Fail Safe

A still from the movie Fail Safe

I am a pretty funny guy – even though my kids and my wife don’t think so. But I keep telling my joke (sic) anyway. And, as I say almost every time that I mention my wife and son haven’t laughed, “But you love me anyway.” And they do. I keep trying to tell jokes and have fun with it because I know they love me, even if I fail at telling jokes.

I fail at plenty of other things as well. All of us do. And some of those things simply need to be stopped. I don’t need to keep trying to lie or lash out or lend my ears to luscious gossip. That simply needs to be stopped – even though stopping is not simple. But in other areas failure means imperfection, not getting it completey and perfectly right. When I fail at encouraging others - everyone, fail at exhibiting excitement for God in my life – all the time, or fail at exercising my faith in daily life – every day, I can choose a few options as response.

I can give up as a failure and simply not try again. I don’t want to feel the indignity of the failure, or see the disappointment in the face of others. So I simply give up trying to do those things at which I can fail. Or I can do the opposite of what I know to be right, since I am going to fail anyway. I might as well fail well. (Perfection in imperfection?) If I feel everyone is going to look down on me, I might as well make ‘em good and angry.

But as a father, I know that I don’t want my children to feel this. I want them able to be creative, stretching and doing new things in their lives. This means that they have to be able to fail, safely. Children need to know that if they fail, they are still loved. If they fall down, they can get up and try again. This doesn’t mean that there will be no consequences for poor decisions. It means that the parent will be there to accept the child during and after the consequences, that the child will know that he/she is loved, despite the failure. And we all need to know that no one is perfect, doing all things right all the time.

God knows the same about us. He is the perfect Father, the example for all of us. He is there for us when we fall, letting us know that He loves us. He knows that we are not perfect, and that we will not do everything right all the time. But He wants us to try, and keep trying. We are going to fail. What we need is a way to fail safely, able to recover and continue. So forgiveness and grace abound.

But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. (Romans 3:21-24)