What a loser! I mumbled under my breath.
I had a sudden impulse to check my online dictionary for the meaning of failure. I had to laugh out loud to keep from crying when I read the definition staring back at me:
Failure: lack of success, the omission of expected or required action, the action or state of not functioning. Synonyms: loser, underachiever, ne’er-do-well, disappointment. Oxford Online Dictionary
Those few words summed up my emotions perfectly.
I had prayed out loud with a group of people that I didn’t know very well and had spilled my guts. I had confessed my struggle of not wanting to obey God in an area where I felt very vulnerable.
And the worst thing of all: I had sobbed through the whole prayer!
In front of strangers. I wouldn’t even have probably prayed like that in front of people who knew me well.
What in the world?!
What would these people who didn’t know me think of me?
I mean, I couldn’t explain to them that I really wasn’t a basket case who cried every time I prayed. I wanted to tell them that I loved the Lord, but I was finding it difficult to obey in this area.
I felt naked and exposed.
I wanted to defend myself. Tell them that I wasn’t a weirdo. And have some assurance from SOMEONE that I wasn’t the only one who ever struggled to obey God.
I mulled over the meaning of the dictionary’s definition I had just read.
Lack of success? [What good could possibly come out of that confession other than me being mortified?]
Check.
Didn’t turn out how I expected? [That was an understatement! I had never intended to spill my guts at a church function with strangers.]
Check.
Did I want to go crawl in a hole somewhere and never let my face be seen by the outside world again? [Yes and yes!]
Check. Check. Check.
I was three for three!
What makes us feel like failures
Failure has a way of sucking every ounce of self-confidence out of us. The synonyms listed in the dictionary’s definition of the word captured exactly how I felt as I was sitting in the pit of humiliation.
I don’t know of any generation of women who is more plagued with a sense of failure than ours. Both subtle and blatant messages bombard us all day long that we are failures, losers, and disappointments.
We can feel like a loser if our houses don’t look like a magazine or our cars aren’t the latest year’s model. We feel incompetent and uncreative if we can’t pull off amazing Pinterest parties with our kids. We feel like failures if we or our husbands are not keeping up with others or seeing the same amount of success in our respective occupations.
And don’t even get me started about how the decisions our teen-aged or young adult children can make might leave us feeling as though we missed the “How To Raise the Perfect Kid” class that others look like they aced.
Church and spiritually-centered activities are sometimes not even a respite for these feelings.
Why don’t I know the Bible like she does?
How come God didn’t give me a gifting like that person?
We feel jealous of that couple who still holds hands and acts like they just got married twenty-five years after their wedding. We hope that the fake smile we plaster on our face every Sunday doesn’t give away our loneliness in our own marriage.
It’s enough to make us want to hide away and never come out again.
What we must know when we feel like a failure
I heard this today:
Failure is someone else’s opinion on what you have done.
We forget that our God looks at failure completely differently than we do. Everyone fails. Everyone. Because every single one of us has said something we deeply regret, done something we cannot undo, and felt the horrible fear of our worlds never being right again.
And this is when we must remember that God does not evaluate you and me on one failure or even a season of failures the way human beings do.
A little perspective goes a long way with thoughts of failure
Scripture is such a comfort to me. I cannot tell you how many times I have thanked God for His Word. Between the pages of my Bible are stories that assure me that whatever I am facing has been done, said, or thought before. The Bible is full of people who had failed starts.
- I think of Abraham’s fear that led him to put his wife, Sarah, in danger of being molested by powerful men, not once but twice. Did God hold that lapse of judgment against him forever? No, Abraham was told that he would become the father of countless descendants and that that all nations of the world would be blessed because of him. Why? Because Abraham believed God and that faith was credited to him as righteousness.
- Moses bucked God at the thought of being the spokesperson to go to the most powerful man in the known world, Pharoah, to command the king to let the Israelites go after 400 years of slavery. He committed a murder and fled because of what he had done. But after forty years of being a shepherd in the desert, he became the voice of God to Pharoah and led the nation of Israel out of their bondage.
- David had an affair with a married woman. Then he killed her husband and covered it up. He suffered great consequences within his own family because of that decision, yet New Testament Scripture tells us that he was a man after God’s own heart. One could say he was a man of moral failure, but the Messiah, Jesus Christ, was his descendant.
God has accomplished some of His greatest work through the lives of those who believed themselves to be failures.
Examining failure against God’s Word
So if I pull back and look at my definition of failure and compare it with God’s opinion of what I did, were my emotions telling me the truth?
Nothing but God’s Word should be my standard when I am evaluating failure. Scripture is eternal and stands firm in the heavens. It will outlast everyone’s opinion of failure, including mine. The condemning thoughts I have about my failure must be put up against God’s Word.
I have to ask myself:
- Is what I did considered a failure according to Scripture or is it a failure according to my pride or because I am wanting to people please?
- Has this failure made me turn to God’s Word for answers and caused me to repent if the failure was sin?
- What have I learned that I didn’t know before that will help me recognize not to do that behavior again?
- Am I willing to receive the grace God will always give or continue to wallow in my shame?
What if we examine our failure with God’s Word and realize that we have failed in our obedience to Him?
God teaches us some of the deepest, most life-transforming lessons through our failures. What we must know is that the only people God has ever used are failures.
Every single one.
That gives us so much hope as we wait for Him to redeem the disappointment and shame we feel over our failures. In His transforming hands, that failure will become the stepping stone of experiencing the abundant life He has promised us.
Now that is true SUCCESS!
May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. Romans 15:13 (NIV)
How has God turned your idea of a failure into something that brought Him glory or made you understand His character better? Something else? I would love to hear your story in the comments below.
Are you believing these three lies about forgiveness? Click here to find out what they are!
Once again I feel like you were speaking directly to me. I’ve got to learn to Live Forgiven! THanks so much for your words of inspiration and encouragement.
Just as we need to measure our failures by the Word of God, we need to also measure our successes by that same standard.
I find I listen more to the media than I should. I’m not skinny enough, not “cool” enough, don’t have hip clothes like I should (see — even using the word “hip” is NOT cool!)
But my successes aren’t their idea of success either. I’m a stay-at-home mom with no “contributions” to this world, I treasure my Bible not the NYTimes Best Seller list; I drink tea and tap water, not trendy latte’s from Starbucks and bottled water from “the sparkling streams of the BlahBlah Mountains.”
But God knows. He knows where my failures truly lie. In my moral failures. And He knows where my successes are, too. In my relationships with people, not things.
Shawn — I love you! You’re my sister in life and in Christ — and I truly treasure you. You’re a success in God’s eyes, because you’re following after Him with your whole heart. You Go Girl!