The Secret to Success: Embracing Your Current Circumstances with Joy

If I continue to resist my current situation rather than deal with it, I am like a child who gets a piece of candy only to throw it away because it wasn’t exactly the kind of candy I wanted. Keep in mind that I’m not advocating complacency; no, I should improve myself and the world around me wherever possible. But now that I am in Christ, I have run out of excuses to be anything less than joyful and content, regardless of my circumstances. If I embrace the unconditional joy of Christ, I can desire better things and yet exist joyfully in the mean time.

As a rule, it is foolish to dwell on how much I hate my present circumstances. My relational health, for example, will suffer if I continually brood. But I will encourage and empower others around me if I rejoice in my current situation in life, not by way of denial, but by choosing joy over bitterness and discontent.
What prevents men from success in their dating endeavors? Is it their looks? No, men tend to be unattractive in any case. It is something within men that prevents them from succeeding in their pursuits of the opposite sex. Any man who is unconditionally joyful and confident in Christ will be manifestly attractive to the kind of women he wants to attract.
Women will succeed similarly in their relationships if their minds are saturated with commonsense of Christ. Not only is this healthy for women, such confidence will drive away the wrong kind of men and attract the right ones.
As for our working lives, if we take joy in our situation despite our self-defeating insecurities, we will excel at whatever we do. We will work unhindered and thereby facilitate any advancement (if God should provide such an opportunity). In the mean time, even if we never advance in a worldly sense, we will remain no less joyful and content. Such is the genius of depending on God, who is set apart form this world.
The secret to true success is to depend on Jesus Christ. We tend to shy away from this truth because we would rather hoard all the credit we can get. But this desire is self-defeating. The desire to be validated by other people is shallow and insecure at is core. But again, such is the genius of depending on Jesus Christ: In Him all such hindrances are crucified forever.
Forget yourself. Forget about taking credit. Give up yourself because there is nothing good in you. Christ is utterly good. Let Him be your good, then you will have good. Let Christ be your success, then you will be successful.
by Patrick Roberts www.BooksByPatrick.com

Patrick is an average Christ-seeker. His goal is to turn people to Jesus Christ.