Here's a strange call from God. It's the call to failure. It is a call foreign to American exceptionalism which rewards success and throws failure in the trash heap. Failure is the antithesis of everything we've been taught and conditioned to believe since we were children. How strange that The Lord called us to fail!
Teachers don't teach it. They reward the successful student. When I taught in the public school, an ice cream party with a goody sack was held for honor roll students. They were privileged and got of class to participate in the celebration.
Coaches don't coach to lose. A team's failure will only be tolerated for a short time before fans clamor for his dismissal. College athletic directors and owners of professional sports teams won't put up with a coach who loses more games than he wins. There was even a popular saying several years ago. "Second place is the first loser."
Businesses don't reward failure. If a company loses money year after year, the CEO is replaced by the stockholders with someone who can make it profitable again.
Preachers don't preach failure either. How many sermons have you ever heard on God's call to failure? I can't think of a single one. Instead, it's all about overcoming failure to be the success God wants you to be. In fact, pastors who build bigger buildings, increase giving, and add members are often rewarded with even bigger churches and bigger salaries.
No husband and wife wants their marriage to end in the failure of divorce. On their wedding day, they dream of happiness, joy, and marital bliss.
Failure is not an option in our American culture. It is never recognized, never rewarded, and never held as a standard for others to follow.
As General George Patton famously said, "America loves a winner!"
It seems so odd and peculiar that God would call us to failure. It's so wrong. It's so out of the ordinary, and yet that's exactly what God wanted on one occasion for the Israelite army and His chosen people.
The strange call to failure is found in Judges 20:23-26.
"The Israelites went up and wept before the Lord until evening, and they inquired of the Lord. They said, “Shall we go up again to fight against the Benjamites, our fellow Israelites?”
The Lord answered, “Go up against them. Then the Israelites drew near to Benjamin the second day. This time, when the Benjamites came out from Gibeah to oppose them, they cut down another eighteen thousand Israelites, all of them armed with swords."
Can you imagine the consternation and confusion of the soldiers who survived this battle as they ran from the scene of slaughter where 18,000 of their comrades in arms lay dead? Can you imagine the hurt, disappointment, protest, and even anger they had toward God?
They must have said, "But God, you told us to go fight against the Benjamites when we asked you whether or not we should fight them. Why did you tell us to fight and not give us the victory? We were defeated, and You were the One who told us to go into battle!"
So, let me ask. Is every call from God a call to success. Is every task He sets us on going to end in victory? Can a victorious life be a failed life?
It takes a lot of time in meditation, counsel, and reflection to get over the shock of failure that God engineers. The heart can become bitter. Doubt in the Lord's goodness can drive out faith. But in such times, faith is all we have to hold us together. And faith always leads to hope as God reveals the purpose of his strange call to failure.
George Matheson(1842-1906) knew failure. He lost his eyesight at age 20. His fiancé broke their engagement.
One of the great hymns Matheson wrote, "O Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go" contains these lines. "O Joy that seekest me through pain, I cannot close my heart to thee; I trace the rainbow through the rain, And feel the promise is not vain, That morn shall tearless be."
Matheson also wrote a book of devotions, Thoughts for the Journey, (which is available in a free ebook by clicking the link). He observed: "Is there no such thing as a call to failure? What is it that God wants to perfect in us? Sympathy. How is sympathy made perfect? Is it in the number of my victories? No. It is in the number of my defeats. It is not in my gains but in my losses that make me human. My heart must go through the pathway of thorns. The cross has fitted me for sympathy with the crowd.
"It is not the powers but the difficulties of the great that inspire us. I get my wings from their night not from their sunshine. I make their clouds my chariot. I rise upon the step upon which they fall. It is not the footprints they left on the sands of time that impel me to follow. It is the spots where the footprints fail. It seems a strange thing that the temple of a holy life should have one gate not beautiful. Elijah had his depression. Moses had his temper. John, who saw heaven, had his moment in Samaria. I will take wing from their weakness. Get robed from their rags. I will rise from the spot where they wrestle. In the place where they flagged, I shall be constrained to fly."
Another reason God's call to failure is strange to us is because He wants to form the image of His Son in us making us complete and whole through the humility caused by failure. Our default position is pride. There was a time in my life that I was like the Israelites. I prayed and felt God calling me to "go into battle against the Benjamites." But, I failed miserably. Pride kept me from seeking a counselor. "After all," I thought, "I'm a pastor. I have helped others with my counsel. I am the pastor-counselor, and counselors like me have all the answers. I even took several counseling courses in seminary." I thought I didn't need anybody's help, but I was so wrong.
