Success means so many things to so many people as what I may
see as success might not be regarded as success by some other person. It is however
necessary to define success to mean achieving what you set out to achieve at
any given point in time. This definition of success makes it mean different things
to different people. Biblical kingdom success can be defined to mean achieving what
you set out to achieve as a Christian in life through the way of God and that
is through the instrumentality of the Holy Spirit who is the ultimate guide and
teacher of every true Christian. The ultimate success for every true Christian is
making Heaven.
Principles of Success in the Bible
The following can be said to be some of the standard
principles of success in the Bible:
1. Belief or Faith: this principle enunciates that you will
have what you believe that you can have and this can further be referred to as faith
which in the Biblical way is believing that you already have a thing once God
has promised you that you can have such a thing in the Bible even if it seems
humanly impossible – Mark 11: 23 – 24 where the Bible has made us to believe that
we can have anything that we so desire to have once we believe.
2. Diligence: believing in a thing does not automatically make
it yours and this is because God is not a magician, you must work at that thing
and not just working but working steadfastly on it. Diligence is simply working
on a thing steadfastly. When you work on a thing with a heart of determination
and steadfastness combining it with faith, you will become a success at it – Proverbs
10:4 shows you the benefit of being diligent at what you do and the
consequences of being lazy and Proverbs 21:5 also goes to buttress the point.
3. Wisdom: this can be said to be the direct application of
what you know to your everyday life. Knowing a thing does not make you wise but
applying such a thing to your everyday circumstance is what makes you wise. Reading
the Bible does not make you wise but applying the principles that you have learned
from the Bible is what makes you wise – Proverbs 4:7 admonishes us that the best
thing that you can get in life is wisdom.
4. Desire or Hope: when you have your faith placed on God for a
thing and you are working diligently towards the attainment of that goal, you
must also have a desire to see such a goal attained. This is because desire or
hope is the mother of faith. When you have a desire for a thing, it will help
you build up your faith for the actualization of such a thing which will
ultimately lead to the realization of such a set goal – Proverbs 23:7 where the
Bible made us to understand that we are just the way we think we are in our
hearts. The heart is the birth place of who we will actually become.
5. Self Control: the ability to be able to control your soul
and spirit is another key principle to becoming a success. Not being able to
control your emotions like anger, your impulse for getting or buying things
will ultimately affect the rate at which you will end up being a success
because what you do not control will end up controlling you. It starts as a
small seed that will end up becoming a giant tree or even a monster that you
will be unable to control and even the Bible in Proverbs 25:28 tells us that a
person that cannot control his or her spirit is likened to a city that has no
walls.
Aspects of self control
There are different aspects of self control that you have to
work on in order to end up becoming a success and these are a few of such
aspects:
a. Urges and Impulses: this is one aspect of self control that
you have to work on to be a success. It is not everything that you see and like
that you should have or buy. Buying everything that you desire will make you
end up a pauper without any form of savings or financial freedom whatsoever and
this will ultimately lead to borrowing that will land you into debts. Always remember
that a borrower is always subject to the lender.
b. Friendships: your relationship should also be a subject of
self control. It is not everyone that you come across that should end up being
your friend. Taking quality time to study a person is essential for the test
and stability of any true friendship. Friendship rushed into ends up most times
in disasters or hurriedly because sufficient time was not taken in building a
relationship that will last.
c. Search or the Desire for more money: there is a need for you
to control the urge to keep acquiring more money and this is because it will
only lead to greed. It might start up as a false desire to make you and members
of your family more comfortable than you presently are but it tends to lead
most times to greed, stealing, covetousness, sadness etc. Money is good but an
uncontrollable desire to have more money all the time is a habit that needs to
be controlled by you to avoid it leading you to a disastrous end because the
Bible has also admonished that you cannot serve God and mammon (which is the
god of money) and that the love of money (an insatiable desire to get money and
the ability to do just about anything to get money) is the root of all kinds of
evil.
d. Vanity: the urge to be known by all, to become a friend of
all, to acquire all the latest and classy things, to throw parties and behave
in such a way and manner that will make you to be liked by all should also be
controlled because everything that you are or have in life will all vanish away
and will not be taken by you when you die.
