Every time I think of life, most of the things that I thought about is the achievements of life – whether it is money, promotion, power or position. Seems like these things are our standard of achievement in life. But is it really? How many rich people, high-positioned people die in regret? Die in vain? Die in sadness and sorrow? Then what are we supposed to be chasing after in life?

I see a life beyond success as a life with no regret, a life where we live to the fullest so there will no chance of saying, “if only I do that, if only I take that, if only …” And for me a life with no regret is the most important achievement we should get. If a successful brings a regret at the end of our life – then how is it possibly could be something that we’re proud of? So, today I would like to share about 2 essential points and 7 weapons to achieve a life beyond success.

(Luke 10:19) “I have given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to overcome all the power of the enemy, nothing will harm you.”

So, you see, a life beyond success doesn’t mean that there will be no snakes and scorpions along the way – success or winning it self comes because there is something we’ve defeated – because there is a battle – so we could be called winning / success when we overcome it.

1. Your goal is your standard of achievement

A goal should be our first thing first before doing anything. We even taught to put our goal first in every report we do at college, haven’t we? Why I said that our goal will be our standard of achievement? Because we human, do things based on a set goal – and usually we don’t waste any effort to do beyond our set goal.

I have a video of Samsung’s history here for us to understand about point no.1 easier.

How many of us today set a goal to be rich? Set a goal to be a manager, a director, a successful man? The founder of Samsung set his goal beyond all this – he didn’t just set a goal to be rich but to increase his country’s economic and make Korea a successful country. Imagine if he set his goal to be rich – I believe he would stop being productive in the first trading company of wool and sugar of his. As we know – he is already rich with his wool and sugar company. But because he has a beyond successful goal – he keep reaching high until today where Samsung is not just number one company in Korea but a really appreciated company in the world.

So, be careful in setting your goal – it is the key of your future achievement.

2. A mature faith

We need a mature faith not only spiritually but also mentally and emotionally. In mentally and emotionally, a mature faith speaks about a not giving up hope character. In spiritually, a mature faith speaks about how we never lose our faith and trust in God in whatever we’re facing. Even though we’re now facing such a long and dark road – our heart keeps believing Him that He loves us and He will rescue us in His appointed time and ways. This is the ultimate key in rising up even when everything seems falling.

7 WEAPONS IN ACHIEVING A LIFE BEYOND SUCCESS

(Ephesians 6:14-17)

“Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place. And with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one, take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.”

1. Stand firm

Standing firm speaks about the readiness at all times. So when no matter the rock comes up front, we are always ready to overcome it with courage, power and wisdom. Just like a soldier who is always ready when he got called by his commander. He’s ready to battle any war without questioning each wars. Why? Because he is trained non-stop. Even when he has become a soldier, he is trained harder. Train yourself in the word of God, in faith, in courage, in wisdom – so there is nothing that can stumble you.

2. Belt of truth

Just like a car’s seat belt, buckled yourself in truth. Speaks the truth, do things in the truth. In other words, be true in whatever you do and say. Being true is an expensive character that will be honor both by God and men. Then how to stay true? It is to beware of everything you let to come inside of your life – and yes I’m talking about movies, books, etc – everything that you let to come to you could affect your beliefs and then your character. For example, if you let a movie about telling lies that seems to be a normal thing to do , then you’ll start to believe that telling lies is not always a bad thing. You begin to doubt about honesty. And you’ll soon begin to tell lies.

3. Breastplate of righteousness

Righteousness here speaks about holiness. Yes, righteousness is one of a weapon. When we borrow things from evil, let say pornography – we won’t get a breakthrough in any of our prayers. How come? Because whenever we feel like to come to God, whenever we pray – especially when we are in the middle of a mess, the evil is ready on the other side throwing arrow to our chest – and without a breastplate – the arrow will thrust into our heart telling us that we are not worth praying, intimidating us with it’s negative words and leaving us to dead without any hope. And if we are not standing firm – it will be so hard to find our way back to Him.

4. Feet fitted with readiness that comes from the gospel of peace

Make sure that wherever we go, we always bring peace in both our words and deeds and not the other way. Never bring wounds, terror, fear or negative to other people. We don’t know whether he is in attempt of suicide and with our negative words, we could possibly hurt him and encourage him to do so. Always be true and positive will surely widen our relationship and networking with anybody. And relationship is such an important thing in building up career and life, isn’t it?

5. Shield of faith

I reckoned it as our immune system. There is times where our immune system seems to drop, and usually we are so easily to get sick when it’s drop. Start with a simple sickness like flu until the most complicated ones like herpes / cancer. When our faith to God is drop, we are too so easily got intimidated by our troubles. When you lose faith, you lose hope and when you lose hope, you lose your heart and mind. Grow your faith each day with the word of God – pray continuously and give thanks for everything.

6. Helmet of Salvation

Helmet of salvation speaks about the disciplined mind. Note that this is where the evil most likely to mess with. Because our brain controls our body – and by controlling our mind, it would likely control us to do exactly what it wants. That is why it is so important and necessary to guard and discipline our mind. Don’t let any space for the evil to spread the negatives, the lies and terror. Never believes the darkness. And the only way to guard our mind is to drawn our self nearer to God. Live in His words and presence and let the Spirit guide our mind to the righteousness. Don’t let our mind control us but rather control our mind to the goodness.

7. Sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God

Our words is like a sword – it could help us by cutting the vegetables or it could wound someone to death. Beware of our mouth and tongue. Learn to stop saying bad things – learn to stay silent when we need to – learn to speak only the truth – learn to pick words before saying it – learn to think the cause of our words before saying it – learn to spread the love and peace through our mouth. Don’t let it be used by the evil, but rather give it to God to be used in spreading peace. People who could guard her mouth could guard her heart. People who could guard her mouth could have favors form God and men.

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Imagine you are a president of the states. You have 1 wife / husband and 2 sons. The eldest is what people say the obedience ones, the taking responsibility ones and the one who stay true in whatever he says and do. While the youngest is a party brother, he loves to screwing around with drugs, woman and his life – he rarely come home and all he does is spending his parent’s money for his satisfaction. Now, you as a president have 1 medal that you could give to one of your sons – this medal means that whoever got this will exactly has the privilege of being president, this medal could make whoever got it be treated just as the president. All the commanders will absolutely obey the one with this medal. The question is, who will you give it to? The eldest or your youngest?

Well, if it were me then I will surely give it to the eldest. Not because I don’t love the youngest, he’s probably in my mind more often that the eldest – because then I have to worry about his life every single day. But because I too love the youngest, i knew if i give the medal to him,  he can’t handle it. He’ll probably misused it for his satisfaction and ego. He’ll probably told my commander to kill someone he dislikes on the club – and that will cause him to be punished even more.

This goes the same with us and God. When we are asking for a life beyond success or whatever goodness it is that we asked for, do we already have a life that He knows He could trust on? Remember, He won’t give us His authority when our life can’t be trusted – not because He doesn’t love us but because He loves us more than we thought.