Can a Christian be ambitious?
Dave Crofts
Firstly, what is ambition? Let's just get a handle on the nature of the beast. Here's a dictionary definition:
ambition n. An eager or strong desire to achieve something, such as fame or power.
I'm sure that in a church with as many doctors and other professional types as we have, many if not most of us have come up against the question of how we fit our desire for success and personal advancement with our Christian faith. And even if it's not a career thing, I'm sure we all have some ambitions - sporting ones, family ones, social ones, even gastronomic ones...
So, can a Christian be ambitious? It's a "Yes...but" basically. Two "Yes...buts" in fact. And here's the first:
1) Yes... but give God the glory
It would be daft, wouldn't it, to suggest that whenever someone becomes a Christian they have to instantly let go of all ambition and stop trying? Our churches would be full of lazy slobs if that was the case - and looking out at you lot I know that isn't the case.
No, as Christians God wants us to work hard. Why? Because we're ultimately working for him, using the gifts that he gave. It would be wrong to let those skills and talents go to waste by just staying in bed all day every day...
The problem with having abilities that fuel our ambitions is that ambition very easily turns into self-promotion. And it's when ambition gets selfish that things turn ugly, as James wrote:
...where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice...
James 3:16
So what's the remedy? Give God the glory. As you achieve your ambitions - get that promotion, that car, that exam result - thank him and praise him rather than just giving yourself a big pat on the back.
That's one "Yes...but" dealt with. Here's the second:
2) Yes... but give the gospel the priority
We've just been saying that for the Christian, ambition is all about making the best possible use of the gifts God has given you. But what is the best gift God has given you?
Well, it's the gospel, isn't it? And that absolutely has to shape all other ambitions we hold. Our overriding ambition should be to make the best possible use of the salvation God has given us. That will mean living in the light of it, and telling others about it.
The apostle Paul was a very ambitious man - quite the 'career rabbi' before his dramatic conversion. And even as a Christian he retained his ambitious nature - he just redirected it. In Romans 15 he says that:
...I make it my ambition to preach the gospel...
Romans 15:20
Whatever we long to achieve in this life has to be shaped by what we long for in the next. By the big picture. By heaven, and the gospel that gets people there.
So we mustn't let the furtherance of our career or our sports team or our bank account or whatever other ambitions we hold take top spot away from God and the gospel he has given us.
The most obvious application is to our evangelism. Our ambition as Christians should be to preach the gospel to the glory of God. But it doesn't end there - we should be striving to live a life that backs up the gospel and glorifies God by doing so.
So, Christians can be ambitious, but only in a way that is radically different from the world. The world's ambition turns nasty because it's selfish and it's disproportionate. Our ambition must be for God's glory, not our own - and therefore for the proclamation of his gospel and our own sacrificial obedience to it.
Jesus set us the supreme example. If he'd let ambition for worldly gain override his passion for God's glory and for the gospel, he would never have humbled himself to die on a cross for us. So we should all be able to say with Paul that our ambition is:
... that I may know Christ and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.
Philippians 3:10-11