"Well Done, Good and Faithful Servant!"

Genesis 39:2–6

"The Lord was with Joseph and he prospered, and he lived in the house of his Egyptian master. When his master saw that the Lord was with him and that the Lord gave him success in everything he did, Joseph found favour in his eyes and became his attendant. Potiphar put him in charge of his household, and he entrusted to his care everything he owned. From the time he put him in charge of his household and of all that he owned, the Lord blessed the household of the Egyptian because of Joseph. The blessing of the Lord was on everything Potiphar had, both in the house and in the field. So he left in Joseph's care everything he had; with Joseph in charge, he did not concern himself with anything except the food he ate."

All of us desire success in life. Many find it elusive and many try to distill principles from the lives of people who are generally considered successful. Although the definition itself ultimately varies from person to person, we have a roughly universal idea that it encompasses certain combinations of aspects of our lives such as loving and meaningful relationships - friends and family (including our relationship with God), financial security, dream career or profitable business and investments, wisdom and enlightenment, influence and social status, material wealth, mobility, justice, goodness, self-denial, service and charity, and health and fitness. We all want to acheive all or most of these. One such successful person is Joseph, son of Jacob. The success principle in the Bible is pretty straightforward: Love God and that includes faith, which is trusting Him. This is evident in the life of Joseph and others such as Job, Gideon, Boaz, David and the early Solomon. An American editor and journalist Herbert Bayard Swope wrote "I can't give you a sure-fire formula for success, but I can give you a formula for failure: try to please everybody all the time." This tells me to wisely discern who to please above all, and the only One deserving of our worship, obedience, love, and praise is God. Like children, we adore our Heavenly, Almighty and Eternal Father and relish our relationship with Him. After all, when we delight in the Lord, He gives us the desires of our hearts (Psalms 37:4) and in His right hand are eternal pleasures (Psalms 16:11). But not only that, like Joseph, we also seek His wise counsel and His wisdom and vision, trust and obey His Word. Of course, the pursuit of success for its own sake comes with a stern warning that despite all this good, even great things, the Lord admonishes us to keep proper focus (something I'm personally challenged with) on the top priority, "for what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?" (Matt 16:26) and so we ought to "seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness," which is what Joseph did, and so "all these things will be added unto you as well" (Matt 6:33), and that's exactly what he got! It seems like success, according to the bible, is a by-product of the Greatest Commandment: Loving God and loving our neighbours and upon this hangs all laws (Matt 22:26-40). Success is not to be chased for its own sake. And how many have we heard and seen of those grand quests for earthly gains which came to naught or at the expense of other important aspects of our lives? When God promises success, He grants it without accompanying sorrows (Prov 10:22). That is not to say that if one suffers that God is not blessing him. There are those that God has called to greater glory such as martyrs, both in the past and in our time. St. Paul and the rest of the apostles are a testament to this. Our Lord Jesus Himself went through tremendous agony and loneliness all for the victory of His love for us — conquering Death, the Old Enemy, and reinstating the Kingdom of God, inviting us in direct community with Him once more. Be that as it may, the main point is that loving God and obeying Him (1 John 5:3) is the key to our success in this life and the next. Loving people or loving our neighbours, the second component of the Greatest Commandment has an additional practical approach that can be seen in the life of Joseph. He was a prudent and hardworking steward of Potiphar's, and later Pharaoh's (and the country's), resources. This stems from his character and rectitude tempered by a close relationship with God through all the difficulties. Albert Einstein once said, "try not to become a man of success. Rather become a man of value." Success comes when we pursue to be of value to others and especially of value to our Master. Brothers, have a blessed and meaningful Holy Week ahead!

Matthew 25:23

"His master replied, 'Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master's happiness!'"

~19.03.2016