How to be (un)successful

Fullness of life can be yours in 2024. But it won’t be found via worldly measures of success, says Pete Portal

It was almost 15 years ago that I quit my job in TV, packed my bags and set off for South Africa, aged 23. Having grown up in a middle-class home in London and come to faith as a teenager, I was eager to close the gap between what I read in scripture and what my life looked like. A year after arriving in Cape Town, I moved into a township called Manenberg and invited young men wanting help to leave addiction and gang membership to come and live with me. My life had been changed by Jesus, and I wanted to extend his invitation for “life in all its fullness” (John 10:10, NCV) to those living in a version of hell.