What is it that makes people succeed despite their personal
circumstances? Several years ago in the April 29, 2008 edition of the Wall
Street Journal, Melinda Beck wrote an article listing impressively successful
people who struggled significantly early in life, yet never gave up: Julie
Andrews was rejected by MGM Studios as an actress for “not being photogenic
enough”, The Beatles were rejected by Decca Records because they “didn’t like
their sound”, Walt Disney was fired by a Newspaper editor for “lacking
imagination”, and Michael Jordan was cut from his high school varsity
basketball team for not being a good enough player. Despite rejection and
setback, these individuals kept pursuing their goal and found success. The
article called this self-efficacy, “the unshakable belief that some people have, that they have what it takes to
succeed.”
I believe it is important for us as
believers to properly evaluate ourselves and our abilities, based on G-d’s
Instruction found in Scripture:
“For through the grace given me, I say to everyone among you not to think
more highly of yourself than you ought to think—but to use sound judgment, as G-d
has assigned to each person a measure of faith.” (Rom 12:3 TLV)
Living successful lives certainly demands a willingness to
work hard, stay focused and be tenacious. But truly living a spiritually
successful life demands more than anything else faith in G-d and submission to
his righteousness. Maintaining a
positive faith in ourselves is simply not enough!
If we desire to live spiritually successful lives, we must
deepen our daily understanding of what it means to live lives of faith. I can
guarantee that you will struggle, face rejection and even seemingly fail, but
with G-d’s help based on faith in him, your efforts will eventually lead to
amazing success. It’s not self-efficacy, faith in ourselves and our abilities,
that will get us where we need to go as followers of Messiah Yeshua, it is G-d-efficacy.
Let’s make sure we are keeping our minds focused on the Righteousness of G-d!
Forward
for Messiah,
Kirk
Gliebe
Rabbi &
Director