I rationalized, "Why should I go to anyone else since I have all the answers?" So, I tried harder in my own strength and was crushed again and again when I tried to figure out my issues on my own that had brought me such pain and depression. But each time, I was routed on the field of battle like Israel. It was with enormous difficulty that I swallowed my pride and sought professional counseling and began in earnest seeking self understanding through long times of prayer, meditation, Scripture, journaling. Slowly, piece by piece, The Lord chiseled away offensive pride and self-sufficiency in me and wrought in me the grace of humility.
One of the many truths I learned was to put aside my prideful self-esteem. I learned instead to bask in God-esteem and accept His providence in that He was and is always working to bring good out of my failures including His strange call to failure. The call to failure creates the image of Christ in me. Jesus said, "Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls (Matthew 11:29-30).
God sometimes makes us fail. He often engineers our failures. Why? "Before a downfall the heart is haughty, but humility comes before honor (Proverbs 18:12). God created us to be dependent and to worship him. Pride and self-sufficiency is a barrier to what the Lord wants. He wants only the best for us, and His best intention for me and you is to rely solely upon Him through faith.
"Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight" (Proverbs 3:5-6).
Jesus said "the last (the humble) shall be first" (Matthew 20:26). No where was this truth demonstrated more emphatically than when Jesus humbled himself to the death on the cross followed by His exaltation to the highest place of Lordship over all. "And he humbled himself even further, going so far as actually to die a criminal’s death on a cross. Yet it was because of this that God raised him up to the heights of heaven and gave him a name which is above every other name" (Philippians 2:8-9 Living Bible).
And what of the Israelites who God called to fail in Judges 20. After their resounding loss against the Benjamites, the narrative continues. "Then all the Israelites went up to Bethel and wept in the presence of the Lord and fasted until evening. They also brought burnt offerings and peace offerings to the Lord. The Israelites went up seeking direction from the Lord. The Israelites asked the Lord, “Should we fight against our relatives from Benjamin again, or should we stop?”
The Lord told them again to go and fight. Frankly, I don't know if I would have obeyed at that moment, but when you hurt from losing, you are receptive to what God says more than ever.
The Israelites did go to battle one more time. This time the result was overwhelming victory.
Before victory comes in our lives, God will humble us. Humility always comes before honor (Proverbs 15:33) and before victory. Always. God may call you and me to failure to make us kneel before Him.
Humility reminds us to focus on what really matters, and what really matters is acknowledging that God is in control and not me. What really matters is acknowledging that God is in control and not you.
God is a jealous God and will have no other gods before Him including the god of self-sufficiency which we form into our own idol.
The way to peace, happiness, contentment, wholeness, and victory is often through God's strange call to failure.
As you ponder and meditate on God's strange call to failure, listen to "Break Me, Lord," by the Heritage Singers. Click the link or click the arrow in the embedded YouTube video.
Teachers don't teach it. They reward the successful student. When I taught in the public school, an ice cream party with a goody sack was held for honor roll students. They were privileged and got of class to participate in the celebration.
Coaches don't coach to lose. A team's failure will only be tolerated for a short time before fans clamor for his dismissal. College athletic directors and owners of professional sports teams won't put up with a coach who loses more games than he wins. There was even a popular saying several years ago. "Second place is the first loser."
Businesses don't reward failure. If a company loses money year after year, the CEO is replaced by the stockholders with someone who can make it profitable again.
Preachers don't preach failure either. How many sermons have you ever heard on God's call to failure? I can't think of a single one. Instead, it's all about overcoming failure to be the success God wants you to be. In fact, pastors who build bigger buildings, increase giving, and add members are often rewarded with even bigger churches and bigger salaries.
No husband and wife wants their marriage to end in the failure of divorce. On their wedding day, they dream of happiness, joy, and marital bliss.
Failure is not an option in our American culture. It is never recognized, never rewarded, and never held as a standard for others to follow.
As General George Patton famously said, "America loves a winner!"
The strange call to failure is found in Judges 20:23-26.
"The Israelites went up and wept before the Lord until evening, and they inquired of the Lord. They said, “Shall we go up again to fight against the Benjamites, our fellow Israelites?”
The Lord answered, “Go up against them. Then the Israelites drew near to Benjamin the second day. This time, when the Benjamites came out from Gibeah to oppose them, they cut down another eighteen thousand Israelites, all of them armed with swords."
Can you imagine the consternation and confusion of the soldiers who survived this battle as they ran from the scene of slaughter where 18,000 of their comrades in arms lay dead? Can you imagine the hurt, disappointment, protest, and even anger they had toward God?
They must have said, "But God, you told us to go fight against the Benjamites when we asked you whether or not we should fight them. Why did you tell us to fight and not give us the victory? We were defeated, and You were the One who told us to go into battle!"
