If you have any responsibilities at all, sooner or later, you'll fail. Sometimes, it might be sooner and more often than we'd like.
Sometimes, our failure is measured by an outcome - when we're unable to complete a project on time or when we're not fulfilling business objectives. At other times, failure might happen when we don't measure up to an ethical or behavioral standard. For instance, we might find ourselves becoming angry at a colleague during a meeting or perhaps we realized that we didn't give our best effort on a project.
My question is - what do you do when you fail...when you mess up...or even when you sin. My area of weakness? Impatience and anger... I can become impatient when others don't perform at the level I expect them to... and sometimes I get angry. A few weeks back, I found myself very impatient in relating to a colleague and actually getting angry because I judged him to be unresponsive to my requests. By God's grace, I was able to apologize and ask for his forgiveness. I was grateful for his willingness to forgive my impatience but I found myself discouraged and embarrassed that I had failed in this way. Sure, I know that failure is inevitable but somehow, knowing that doesn't make it much easier, does it?
More importantly, how should we respond to our failures?
I think it's helpful to bear in mind that we're not defined by our failures any more than by our successes. God is not impressed with our completed projects or business accomplishments. We cannot relate to him on any basis other than the work of Jesus Christ. We approach him as sinners, having received grace from Christ alone.
We can and should also humble ourselves when we sin. It may be hard to ask for forgiveness when we get angry but as sinners who have been forgiven much, it's the right thing to do. When we humble ourselves, the Bible assures us that God grants favor to us.
Clothe yourselves, all of you, with humility toward one another for "God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble". (1 Peter 5:5)
When we humble ourselves, God will redeem even our greatest failures... somehow, we might end up showing those we work with, that we're no better than they are... we can approach them as fellow sinners, in need of grace.
Humility also helps us to examine ourselves - we can honestly evaluate our performance. Perhaps we failed to do our best because we were lazy or maybe our failure is just a reflection of our limited gifts and abilities. In either case, we can trust God to help us - to direct us to a better way.
What do you think of leaders when they fail? How do you cope with failure? How do you respond when you sin against those you work with?
