Tear Down the Idols • Success • Ps Erin Manners • Church Online: 17 May

we all really truly long to hear, well done, good and faithful servant. You know, I've sometimes thought about what I would want written on my gravestone, and it it certainly isn't gonna be that she had a really cool job or she had she had some great friends. She had a nice house. Nobody cares about any of that stuff. What I think I would love to have written on my gravestone is that she loved God and she loved people. To me, if people remembered me for that, I think that would be a life of godly success and significance, and it's something to ponder for all of us. What would you want written on your gravestone? What would you wanna be remembered for? [00:27:36] (48 seconds)  #LoveGodLovePeople

And we have time now because we're all here in this room to make a change or to adapt what we're doing, to tear down that idol of success and focus on who God is and how we can love others, how we can make a difference in people's lives, not chasing after all of those worldly things that are not bad. A lot of them are good, but not putting them at the center of our hearts and our lives and our focus. So to tear down the idol of success, we need to anchor our identity in Christ, not in what we do or in what others opinions might be. We need to pursue faithfulness to God's call, not our own way or our own plans. We need to listen to him. [00:28:24] (48 seconds)  #AnchorIdentityInChrist

Here are some things that John teaches us in this passage. Everything we have ultimately comes from God, and he gets the credit for our gifts, for the things that we have, for the life that we lead. It's all because of him. It's a gift from him. When we know our role, we aren't threatened by the success of someone else. We can even celebrate the success of others without it making us feel inferior. I love it. He says, I'm filled with joy at his success. Could we say that about the person who got the promotion over us or someone else who got given the opportunity that we missed out on? It's very challenging. [00:24:05] (41 seconds)  #CelebrateOthersSuccess

You know, when success becomes an idol, it never delivers on everything that it promises, and it can often come at the cost of people we love. I was talking to my son the other day. He's got a friend whose dad is a very wealthy businessman. He spends a lot of time overseas, and Dom, just asked his friend, oh, well, what does your dad do? He's very interested in that kind of thing. And his friend said to him, actually, I don't know. [00:09:45] (29 seconds)  #PresenceOverProvision