nature of competitive sports defines success in terms of wins and losses, but that doesn’t always measure matters of the heart. And in God’s Kingdom, real success is a heart issue.

Leading a team to a Super Bowl win is considered the pinnacle of an NFL coach’s profession, and I’m fortunate enough to have done that. But that was never an all-encompassing quest for me. I knew it would not make my life complete if we won or leave me feeling unfulfilled if it never happened. I wanted to win, of course—I’m as competitive as the next guy. But significance isn’t found in things like winning a Super Bowl—or whatever is considered to be the pinnacle of your career or ambitions. No, significance is found in focusing on the priorities you know are important: doing as good a job as you can do, spending quality time with people you love, and investing yourself in ministry opportunities and influencing others for good. In other words, real success is about doing what God has called you to do as well as you can.

When we figure that out, it sets us free from a lot of pressure. We don’t have to become a head coach, a CEO, a PhD, a billionaire, or a celebrity in order to be successful. There’s nothing wrong with being any of those things, but our significance doesn’t depend on them. In fact, we need to find our significance long before we ever step into one of those roles. We need to set our minds on discovering what God has put us here to do and then doing it as well and as faithfully as we can. When our hearts and our actions are true to our callings, God considers us successful. And in the end, His is the only scoreboard that counts.

Uncommon Key > God measures success by how faithfully we follow Him, not by outward accomplishments. Write down what you think your score with Him is this morning. Try and get it higher by the end of the day in ways that matter, starting with your family.

From the book