Since I work in sports, I easily recognize how the world views success and failure in terms of winning and losing. If you win, you succeed. If you lose, you fail. It’s all so very black and white to the world.
God, however, does not share this view of success and failure, because in God there is no such thing as failure. He is not influenced by the world’s understanding. He uses failures in the world to bring glory to His name.
Case in point, the disciples were, according to the world, failures. They were uneducated fishermen who followed a rogue preacher. If that wasn’t failure enough, they even abandoned and denied their leader on the night of His arrest. They scattered and hid from the Romans. The world branded them failures.
However, after the death of Christ, the power of the Holy Spirit grabbed these failures and turned them into mighty preachers. And what about Christ himself? On the eve of His death He prayed, “Father, the time has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you” (John 17:1). Then He was whipped, crucified, and pronounced dead.
His plans according to His persecutors, had failed. However, the world could not see that His apparent failure was actually His ultimate triumph. As He had prophesied, He rose from the dead, opened the gates of paradise for all who believed, and established His church in the world.
As Christians, we should never see our setbacks and trials as failure, but know that we share His divine glory.
Denise Larson Cooper has a passion for Christ and sharing His Word. A wife and mother of two daughters, Denise currently works as a gymnastic coach.
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Godnesia: Keeping God in Mind Each Day http://amzn.to/2GSquOD
Ordinary Days With an Extraordinary Savior – http://amzn.to/2mFGASBLife Is a Metaphor: Recognizing God in the Everyday – http://amzn.to/2De1rU2