What does the Bible say about ambition?

Oh! to be nothing! This is true liberty — true happiness — true moral elevation. What intense power of attraction in one who makes nothing of himself! On the other hand, how repulsive is a pushing forward, elbowing, self-exalting spirit! How utterly unworthy of one bearing the name of Him who made Himself of no reputation! It is a fixed truth that ambition cannot possibly live in the presence of One who emptied Himself. An ambitious Christian is a flagrant contradiction.

This is the shortest chapter and contains a special message to Baruch, the companion and secretary of the prophet Jeremiah. It must be noticed that this did not take place in Egypt, where now the prophet and his friend sojourned, but it was in the fourth year of Jehoiakim. Baruch had just finished writing the words which Jeremiah dictated. It was no doubt a strenuous task, and when Baruch laid down his pen, the work having been finished, the Lord sent him a special message, showing that He had not forgotten the faithful scribe. He, too, was deeply exercised over the existing conditions; he shared the grief and sorrow of the prophet. But there must have been a measure of disappointment in Baruch's heart. Had he expected some special recognition? Was he seeking something for himself, expecting great things? Had he planned and was he lifted up with some high ambition? It would seem that such was the case, for He who knows the thoughts of His creatures from afar said to him: "And seeketh thou great things for thyself? Seek them not." It is the very heart of the old nature to seek great things, to be ambitious for earthly possessions and honors, to please oneself. God's people need to watch against this more than against anything else. It is the very crime of the devil, pride (1 Tim. 3:6). Every high ambition must be dethroned; the only ambition worthy of a child of God is to please Him, who lived on earth, never pleasing Himself, who made of Himself no reputation. How it ought to ring in our hearts daily: "Seeketh thou great things? Seek them not." Seek not recognition in this poor age; wait for His day. And Baruch is assured of God's protection and care.

Ambition is especially the sin of the great, and the greatest of all wrongs are due to it. Satan transgressed by reason thereof, and his followers still pursue with eagerness the same course, seeking greatness by following the desires of their own hearts.

Yet there is such a thing as laudable ambition, for in three places in the New Testament the Greek word which means "To be ambitious" (though not so translated in any English version known to us, save in the margin of the Revised Version) is used either by way of exhortation or as a pattern. We propose, therefore, to enquire briefly as to the ways in which it is right to be ambitious.

Young as some of you are there is one sentence in it that I know will appeal to your heart if you love the Saviour; it is verse 9, and I will read it as it is given in a New Translation. "Wherefore we labour (or, are ambitious) that whether present or absent we may be well pleasing to Him." That is my text, The "Him" of it is the One who died for you, your Saviour and your Lord. You will all agree with me when I say that we could have no higher and more blessed aim or ambition in life than that, and also that we ought not to have a lesser one. No life can be right and successful that has not the right aim, and this is the Christian's right aim, to be well pleasing to his Lord. The life that has this aim will be a happy life; it will be a life moreover that will be useful and full of blessing for others, and most and best of all, it will glorify the Lord. Truly this aim must be yours; you will be hopeless and miserable failures if it is not, and we do not want you to be that. You must labour to be well-pleasing to Him, let it be your absorbing ambition, there are a thousand reasons why you must.

271 In the world this kind of greatness was doubtless met with everywhere; but this was not Christianity. He who seeks to be great, and to take the lead among Christians, has entirely falsified the Christian character. He will be the last of all; and the true way of having the highest place is to serve, considering oneself as the slave of the wants of other disciples. It was so that Jesus had done; He was not come to be ministered to in this world but to minister, and to give His life a ransom for many. A lesson simple and clear indeed, but of all importance! The seeking for personal exaltation is only the selfishness of the flesh, the spirit of the world which is enmity against God. Love delights to serve - this is what Christ did; pride and selfishness love to be served, and to take precedence of others.

As already stated, the qualifications for an overseer are given in I Timothy 3 and Titus 1: 6-9. They are clear enough and require no explanation here. Strong moral qualities are required as well as spiritual capacity for the work. But let us note in closing this subject that the apostle says, "If a man desire the office of a bishop (overseer), he desireth a good work" (I Tim. 3:1) . The work of overseer in God's Assembly is a good and most necessary work which should be desired by those duly qualified. Sometimes this good work is left undone in Assemblies which would indicate a lack of spiritual exercise and desire on the part of some whom the Holy Spirit would undoubtedly use. Thus perhaps some need to be exhorted to desire to do this good and needful work. This we find Peter doing in his first Epistle, chapter five. There he urges the elders to take the oversight of the flock willingly, setting an example for the others. A crown of glory from the Chief Shepherd will be the reward.

