Failing Forward

The leadership expert John Maxwell has a book that he wrote years ago entitled "Failing Forward". The gist of the book is about failure being designed not to stop your efforts, but as a means of improvement and development towards the reaching of one's goals. This is a lesson that a lot of us as Christians could afford to learn. There's not a person alive on this planet today who, at some level and in some area, hasn't failed. Failure is a part of life. If you're going to live, you're going to fail. The question is not, am I going to fail. The question is, how am I going to respond after I experience failure? This is how we want to make sure that we're Failing Forward.

So many of us, and I'm guilty of this, want to succeed "the first time around". We want to make sure that we get it right "the first time". If it goes down that way, Great. But if it doesn't, what do you do then? Many times in the spirit realm, particularly in the area of ministry, if we don't get it right initially, or if our efforts don't meet with immediate success, then we think it's not for us or that it's "not God's will" for us to engage in that particular area. This is incorrect. A lot of times God will "allow" us to fail in a particular area for which He's ordained us to participate in, just to test our resolve and our Perseverance. Saints, we have to reach a point in our faith and our commitment to God where we recognize that Failure is Not Final. Just because we didn't get it "the first time" doesn't mean we got the Call wrong or that it isn't God's will. This is significant, because there are some areas that the Lord is going to lead us in that are actually going to require "practice". Areas of spiritual gifts and callings that some of us may have never operated in before, and God is calling us to function in those areas of anointing. Just because you "mess it up" the first couple of times or so, doesn't mean you're supposed to throw up your hands and "quit". Neither does it mean you're supposed to try to justify your "temporary inactivity" until you "mature in your gift" and can get it right. No, you grow "through" it. You learn to Fail Forward.

A good example of this, believe it or not, was Jesus. Do you remember the time when Jesus was healing the blind man (Mark 8)? If you remember the story, the man didn't receive his full sight "initially". Oh oh, Jesus failed! Now, of course we know that Jesus didn't fail, but it looked like it didn't? I believe that the Lord allowed this to be written (at least in part) to inspire us to forge ahead in ministry, regardless of the area (but particularly in the Ministry of Healing) even when we don't get the complete results right away. God is getting ready to call many of us into areas of ministry that we've never done before. Do you know what that means? We're going to make mistakes! We're going to mess up. We're going to get it wrong. But be Encouraged. Don't let your mishaps and foul-ups get you down. Don't hang your head. Persevere.  Hang on in there. And let the Holy Spirit teach you the art of Failing Forward.