F is for Failure

Today’s blog is not getting posted on FB. It is not a finished piece of profound insightful self-discovery. It is what it is, and I am only posting it because I wish to be faithful to my commitment to write and post each day.

So far, I have written about feelings – three or four different ways, forgiveness – two or three starts and stops, and cannot get beyond a paragraph or two. Maybe today’s F word for me is failure – if I stopped.

But I don’t want to stop. I do not want to fail once again at a task that I love. I have written all of my life, but have been derailed over and over again by things both real and imagined. Writing takes time. I need to think, to ponder, to let ideas wander around in my heart and brain before they spill out onto the paper. And time is not my friend. Or sometimes words will come tumbling out of my brain so fast that I cannot keep up with them and I lose the thought altogether. Or there are the times when the words are right there - and I am in a place where I cannot write and those perfectly placed words are lost – forever.

But perhaps the biggest obstacle that leads me to failure is listening to what my imagination says and my heart believes.

“You’re no good at this”. “No one wants to read what you have to say.” “You sound stupid.” “No one will understand what you meant.” “You can’t write as well as (insert name here) why do you even try?”

And today is one of those days. The voices in my head of failure are loud. I wanted to write about feelings and how they are both wonderful and terrifying but above all fickle. But no matter what I wrote, it all came out sterile and boring. So then I tried forgiveness, because I know first-hand what it feels like to be forgiven – not just understand in my head what it means, but experientially I know what it means to have God’s forgiveness in my life. It is a powerful, and humbling feeling that brings a depth of peace and comfort that my human words fail to express.

And maybe that is why today is so hard. I desire so much to express in a meaningful and profound way what it means to say I am a sinner, saved by grace, nothing more, and nothing less. I want to share with you the amazing depth of his love for me – for you, for us, in a way that will touch the deepest part of your soul so that you will know, truly know what His forgiveness feels like. God doesn’t care about rules or laws like lines drawn in the sand that we are forbidden to cross. It isn’t a game of we mess up and he zaps us because we failed to toe the line. Sin is about destruction. When we sin – no matter how right we may feel or how much we can justify it, it leaves a wake of destruction in its path. It tears apart lives, it devastates. And God’s heart is wrecked when we sin because it causes us so much damage. He hates sin because of the pain it causes us, because it rips us to shreds. We are broken, hurt and in need of healing when we sin. And the only healing that will truly heal – not just cover up, but truly heal the broken places in our lives, is His blood. It is his blood that brings life that repairs the broken places. It is his forgiveness that makes us whole. But the mystery of His forgiveness is too vast for my plain and meager words.

So today’s word is Failure – not because I failed to post but because my mere human words fail to express the amazing and profound feelings of knowing I am forgiven.