"Be More Ambitious"    San Williams, UPC

James 3:13-4:3, 7-8a

I learned a new word this week:  Contestor.  Contestors are North Americans whose lives are defined by one blinding ambition:  to win contests.  Last year, apparently,  there was a television documentary called “Winning for a Living,” and it was all about contestors. One of the contestors featured on the documentary is Mike Smith of Toronto.  Just how determined is he to win a new 32-inch TV?  He fills out ballots while driving.  “At a full red light, I get six of seven ballots made out,” Smith proudly declares.  But here’s the thing:  Smith has already won seven TV’s!  Not to mention a car, computer, vacations, you name it.  All told, he figures his “contesting” addiction has netted $250,000 in prizes over the past three decades.  Give contestors like Mike Smith credit for one thing:  they are tenacious. Their ambition is unfettered. Their zeal is impressive. Well, in the church we’re trained to think of ambition as unbecoming to Christians, but our reading today from James prompts us to take another look at ambition.  James is giving his congregation a pep talk.  In essence he says to them, “Be more ambitious.” 

Here’s the problem as James sees it:  We’re ambitious for the wrong things.  Ambition is not the problem.  The problem is that so often ambition is misdirected.  At one point in our reading James says that it’s not wrong to ask, to seek, to desire.  No, the great mistake is that we ask wrongly, and by doing so create all sorts of disorder and damage to ourselves and others. According to James, conflicts and disputes come from craving that which we don’t have.  We covet the world’s goods and are envious of those who have more of them than we do. 

And such misdirected ambition--what James calls earthly wisdom--pervades our society. Children desire brand-name clothing, for example, because they see others who wear that clothing as popular and happy. Youth crave the latest in tech toys.  Adults spend our resources on those things that we believe bring fulfillment and pleasure--driving the sleek car, building our dream house, finding the job that will sustain our lifestyles of conspicuous consumpton.   

Of course, advertizes know how to manipulate our desires.  Consider a recent commercial promoting the latest family vehicle.  In the commercial, a father comes up to the family’s new van and finds his young sons playing cards in the vehicle.  He eagerly tells his children about the tree house he has just built for them.  When the father invites the boys to come play in his creation, the boys respond with a series of questions for their father:  Does the tree house have leather seats, a DVD player, a television and amazing speakers?   We live in a society where even—and especially--our children are programmed to be ambitious for the wrong things.   

However, contrary to some popular misconceptions, the Christian answer to selfish ambition is not to reject ambition but to harness it, to redirect it.  As James sees it, we Christians should be as ambitious for a lifestyle that makes for peace as others are in living a life based on selfish gain.  Could it be that Jesus was getting at this very point when he said, “The children of this age are more shrewd in dealings with their own generation than are the children of light.”  Maybe Jesus was wondering why it is that those who are ambitious for selfish gain often have more zeal, spunk and chutzpah that those who try to live in the light of God’s wisdom. Wasn’t Jesus encouraging ambition in his disciples when he said, “Ask and you will receive.  Seek and your will find.  Knock and the door will be opened.”  We should be at least as ambitious in exhibiting the fruits of the Spirit—gentleness, mercy, openness to reason, peace-making-- as others are in pursuing a life based on possessions, winning and self aggrandizement.  The poet, William Butler Yeats, lamented the lack of zeal in those whose intentions were noble compared to the fervor of those who spewed hatred and fear.  “The best,” he wrote, “lack all conviction while the worst are full of passionate intensity.”

At our weekly staff meeting this week, Ara handed me a review in the Financial Times of a new book called A history of Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years.   The reviewer wondered if Christianity in the West will survive another millennium if it increasingly becomes characterized by what the reviewer called, “a toned-down tolerance bordering on indifference.”   It’s that indifference that James admonishes his congregation to overcome.  Be ambitious, he pleads.  But be ambitious for the things that come from God.

A similar concern lies behind Martin Luther King’s famous sermon called “The Drum Major Instinct.”  He defined the drum major instinct as the human desire to achieve distinction, to be important, to lead the parade.  Surprisingly, King doesn’t criticize the drum major instinct. “It is a good instinct,” King said, “if you don’t distort and pervert it.  Don’t give it up,” he pleads. “Keep feeling the need for being first.  But I want you to be first in love.  I want you to be first in moral excellence.  I want you to be first in generosity.”

And, friends,  this urgent call to re-direct our ambition needs to resound in the church today for the sake  of the world.  Paul wrote to the Christians at Ephesus, “Through the church the wisdom of God in its rich variety might now be made known.”  That’s our calling: to make known to the world that true wisdom focuses on the needs of others. True wisdom seeks the good of our neighbors.  It is gentle, full of mercy, good fruits and integrity. This wisdom from above is not just church talk; it’s not mere morality for good church folks.  No, it describes the way the world is supposed to work—must work--if we are ever to live together in peace.  Just think. By the year 2050 there will be an additional 2.5 billion people in the world.  You have to wonder. Will there be more and more people craving the things that will throw the world into ever greater conflicts, disputes and chaos?  Or will we wise up and redirect our ambitions, transform our desires, and by doing so reap a harvest of peace?

In recent years the church has been tagged with numerous names. There’s a new book out titled The Deep Church.  We’ve also heard a lot lately about the emerging church.  Nearly everyone has heard about the Purpose-driven church.  Some still long for the traditional church.  But today let’s hear it for the ambitious church.  Picture an ambitious congregation, our congregation, that is zealous for good works…whose members seek to out-do one another in showing kindness…a church striving to be first in service to others…lavish in generosity…unrestrained in forgiveness…hungry for justice…ardent in worship…avid in practicing hospitality.  In short, let us be an ambitious congregation that tries to love God with all our heart, mind, soul and strength, and to love our neighbor as tenaciously as we love ourselves.