Success Is Obedience

I have spent a lot of my life trying to do really good things for God.

I grew up in church. I don't have the kind of story where an angel shows up and rescues me from the streets. I have the kind of story where a guy works hard, gives God the glory, and slowly figures out he has been sacrificing for the Lord without actually obeying Him. Those two can look identical from the outside. You're in church, you're tithing, you're doing good work, and nobody would ever tell you that you're doing it wrong.

That's why a conversation I had recently hit me so hard.

Jerry B. Jenkins and Dr. Mark Yarbrough came on the show. Jerry has written more than 200 books and sold over 70 million copies. You know him from the Left Behind series and The Chosen novels. Mark is the sixth president of Dallas Theological Seminary and has given his life to helping everyday people open the Bible for themselves. I was honored to sit with them, and within a few minutes they were both convicting me. I told them to stop.

The Vehicle for the Bigger Call

Jerry told a story from when he was 16. He was already writing sports for a newspaper, so young that his mother had to drive him to the games. At church camp he felt called to full-time Christian work, and he went forward ready to lay down the thing he loved. He told the counselor he was willing to give up writing and study to be a pastor or a missionary.

She told him not to be too quick to give up the writing, because God often equips us before He calls us. What he had in his hands might be the vehicle for the bigger call.

I have lived a version of that. I built a bass playing brand, and at one point God told me that if it got any better, it would be what I was known for. So I dropped it. But everything I learned about marketing during those years has come back to life in a whole new way. Nothing you learned while you were faithful gets wasted.

Then Jerry said the line I keep repeating. He said he obeys when he finishes the manuscript. What happens to it after that is not up to him. In his words, "To me, success is obedience."

Think about what that does to your scoreboard. Reviews, royalty checks and bestseller lists are icing on the cake. The assignment is the assignment, and it's finished when you've done what He told you to do.

Whose Plan Are We Blessing?

Mark brought it right to where most builders live. He said that for people with drive, people who lay it all out in step A, step B and step C, daily surrender is hard. He paraphrased Henry Blackaby on the great temptation we all face: we make our plans, line out what we want, and then ask the Lord to bless it.

Scripture points the other way. See where God is and where He's going, then go with Him. Mark called it finding God's wave and riding it.

I felt that one. Business people ask me for my five year plan, and I've started telling them I'm such a kid in the kingdom that I don't know if I have a five minute plan. I'm not being lazy when I say that. Matthew 6:33 gets all the attention, but verse 34 has become a guardrail for me, because tomorrow is not my assignment. God's job is the plans and the provision. My job is the daily discipline.

Jerry's son Dallas, who created The Chosen, put it even better when someone asked where he saw himself in five years. He said that was none of his business. His job was to do the best he could today with what God had called him to do, and if he did that, in five years he'd be right where God wanted him.

When the Holy Spirit Stops You Cold

Jerry told me about the Left Behind series reaching a million copies across the first three books. His publisher sent a framed display, and he admits he felt pretty good about himself. Then he was told to check Amazon, and book four was number one two weeks before it even released. You'd think that would feed the ego. It did the opposite. He felt the Holy Spirit tell him this was a God thing and not a Jerry thing, and he repented and said he would just keep obeying and never take credit for it again.

Mark's story was harder. In high school he watched a lifelong friend drift down a different path, and he chose to do nothing. That friend later died in a tragic accident. Mark carried massive guilt, and he eventually had to hand it to the Lord. He was careful to say we can't control anybody. But it marked him with one conviction: never be silent when you feel the prodding of the Holy Spirit.

I knew exactly what he meant, because I'm a shy guy and I've had my own version of that question. Should I have said more? Should I have looked my friend in the eye and asked if we could work on his questions together?

Do Today's Assignment

Here is what I'm taking from these two men. Keep your quiet time, even when you're doing ministry all day. Pray for your enemies, which Jerry admitted convicted him too. Hold your plans loosely. Speak up when He nudges you. Then do the same thing again tomorrow.

You don't need a five year plan to be obedient today. You need today.

Jerry and Mark's new novel, The Battle for Heaven and Earth, tells the story of Scripture as biblical fiction, and you can find it at thebattleforheavenandearthbook.com.

For the whole conversation, listen to Success Is Obedience with Jerry B. Jenkins and Dr. Mark Yarbrough on The Jesse Wood Show, on YouTube or wherever you get podcasts. And if you want the full framework, get my book, The Purpose Driven Business Builder's Blueprint. Ready to stop getting in your own way? Start your mirror moment at builduntil.com/mirror.

Let's build together.