Honest Words - Failure

Greetings Dear Reader,

Some of you may wish to curl up your toes hear.  When I was still teaching I was actual told that I could not tell and adult college student that he had failed a class.  I was instructed to tell the student that he had “delayed success” in his English Composition effort. 

This particular student had failed to attend two thirds of the classes.  He had failed to turn in the weekly homework for the entire term.  He had failed to complete his term paper.  He failed to tell the truth to his instructor, my friend, when confronted numerous times about his deferment of his success.  I failed to be politically correct with him.

I have seen bad teachers and my friend Katie is the opposite.  She went above the requirements for every student who showed the possibility of being successful.  She did everything possible to make students feel safe, capable, and motivated to avoid delaying success in her classes.

We fail sometimes.  As a school chair I did dismiss a teacher who told a student that she was a failure.  That is mean and horrid.  No one is “a failure.”  Failing, however, is a part of the learning process.  You fail.  You evaluate. You learn more and then you try again.  There are also some things some students will never be able to accomplish.  They are not a failure but they will fail at some things always.

To me it is dangerous to teach others that the never fail.  It sets a state of mind that they can do anything.  There are things I cannot do.  I will never set a record for the long jump.  I fail at jumping most of the time.  Even puddles do not fear me.  They know that I will land in them.

We fail.  We are a fallen, flawed, and fractured species.  Without the understanding that we fail we may not see our greatest failure.  We may not understand that we need something beyond ourselves for redemption.  If I do not acknowledge my failures then I will not see my need for God. 

I sin (we will visit this word a little further down the path).  I do not always follow Christ in daily situations.  When I fail to follow in the moment that moment passes.  I have not delayed success.  I have FAILED.  I can still follow but the moment is gone and will never return.

It is my responsibility to acknowledge that I fail to do what is right at times and use that knowledge to learn, grow, and fail to fail in the future.  If I do not learn from my failures then I will not follow Christ faithfully.  If I do not embrace the full weight and length of the coil of my sin then I will fail to be horrified by it.  I will fail to see my depravity so that I might fight against it.  That would lead to failing to follow which in turn would be the greatest failure of all. 

Wishing you joy in the journey,

Aramis Thorn

Mat 13:52 So Jesus said to them, "That is why every writer who has become a disciple of Christ’s rule of the universe is like a home owner. He liberally hands out new and old things from his great treasure store.”

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