Success is Fleeting

Available for 29 days

Good morning. I’ve recently become a golfer, and an enthusiastic one at that! In addition to getting out on the course regularly, I follow top players like World Number One, Scottie Scheffler. This man has extraordinary skill, but he also has deep religious belief. After his win at the British Open last summer, he told the assembled press that his greatest priorities, in rank order, were faith, family, and golf. He also remarked that winning only feels “awesome for about two minutes”. He loves being able to live out his dreams, but he qualified this, by adding “sometimes I just don’t understand the point… it doesn’t fill the deepest desires of my heart”. I found his way of approaching both life and livelihood to be profound, and a model for how we might re-evaluate what’s really important to us. We all love success, but pursuing it before other things that we should hold most dear can produce great anxiety and fear – particularly if we fail to achieve those goals. Scheffler’s example reminds us that success is fleeting: the emotional high evaporates; the next challenge soon appears. Faith keep things in perspective. It allows us to detach our sense of worth from material outcomes. We can still achieve, without placing personal significance before all else. Lord God, help us to understand the value and true purpose of the talents we possess, and to remember that they are divine gifts, which we must cherish and nurture. We pray that humility and earnestness will trump more worldly concerns, as we come to know what constitutes our true worth. AMEN.