I don’t know if you have ever felt it, that feeling of complete and total failure. \u00a0It’s one of the worst feelings I have ever experienced.<\/p>\n
Many struggle with it. \u00a0Jobs lost, marriages ruined, relationships destroyed, children alienated. \u00a0All of these make us aware of our weakness and failure to do those things well, to be a success at something…at anything.<\/p>\n
There is a partner to failure, it’s depression. \u00a0It may be, at times, that the depression arrives first and failures are then unavoidable, but that’s just a thought I’ve been dwelling on for a while. \u00a0I’ve noticed as well that I find myself feeling an overwhelming sense of failure when there is really nothing wrong at all. \u00a0It’s a terrible cloud, but one that plagues us all at times if we are honest.<\/p>\n
We each struggle with failure. \u00a0We don’t think we are pretty enough, happy enough, successful enough, good enough, that we don’t have enough friends, enough money, that we don’t do anything “important”. \u00a0On the list goes, but in the midst of whatever we do many of us feel the tug of failure pulling us down constantly whispering in our ears…”you’re not good enough, you won’t make it, you don’t fit in, you won’t get that job.”<\/p>\n
Knowing that this cloud hangs over us all at times makes it clear why we so desperately need God. \u00a0Our expectations and goals are far above our abilities and so we live with the high jump bar at 20′ knowing the highest we have ever jumped is 5′. \u00a0Failure is sure. Doom is near.<\/p>\n
At least that’s the way it feels.<\/p>\n
Then comes Jesus to deal with all of this in the gospels. \u00a0 In those amazing encounters with failures he embraces them, loves them, forgives them. \u00a0He tells them he really likes them! \u00a0He loved eating with “sinners” and they loved him. \u00a0Why? \u00a0Because as bad as the world considered them to be and as bad as they felt about themselves there was one person who loved them and really liked them….Jesus.<\/p>\n
The rich young ruler, the woman caught in adultery, the leper begging for help, the tax collectors, the foreign mother with a sick child and so many more. \u00a0All of them, if they could tell us their stories, would admit they felt like failures, but there was one who didn’t see them that way. \u00a0He really loved them….even in their mess. \u00a0He enjoyed their company…even when the “religious people” wouldn’t even look at them.<\/p>\n
Jesus loves failures because failures know they need Jesus!<\/p>\n
I’m really glad that the story of Jesus is the story of God loving broken, struggling, failing people. \u00a0People like you and me.<\/p>\n
Here’s what God says about people like us, the failures of the world,<\/p>\n
\nSo, if you find yourself struggling with self-doubt, the cloud of failure, failing at everything, failing at anything….know there is a God who loves people like you and me. \u00a0Isn’t that great?<\/p>\n