6. Discipline: another aspect of true Biblical success is
discipline. Discipline will help you go on even when you feel like quitting or
giving up. Discipline pushes you on against all odds that may come your way
when you are set to achieve a given goal in life. Discipline can be referred to
as the twin brother of diligence, it gives you the strength to go on when
everything around you is telling you to stop, pause or even give up completely.
7. True Joy: joy differs from happiness in that happiness is
short lived because it is based on the happenings around you like what you
have; what you have achieved etc while true joy comes from within and is not
based on the circumstances around you. It comes from being at peace with God,
always praising and thanking God. Being a true worshipper of God will give you
the true joy that you so desire. When you have true joy, you will discover that
no matter what is happening around you, there will be no fear and you will be
at peace.
8. Contentment: this is one of the Biblical principles for
success and it is the ability to be satisfied with whatever you have irrespective
of how much that thing actually is. This principle is the cure for urges,
impulses, search for more money, vanity and so on. The ability to appreciate
and value all that you have even if such a thing is small; what you have will
always remain insignificant because contentment is a thing of the heart and it
is not subject to what is happening around you or what you have.
9. True Legacy: the desire to build a true legacy is another Biblical
principle that will make you attain the Biblical order of true success. The Bible
admonished that someone who is a true and a wise father will leave riches for
his children. This makes it eminent on a father who wants to have the true
Biblical success to ensure that he builds a true legacy that will transcend his
lifetime and remain for his children even up to his fourth to fifth generation.
A true legacy transcends a lot of generations; it is built with posterity at
the back of the mind of the builder.
10. True success: true success is the success that is built in
God’s own way and that is through the various Biblical principles that are available
at our disposal as Christians. True success is building a dynasty or an empire
that is different from the worldly way of building dynasties which is usually through
cheating, stealing, fraud, deceit and so on. True success comes only from God
because He alone gives promotion and the power to get wealth is in His hands.
Joshua 1:8 makes us know and understand that having true success is based on
how well we understand and apply the principles of God in our lives.
Some of the principles for true financial success
These are the Biblical principles for true financial success:
a. Tithing: knowing that tithe does not belong to us but to God
and applying this principle in our daily financial affair and transaction will
make us a true financial success according to Malachi 3:10 that admonish us to
bring our tithes into the storehouse of God in order for us to be able to
attain true success.
b. Soul winning: this is another Biblical principle that works.
Winning souls which is God’s desire and the purpose why He sent His only son
will make God pleased with you and cause you to become a true success in any
field of endeavor that you find yourself in. Matthew 6:33 admonishes us to go
after the things of God of which soul winning is part of and God will give us
all the things that we desire to make life pleasurable while we are on the
earth.
c. Offerings: the giving of offerings to God where the Bible tells
us not to appear before God empty, giving to the poor that the Bible has
likened to lending to the poor and sacrifices that the Bible in so many
instances has made us realize moves God.
d. Praises and thanksgiving: praising God and appreciating Him for
what He has done in our lives will make God do more things for us and lead us
unto true success that money cannot buy.
e. Vows: this is when the hand of God is provoked in our lives
through the promises that we make to Him. And example is that made by Hannah
that when God gives her a male child that she will give the male child back to
God, 1st Samuel 1:11.
f. First fruits: this is when the first income of what you do
in the New Year or even in a new season is given back to God in appreciation of
what you believe that He will still do in your life.
11. Time: it is important to state here that this is the last
but not the least of the Biblical principles that will guarantee you success. Whenever
any principle is being practiced, it is necessary that you give it time to
attain maturity because every seed sown needs time to grow. There is a season
for everything that happens in life. Ecclesiastes 3:11 has made us to
understand that it is only God that beautifies things in His appointed time. There
is always an appointed time for everything that happens in life and once it is
the appointed time every seed that have been sown in the way of offerings,
sacrifices, praises, thanksgivings, vows, tithes, first fruits and so on will
definitely germinate and grow to become a big tree.
Biblical principles for true success comes with times and
seasons, when you miss the first cycle of time and season, it is important that
you get set and await the next cycle of time and season so that you will not
miss it as this is the way to attain true Biblical success. God is always a God
of a second chance.
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