Reflection Options  

Journal  (Reflect on one or more of these questions)

• Did you have an idea of where you wanted to be by a certain age in regard to success in your career or social circles? Describe it.  How close are you to that idea?  From your perspective now, what is realistic or unrealistic about that picture? Or what is healthy or unhealthy about that picture?

• Make a list of positive goals you have.  Now make a list of anything you are unhappy about in the way you pursue those goals. Write about what you think the difference is between seeking status and pursuing meaningful goals.  

Quote Interaction (Interact by agreeing, disagreeing or otherwise engaging with the quote/quotes)

• It is not your business to succeed, but to do right: when you have done so, the rest lies with God. (C.S. Lewis) 

• When you become so blind that the maker of galaxies and ruler of nations and knower of all mysteries and lover of our souls becomes boring, then only one thing is left -- the love of the world. For the heart is always restless. It must have its treasure: if not in heaven, then on the earth. (John Piper)

• If there lurks in most modern minds the notion that to desire our own good and earnestly hope for the enjoyment of it is a bad thing, I submit that this notion has crept in from Kant and the Stoics and is no part of the Christian faith. Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling around with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in the slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.  (C. S. Lewis) 

• Let us therefore, leaving off all other things, aim exclusively at this - that we may be approved by God and may be satisfied to have His approbation alone, as it justly ought to be regarded by us as of more value than all the applauses of the whole world. (John Calvin) 

Reading and Reflection from the book, Shaping The Journey of Emerging Adults: 

• Read the story of Jon and Sarah (pp. 23-26). How did their idea and their experience of a successful adult life change as time went on? What would be on your "wish list" for gaining guidance as you navigate your adult life or your career? 

• Read "The indisputable mandate" (pp. 62-63). Why was Jesus's plan for success counter-cultural in that day as well as in our own time?  What was the "status" of the persons he chose to act on that plan?