Leadership lessons: Success. God's way.

Remember John Wooden. He was the legendary coach for the UCLA basketball team from 1948-1975. His teams won 10 NCAA titles in 12 years.

Lots of people don't know that Wooden professed Christ and was a Bible reader. Jay Carty has written a book, Coach Wooden One on One, that explored Wooden's faith.

One thing that has always intrigued me is his Pyramid of Success. You can study it on the Official John Wooden Web Site. Check it out.

After he took a position teaching high school English at the age of 24, Wooden grew frustrated with the grading system he was required to use. He felt compelled to help his students better understand success as a result of effort. He thought of his father's advice, "Never try to be better than anyone else, but never stop trying to be the best you can be." And he remembered a verse of poetry he had recently read:

At God's footstool to confess,
A poor soul knelt and bowed his head.
"I failed," he cried. The Master said,
"Thou didst thy best, that is success."

Wooden defined success as a "peace of mind which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you did your best to become the best that you are capable of becoming."

The definition satisfied Wooden for a short while, but he quickly realized it was insufficient. He needed something more concrete, more visual. So he spent the next 14 years identifying 25 behaviors he believed were necessary to achieve his idea of success. This search resulted in a simple but profound diagram Wooden called "The Pyramid of Success", which he completed in 1948.

I would prefer a more God-saturated, Christ-centered definition of success - maybe something based on Colossians 3:23: Success is seeking to please Christ by giving a wholehearted effort toward the task at hand and leaving the results of God.

For sure, God is interested in success.

Only be strong and very courageous, being careful to do according to all the law that Moses my servant commanded you. Do not turn from it to the right hand or to the left, that you may have good success wherever you go. This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success.
Joshua 1:7-8

The word in this passsage is tsalach. It means to "advance, prosper, make progress, succeed, be profitable."

I believe that it's important to think through what success looks like biblically. How do you think God would have you define success? And is Your life moving in that direction? What changes do you need to make?