Christian reader, are you “a man of rest”? Have you found “rest unto your soul”? The vast majority of believers in Christ have not; and why? why their disquietude, their lack of a settled calm in the midst of trying circumstances, sickness, loss of property, want of success in business, and the thousand and one things of life that harrow the heart, and torment the soul, and from which none may hope to escape — for none are promised immunity? The answer is simple — it is wrapped in allegorical form in the story of these brothers, Baruch and Seraiah. Most Christians have a mind fashioned more after the pattern of Baruch than that of Seraiah; they are ambitious, they hope for something in life apart from, or in addition to, Christ. They do not in their hearts really submit to the judgment of God pronounced in His word against this world; and they consequently seek something here in this scene of sin, either for themselves or for their children. And these things are not always evil in themselves; nor is the mere possession of them wrong or inconsistent in a child of God; it is in the seeking of them that the evil lies. “One thing have I desired of the Lord, that will I seek for” confessed the psalmist. This was not anything of earth, but that he might dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of his life (not just to go to heaven when he died), to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in His temple (Ps. 27:4). It was a purely spiritual ambition, he coveted earnestly what it is lawful for us all to long for. And this brings rest, this maintains the soul in quiet and unbroken calm in the midst of a groaning, toiling, restive world, never satisfied, and altogether unbelieving concerning the judgment hanging over its head, or the suppressed volcano boiling for vent beneath it.

James and John (in verse 35) had evidently pondered over these things and said to the Lord, "We would that Thou shouldest do for us whatsoever we shall desire. And He said unto them, What would ye that I should do for you? They said unto Him, Grant unto us that we may sit one on Thy right hand, and the other on Thy left, in Thy glory." We might say at once — "presumption"! But do we not want a place in that glory? Would we not like to sit on that left hand and that right hand? The Lord tested these men, but He did not tell them they would not be in the place they sought. Equally, He did not tell them that they would. We need not beguile ourselves about these things, beloved. We do want a place in the glory and in the kingdom; we should not be following the Lord today if we did not have that in view. If the motive is pride of heart it would be another matter. Their request was quite all right in itself, but the Lord applied the test. John was one of the few who stood by the cross. Did he think about this desire of his when he saw a malefactor on the right hand and another on the left of the Lord — this is what I asked for, a place on His right hand, a place on His left; is this what it means for me to obtain that place in glory?

Its character is summed up in verse 16. At the root of it lies envy or emulation. This was the original sin of the devil. By aspiring to exalt himself, as envying that which was above him, he fell. When this is found there is bound to be strife, and strife in its turn results in confusion and every kind of evil work. Many of these evil things, perhaps all of them, would be counted as wisdom by fallen men. It looks wise enough to the average man to scheme and fight for oneself — to be always out for "number one" as it is called.

But, you will ask, What has this to do with Paul's ambition? Just this, the word translated "so have I strived" is philotimoumenon; which literally means 'loving-honour', hence 'being ambitious.' Paul said, he was "being ambitious to preach the Gospel of Christ, not where Christ was named." How few there are who have such an ambition! This ambition almost surely entails hardship and dangers: it means sharing some of the sufferings Paul describes in Second Corinthians 11. Read them for yourself, and unless the love of Christ works in your heart mightily, it will take away the kind of ambition that Paul had. Excuses are easy to find. We should not go where we are deprived of remembering the Lord in His death. We are called to preach separation: not the Gospel. I think I can be more use attending a conference, than going to some place far away from meetings. And so the excuses go. But rarely do we hear of those who share Paul's ambition, and sadly little do most of us know of it.

The next ambition Paul describes is in 2 Cor. 5:9: "We are ambitious, that, whether present (with the Lord), or absent (from the Lord), we may be well-pleasing to Him." (Literal: See Verses 5 to 8). What more beautiful ambition for every true Christian, — to be "well-pleasing" to the Lord: no matter whether it is in life or in death. Worldly ambition has wrought ruin with multitudes of the Lord's soldiers and servants. All around us we see beloved saints of God whose lives proclaim their ambition for riches or honour or ease or learning or fame. We see Demas who loved this present world and Diotrophes who loved the pre-eminence: and their descendents are with us today: but how rarely do we meet a man whose ambitions in life are to preach the Gospel where Christ is not known; and whether in life, whether in death, to be well-pleasing to Him. Oh, that these two ambitions may be mine, and your's, my beloved Reader: may our love be for the Gospel, where Christ is not named: and ever, and always, to be well-pleasing to Him.

The third ambition of which Paul speaks is found in 1 Thess. 4:10-11. The Apostle beseeches his beloved Thessalonian brethren to "be ambitious to be quiet, and to do your own business, and to work with your own hands." I sadly fear that most of the Lord's people today love the honour of working with their heads in a clean and honourable position, rather than soiling their hands by using them in hard work. They forget their Master worked with His own hands until He was about thirty years of age. They forget that the one who exhorted to this ambition could hold out his hands, and say "Yea, ye yourselves know, that these hands have ministered unto my necessities, and to them that were with me." "These hands" were probably worn and calloused with making tents. And let us remember his words: "I beseech you to be imitators (mimics: mimetes: always in a good sense in the New Testament) of me." (1 Cor. 4:16). And to the very saints whom he exhorted to be ambitious to be quiet, and to work with their own hands, in the very same Epistle, he wrote: "Ye became our imitators (mimics: mimetes), and of the Lord." (1 Thess. 1:7; See also 2:14.) And in the Second Epistle, Chapter 3, Verses 7 & 9, we read: "Ye know yourselves how ye ought to imitate (mimic) us … We … give ourselves as an example to you, in order to your imitating (mimicking) us." (See New Translation).

May God help us to learn the lessons that Paul's ambitions would teach us: — Ambitious to preach the Gospel where Christ is not named. Ambitious, whether by life or death, to be well-pleasing to the Lord. Ambitious to be quiet, to do our own business, to work with our own hands.