Rooted in Failure

After one of the World Series games last week, I listened to one of the players being interviewed, and he said one of the most profound things I've ever heard in a post-game interview. OK, OK ... the competition for profundity in pro athlete interviews is not the hardest competition in the world to win, but even so, it was a gem.

I didn't write down the exact quote, but the gist is this: "Baseball is rooted in failure." The team just won the game, bouncing back after a previous loss. But even after winning, that was his thought: baseball is rooted in failure. Sounds odd. But it's fantastic.

His point is this: The goal of training and playing the game is to push until you fail, learn from your failures, and then become better. Reaching your limit or facing an opponent who's stronger than you, "failing" in that sense, and then using failure to improve toward excellence. You reach the World Series by failing ... repeatedly ... even intentionally. Without failing, a team (or a player) will never become good enough to make it to the Series - you cannot reach excellence without failing. Keep pushing to point of failure ... then figure out how not to fail in that way again.

This is more than saying that failure is inevitable, so react well when it happens. It looks at failure not as an unwelcome, unavoidable guest, but something that should be sought out in order to be overcome. This player sees Failure as a useful tool towards excellence.

That's baseball. Or other sports. Or even business. And this player was not claiming to spout biblical truth for Christians to follow. But is there a lesson for followers of Christ in this? I think so.

First, this is not to say that we should push until we fail in sin, and then figure out not to sin next time. I'm not going in that direction at all.

Second, neither am I talking about trying to become more acceptable to God or more righteous. In Christ, we have Christ's 100% righteousness as our own and are perfectly accepted by God because of grace alone.

Third, I see Christians across the country afraid ... fearful! ... to take risks for the Kingdom of God because of a fear of failure. They avoid failure, and in order to avoid failure, they avoid risk. Here's the dirty little secret - that is failure!

Rather, we can look at excellence in advancing the Kingdom of God as something we can achieve only by pressing in the right directions until we "fail" by reaching our limit or facing challenges that are stronger than we are. And then we figure out why we failed, and then how to become better at our goal. We need not stay in mediocrity. And if we can see Failure as a useful tool towards excellence, we can in fact become more excellent at the mission Jesus gave us to do.

We can not succeed at all, of course, without the empowerment of the Spirit, but certainly we can became more capable vessels by seeing success to be rooted in failure.

What is Success?

What is "success"?

This question gets asked a lot in leadership seminars, self-help books, and "positive confession" teachings. But I'm not asking the question in those ways. I'm not asking in a theoretical or philosophical way, either. I'm asking in a simpler way.

We sometimes experience disappointment because we don't feel "successful." We haven't accomplished something we wanted to, we haven't performed to someone else's expectations, we see people who have done better at something than we have, we assess our lives and don't find a very big sum total. (It's worse when the more successful ones are younger than we are!)

We know what it's like to feel unsuccessful. But one question I've learned to ask of those who feel unsuccessful is to ask them what success would be. Too often, they don't know.

I ask you - how can you expect to feel anything other than unsuccessful if you aren't sure what success would be?

I try to avoid definitions of success that rely heavily on factors I can't influence. For example, if I have a estranged relationship with someone, I can't control how the other person will respond. So for me to define "success" in this case as full reconciliation, my definition of success would be based in large part on something I have no control over. But if my definition of "success" is to do everything reasonable to seek reconciliation, to remove all stumbling stones within me that block reconciliation, to be the kind of friend I should be, then I can be successful in things that I have influence over (with the Spirit's strong help and guidance). Paul says in Romans 12:18 "If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all people" (emphasis added).

Now, full reconciliation would always be the goal, but my personal success would be in fulfilling my part of reconciliation, and doing what I can to foster it in the other person.

If you feel unsuccessful, ask what success should really be. Make sure your definition of success is something you have major influence over (again, with God's help). Most often, success will be defined as obedience and submission to God's will. Don't let anyone other than God define for you what success really is - otherwise, you're almost certain to feel unsuccessful, and not even know why.