Doctrine that Inspires Ambtion (Cont.)

This is my second post concerning the following quote from Dave Harvey's "Rescuing Ambition" :

If our understanding of doctrine creates passivity toward God's empowering presence or cools the hot embers of our ambition, we've misunderstood God's sovereignty.

Earlier this week, I addressed my own "passivity toward God's empowering presence."  Tonight, I hope to increase my understanding of doctrine, that I might re-ignite the "hot embers of [my] ambition."

Before a Christian can go about firing up their ambitions, however, they must understand what ambition really means for a Christian.  This, in essence, is the sole purpose of Harvey's book.  I'm not going to get into too much detail (for that, you may want to just read the book itself.  Harvey will explain it much better than I can), but the basic message is that Christian ambition strives to please God and to bring Him glory.  Godly ambition not only brings us closer to God, but it allows us to accept the times when God says "no."  For if we are no longer focusing on ourselves when we pursue our ambitions, how can we be distraught when we are faced with an obstacle?  For "we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to His purpose." (Rom. 8: 28)  What an encouraging verse! In his letter to Rome, Paul isn't saying "some" things or "most" things or "just the things that would make sense in the limited, finite capacity of our human minds." No, he says ALL things.  If that isn't a lesson in God's sovereignty, I don't know what is!  And if we, as Christians who love God, take this verse to heart, how can we ever give up when we don't get that dream job or if God's plan as we know it doesn't seem to be going very well?  If God says "no" to one of your aspirations, you can be sure that it means He has something better in mind.  If that's the case, then, what is stopping us from pursuing our ambitions? 

A couple years ago, I started writing a novel of sorts, a kind of Lord of the Rings-esque fantasy story about a regular guy who escapes from his dissatisfied lifestyle into a world that he never dreamed existed. Sad to say, I haven't written anything for it in quite some time, and it's only about 4 chapters long right now.  This may just be another nerdy hobby of mine, but reading Harvey's book on ambition, my imagination cannot help but to be drawn back to that world.  My desire now is to pick this story back up, and start writing again, praying that God can use it to His glory.

-Nick Natoli, Building Bookcases writer