This blog’s core purpose is to communicate what the Bible says about how to live well. God knows there is enough suffering in this world. Some of it comes crashing in from no cause of your own. Then you hold on and pray and deepen your trust in a God who, astonishingly, endured suffering himself. On the other hand, many kinds of suffering are self-caused and completely unnecessary. This is, in part, what this blog confronts – the needless pain and angst caused when a Christian simultaneously tries to live by faith and yet also, even if only a little bit, by the world’s values.
The story behind this blog originated in the mid-1990’s when I began to give more importance and time to my career. Through God’s leading, my family and I relocated to China for a multi-year assignment with Procter & Gamble. I encountered an environment of intensely career-oriented colleagues and a plush expat life. People at headquarters started treating me differently, as a potential high flier. Then I started to believe my own press and turned my ambitions toward climbing the ladder and making my mark. This happened gradually enough that I failed to see how dramatically my priorities were shifting. I remained active in church leadership and still spent daily time in prayer and God’s Word, but I was subtly making an idol of my job, my reputation, my status.
Frustration and Revelation
We returned to the USA four years later. By then, my expectations were sky high. I deserved to be promoted – and fast! Eventually, frustration set in. I saw others promoted ahead of me. I took on more work that I didn’t like and wasn’t a good fit for me (but “good for my career” and for “visibility”). I made myself miserable. In turn, I made my wife and children miserable.
After one memorable argument with Dawn, I lamented that maybe it was my heavy travel schedule that lay at the root of the problem. That’s when she leveled with me that it wasn’t the travel. It was my critical nature at home. In fact, she said, when I was away on business, she and the kids could breathe easier vs. walking on eggshells. This shocked me. It flew against everything I hoped for in my marriage and in raising my children. Around the same time, medical checkups began showing elevated blood pressure despite no changes in my diet or regular morning workouts. I think I was the only one naïve enough to be surprised that the stress of trying to please the world was taking its toll on me and my family.
What is Success?
In 2004, while pondering this and looking for a way out, I jotted down the word “Success.” Below it, made a list of what I’d been hearing (and, to an extent, believing) about the world’s definition of success.
What the world says:
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- Success = Money.
- Your status (at work, on the sports team, which community you live in) determines your significance.
- You must focus your energy on increasing your status. It’s all about you. So boast, mix with the “right” people, climb the ladder, sell yourself, grab all you can, bend others to your will, take charge!
Worldly measures and aspirations:
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- Believe in yourself.
- The ends justify the means.
- Only the successful people matter; all others are just background fill.
- To be an executive at a young age is a great thing to be desired.
- The car you drive = the man you are.
- The way your wife looks = the man you are.
- The university you graduated from = the man you are.
- Your athletic ability (past or present) = the man you are.
- Your IQ = the man you are.
- Real men pound the table and make outrageous demands.
- Public life and private virtue are separate things and not to be mixed.
- Character doesn’t really matter, so don’t waste your time.
At the bottom of this list I wrote, “But what does the Bible say?”
Researching the Scriptures
Over the next several months I read through the entire New Testament and much of the Old Testament (especially Psalms and Proverbs) searching for answers. Every time I found a verse that spoke to career, ambition, priorities, etc., I wrote it down. I soon learned that the Bible explicitly communicates a radically different message than the worldly list above. More importantly, God is actively opposed to those things, in part because they never ultimately deliver what they promise. In fact, they lead to ruin, not just in eternity but in the here and now. Examples abound if we’re willing to be honest about our own lives and the lives of the “successful” people we know personally (not to mention the celebrities we see on magazine covers while standing at the supermarket checkout).
Are these the kind of lives to aspire toward?
A key experience that followed was taking my son to JH Ranch in northern California for a father/son week in 2006. Despite placing my faith in Christ as a child, it was at the Ranch that I finally began to fathom the outer edges of God’s unconditional love for me. I understood at last that I didn’t need to prove anything or achieve anything to receive God’s love. God is far more interested in my motives and my character than my performance.
Not long afterwards I relinquished my career ambitions and gave my job fully over to God. This didn’t mean I slacked off. But it’s very different to pursue excellence at work without demanding that it reflect well on me or lead to promotions (“Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters.” Colossians 3:23). Making this change felt scary, as if I was becoming somehow irresponsible by no longer seeking to climb the ladder, by changing my self-image about work, by admitting to being just a regular guy. But what a relief! What a burden lifted! What a huge blessing to Dawn and the kids! Thank you, Jesus, for being so patient and persistent in changing me!
Revisiting Truth Through Journaling
Years later, in 2016, I dug out the list of verses and began journaling my observations every morning. This exercise blessed my soul twice over, especially with the joyful perspective of the intervening years. That turned out to be one of the best – no, it was the best – quiet time study I’ve ever done. The verses sustained me and deepened my understanding of God’s grace and my utter dependence on him. I awoke every morning eager to meditate on the day’s verses, to journal and pray, and to experience God speaking directly to me through the Scriptures.
God’s Word has not returned void. The cumulative effect of all that truth about “success” has had a profound impact on my life, my family, and my work. And it has protected me from many self-caused dangers.
Sharing with Others
My thoughts now turn to my son, Philip, and my son-in-law, Joe. As young men doing well in their jobs and gaining responsibility and rank, I recognize they will soon, if not already, face the same dangers I’d faced through the lure of “success.” As I’ve prayed about this, I sensed God wanting me to publish these journal entries, short as they are and only light in commentary, to get the Word out to these two men and to anyone else who desires to honor God at work, at home, and in life. My working title had been “God’s Measure of Success.” Though a large number of the verses address career issues, there are many that deal with other areas of life as well. Hence the name, “Faith, Work, and Life.”
I trust that you will find much value in going on this daily journey into God’s Word. I pray that it will impact your life as it has mine. I’ve never attained an impressive title or a high-powered position, but God has given me peace, he has provided for every need of my family, and he has developed my skills and influence in areas that are highly valued in my industry (and that I enjoy). God has filled my home, my precious family, and my life with his presence. May it be the same for you.
Brief Bio
I’ve been married to Dawn, my college sweetheart, for nearly 35 years. Pictured below is the whole family: our three children, Philip, Abbie, and Hailey, and their spouses Megan, Joe, and Bill, along with our four grandchildren (so far): three precious little boys, Elijah, Jack, and Wesley, and one precious little girl, Evie. Our church fellowship is Kenwood Baptist Church in Cincinnati, Ohio. We have also been involved for many years locally in a wonderful family ministry called JH Outback.
I have worked in the consumer goods industry for three decades (here’s my LinkedIn profile). I greatly enjoy my job but it wasn’t always so. Corporate experience has taught me that, despite my distaste for bureaucracy and office politics of large organizations, God intended it all for my good – to humble me and shape me more into the image of his Son. It is from this experience that I faced both my career struggles and the power of God’s Word to change me.
In Christ,
Steve Marosi
“A person with a changed heart seeks praise from God, not from people.” – Romans 2:29b (NLT)