Ambition & Your WorkSample

Jesus Calls Us to Be Ambitious

Andy Crouch is the Executive Editor of Christianity Today magazine and author of Culture Making. In today’s reading, he discusses how ambition fits in with our work, and how we can keep our ambitions aligned with Christ.

“It's all in what you're ambitious for and in how you're working toward your ambition.

Jesus...sowed seed on all kinds of ground. On the best ground, one seed falls in the ground and multiplies 30, 60, or 100 times. My ambition is to place myself—in the things that I do and the places I go and the kind of cultural creativity I engage in—on the best ground so I will see that kind of abundance.

It's very important to emphasize that abundance doesn't come from my striving. Sometimes ambition and striving are equated so that I’m trying to claw my way into influence. I have not seen that bear good fruit in individual lives or even in the broader culture. But, I have seen people bear good fruit when they are ambitious to be where God is multiplying.

One of the biggest threats and challenges in our own culture is this constant frenetic busyness that simply prevents us from ever contemplating what we're creating; why we're creating it; what our ambitions are.—I always go back to the basic disciplines of silence, solitude, and fasting, along with immersion into worshipping God and studying life of the church, studying the story, the Bible that orients us. Sabbath becomes tremendously important. And, that's what the disciplines are for. They cleanse us of useless motivations that lead to people doing really stupid things to get noticed or to get power or to get wealth. In their place comes the spirit of Christ, who actually prepares us to be very ambitious.

We pray a very ambitious prayer on a regular basis: "Your kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven." But, at the same time, we pray a very small prayer: "Give us today our daily bread."

When we pray these prayers together, then we're placing ourselves in the right place to be used by God in what he's doing in the world...”

Video

Watch this short clip “How should Christians engage with culture?”