I Am Not Throwing Away My Shot

My intended series on ambition has thus far consisted of one post on Alexander Hamilton's life and a warning of the perils of ambition. To recount briefly: ambition can be myopia-inducing, causing us to focus on the aim of our ambition and ignoring or diminishing our other responsibilities. I ended by rejecting the notion that your ambition can be broad and be successful--opportunity cost always dictates that if we are focusing on one thing there is an infinite list of other things losing our attention. 

In this post I want to follow up on another thing that frightens me about ambition: failure. The old proverb to not put all of your eggs in one basket is relevant here. If I choose one thing--writing, say--as my thing and I pour all of my energy and effort into achieving success in this field there is an overwhelming chance that I will fail. And then what am I left with? A life with a single aim that fell short of justifying the effort. 

That sounds admittedly bleak, but I am not being fatalistic or sombre. That's the reality. Ambition is not ambition if its aim is not recognized success. I don't mean to bring the dictionary into this, but the definition of ambition is "an earnest desire for some type of achievement or distinction, as power, honor, fame, and wealth, and the willingness to strive for its attainment." If my wife and mom think I'm a great writer but it never goes beyond that level of distinction--sorry mom and Clara--that's simply not enough to vindicate that choice. 

That's scary to me. It just feels safer to not try anything that great. To content myself with a modest existence. To quote Seinfeld, "Not that there's anything wrong with that," but at the same time it strikes me as unsatisfactory. Maybe that's because I'm still young. Maybe it's because I've never tasted failure on a grand scale. Maybe my mostly timid nature has shielded me so far from being ambitious enough to ever be hurt by ambition.

This is a post with no grand answer or succinct and pithy conclusion. I just don't know. It is one thing I constantly weigh when I think about ambition. And the question I am left with is if this fear is a warning to be heeded or an obstacle to be ignored and hopefully overcome.

Why I Love John Piper

I am reading Bloodlines by John Piper right now, a fantastic little book about race, that I plan to write a post about very soon (for books with one controlling thesis such as this one I find it best to wait until I have finished in order to say much about it). But that is not the purpose of this post; the purpose of this post is to use Piper's own words here to talk about why I enjoy him so much and see in him a great blessing to the church.

The first two chapters of the book are autobiographical and this excerpt comes from the first chapter:

"If any of this sounds valiant, don't be too impressed. I am not a good example of an urban pastor. Because of the way I believe God calls me to use my time, I don't have any significant relationships with most of my neighbors. Nor does our church reflect the diversity of this neighborhood. There is diversity, but nothing like the statistics above [Piper's church is in the most ethnically diverse region of the Twin Cities].

Probably I could have been far more effective in immediate urban impact in this neighborhood if I had not written books or carried on a wider speaking ministry. Some thank me for this ministry, and others think I have made a mistake. Again, you may see why I cherish and cling to the gospel of Jesus.

The Lord will be my judge someday. I will give an account to him of how I served him. I expect that as he goes down the list of the choices I have made, none will have a perfectly pure motivation, and many will appear as unwise in the bright light of his holiness. I hope I have been a good steward of my gifts and time. But my confidence in the judgment is not in that. It's in the perfection of Jesus that God has credited to me through faith and in the punishment Jesus endured for me. . ." (39-40)

What I appreciated so much with this, given that it had little to do with the main topic of the book is that Piper is addressing the rise of the so-called celebrity pastor and the backlash it has created.

There are two main criticisms that I have encountered of the celebrity pastor, one comical, the other uncharitable. The comical one is that the critic of the pastors could become famous if they wanted, but humble-hearted servant that they are, they choose to toil in anonymity in a small congregation. These men view fame as a matter of will, apart from talent or the work of God. Focusing on "ordinary pastors" is a great thing*, but the dismissive "well, I don't want to be a celebrity pastor" thing is laughable. If you have to say that, you really do. But, good, you will probably never have that problem.

The uncharitable criticism is one that removes any sense of agency from these celebrity pastors. What I mean by this is it treats these men as if they are not aware that there are other ways of doing their vocation and as if they have not thought deeply and prayed fervently over the ministry decisions they have made. That they sort of fell into this and now they don't know what to do. Piper here shows the care with which he makes his decisions, as well as the omnipresent awareness that there will come a day when he will give an account for his actions to his Lord.

For better or for worse, podcasts and the internet have shrunk our world to where it is not uncommon for a spiritually hungry person to take in more content (audio, video, or written) from a celebrity pastor in a faraway locale than their local pastor in their local church. Of course this can be a dangerous thing, both for celebrity pastor and for spiritually hungry person judging his pastor against the speaking/writing ability of this celebrity pastor, but it is not wholly bad. It can be very good. I thank God for John Piper and Mark Driscoll and Matt Chandler and others like them, because even when I disagree with them I can appreciate their passion for the gospel and the church. Pastors who write books aren't out there actively encouraging people to be dissatisfied with their local church and move to Minneapolis or Seattle.

Piper loves the Church, the whole Church, and feels called to use his gifts in a specific way. Has he made wrong decisions? Yep. Will he make more? Sure. But the purpose of life isn't to wait for perfection and then act, to continually weight every decision to the point of inaction, or to sit back and criticize someone who is working night and day to bless God and his church. Celebrity pastors make mistakes; so do ordinary ones. Ultimately, it is between them and the Lord. Piper is very cognizant of this fact; I hope his critics will remember the same thing.

*One of the ironies to me of publicizing the ordinary pastor movement, if one can be said to exist, is that it tries to popularize the ordinary. An uncharitable view of this, which of course I would never take, could see this as trying to make being ordinary famous. Plus, no one starts a blog and puts their stuff out on the internet in the hope that no one ever will read it. I wonder how often these ordinary pastors check their web traffic?