Rise AGAIN
The great Nelson Mandela once said, “There is no passion to be found playing small and settling for a life that’s less than the one you're capable of living.”
I have heard many people over the course of my life tell me more or less the same line over and over again, “Those are great ideas…keep dreaming!” In essence what they are saying is “…it is very unlikely that what you want will ever happen.” Why? Maybe’s because your larger-than-life dream is too big for their small faithless minds. People will always give you many reasons why you should never take chances in life when God wrote a whole Book on why we should.
We look at failure like it’s the kryptonite of the human heart. Like if it happens to us we will be shamed and mocked by everyone who never had the courage to try. No. I believe failure is a gift. We fail, and we realize that the disapproval of broken men isn’t as crushing as we thought. We learn the greatest lessons in life are not learned from falling but from falling and getting back up. We learn that success is really moving from one failure to another without giving up.
I, like yourself, have no idea when the good Lord will call me home to glory. But when the day comes I don’t want that “I was too afraid to try” to be any excuse I had during my time on earth. I will never be perfect, but I am a child of the One who is perfect, and I claim the righteousness of Jesus. Considering that truth, I have been freed from the bondage of man’s approval, I have been released from the chains of fear. I am free, now, as a chosen child of God to chase the desires and dreams that God has sovereignly placed in my blood-bought heart.
As a kid with a slingshot once said, “You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the LORD Almighty…”
Let that truth echo into the deep caves of your heart. If God is for us, there is no failure, disapproval, shame, guilt, or fear that could EVER stand against us.
“…for the righteous falls seven times and rises again…”
Proverbs 24:16