So, let me ask. Is every call from God a call to success. Is every task He sets us on going to end in victory? Can a victorious life be a failed life?
It takes a lot of time in meditation, counsel, and reflection to get over the shock of failure that God engineers. The heart can become bitter. Doubt in the Lord's goodness can drive out faith. But in such times, faith is all we have to hold us together. And faith always leads to hope as God reveals the purpose of his strange call to failure.
George Matheson(1842-1906) knew failure. He lost his eyesight at age 20. His fiancé broke their engagement.
One of the great hymns Matheson wrote, "O Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go" contains these lines. "O Joy that seekest me through pain, I cannot close my heart to thee; I trace the rainbow through the rain, And feel the promise is not vain, That morn shall tearless be."
Matheson also wrote a book of devotions, Thoughts for the Journey, (which is available in a free ebook by clicking the link). He observed: "Is there no such thing as a call to failure? What is it that God wants to perfect in us? Sympathy. How is sympathy made perfect? Is it in the number of my victories? No. It is in the number of my defeats. It is not in my gains but in my losses that make me human. My heart must go through the pathway of thorns. The cross has fitted me for sympathy with the crowd.
"It is not the powers but the difficulties of the great that inspire us. I get my wings from their night not from their sunshine. I make their clouds my chariot. I rise upon the step upon which they fall. It is not the footprints they left on the sands of time that impel me to follow. It is the spots where the footprints fail. It seems a strange thing that the temple of a holy life should have one gate not beautiful. Elijah had his depression. Moses had his temper. John, who saw heaven, had his moment in Samaria. I will take wing from their weakness. Get robed from their rags. I will rise from the spot where they wrestle. In the place where they flagged, I shall be constrained to fly."
Another reason God's call to failure is strange to us is because He wants to form the image of His Son in us making us complete and whole through the humility caused by failure. Our default position is pride. There was a time in my life that I was like the Israelites. I prayed and felt God calling me to "go into battle against the Benjamites." But, I failed miserably. Pride kept me from seeking a counselor. "After all," I thought, "I'm a pastor. I have helped others with my counsel. I am the pastor-counselor, and counselors like me have all the answers. I even took several counseling courses in seminary." I thought I didn't need anybody's help, but I was so wrong.
I rationalized, "Why should I go to anyone else since I have all the answers?" So, I tried harder in my own strength and was crushed again and again when I tried to figure out my issues on my own that had brought me such pain and depression. But each time, I was routed on the field of battle like Israel. It was with enormous difficulty that I swallowed my pride and sought professional counseling and began in earnest seeking self understanding through long times of prayer, meditation, Scripture, journaling. Slowly, piece by piece, The Lord chiseled away offensive pride and self-sufficiency in me and wrought in me the grace of humility.
God sometimes makes us fail. He often engineers our failures. Why? "Before a downfall the heart is haughty, but humility comes before honor (Proverbs 18:12). God created us to be dependent and to worship him. Pride and self-sufficiency is a barrier to what the Lord wants. He wants only the best for us, and His best intention for me and you is to rely solely upon Him through faith.
"Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight" (Proverbs 3:5-6).
Jesus said "the last (the humble) shall be first" (Matthew 20:26). No where was this truth demonstrated more emphatically than when Jesus humbled himself to the death on the cross followed by His exaltation to the highest place of Lordship over all. "And he humbled himself even further, going so far as actually to die a criminal’s death on a cross. Yet it was because of this that God raised him up to the heights of heaven and gave him a name which is above every other name" (Philippians 2:8-9 Living Bible).
And what of the Israelites who God called to fail in Judges 20. After their resounding loss against the Benjamites, the narrative continues. "Then all the Israelites went up to Bethel and wept in the presence of the Lord and fasted until evening. They also brought burnt offerings and peace offerings to the Lord. The Israelites went up seeking direction from the Lord. The Israelites asked the Lord, “Should we fight against our relatives from Benjamin again, or should we stop?”
The Lord told them again to go and fight. Frankly, I don't know if I would have obeyed at that moment, but when you hurt from losing, you are receptive to what God says more than ever.
The Israelites did go to battle one more time. This time the result was overwhelming victory.
Humility reminds us to focus on what really matters, and what really matters is acknowledging that God is in control and not me. What really matters is acknowledging that God is in control and not you.
God is a jealous God and will have no other gods before Him including the god of self-sufficiency which we form into our own idol.
The way to peace, happiness, contentment, wholeness, and victory is often through God's strange call to failure.
As you ponder and meditate on God's strange call to failure, listen to "Break Me, Lord," by the Heritage Singers. Click the link or click the arrow in the embedded YouTube video.
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