Unfulfilled Ambition

A couple of weeks ago, former treasurer Peter Costello announced he would not be re-contesting his seat at the next federal election after serving almost 20 years in parliament.

Costello was the longest serving federal treasurer, and in the eyes of many conservative commentators, the most successful.

He will also be remembered by others as the man who played second fiddle for far too long. Costello never obtained politics most coveted prize: The Office of Prime Minister of Australia.

Some called Costello the best Prime Minister we never had.

Costello was widely panned by large sections of the press for not having the ‘guts’ to challenge Howard on the party room floor.

Just as Paul Keating took on and finally managed to unseat Prime Minister Bob Hawke, so too, it was argued, Costello should have just tried to blow Howard out of the water.

While it was probably never in Costello’s psyche to have his party cannibalise itself for the sake of a leadership challenge, it is also unfair to label him as some kind of coward.

Anyone who can make it for so long in the blood sport called politics must have a strong backbone, no matter what party they represent.

Costello bowed out without obtaining the ultimate prize. His drama that was lived out in front of the nation’s eyes is actually quite normal.

We all go through life with dreams not achieved and plans undone. In our quiet moments we wonder ‘what might have been’.

Let me bring some Scriptures to bear on the ‘problem’ of unfulfilled ambition:-

For exaltation comes neither from the east, Nor from the west nor from the south. But God is the Judge, He puts down one, And exalts another. Psalm 75:6-7

For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will save it. For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and is himself destroyed or lost? Luke 9:24-25

Now there was also a dispute among them, as to which of them should be considered the greatest. And He said to them, “The kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them, and those who exercise authority over them are called ‘benefactors.’ But not so among you; on the contrary, he who is greatest among you, let him be as the younger, and he who governs as he who serves. For who is greater, he who sits at the table, or he who serves? Is it not he who sits at the table? Yet I am among you as the One who serves. Luke 22:24-27

Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others. Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.

Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Philippians 2:3-11

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