Rev. Don Campbell
If Failure Were Fatal, We Would All Be Dead
God is the original recycler, for he has always worked in, through, and with sinners. If he didn’t, he wouldn’t have anything with which to work. In listing some of the names on God’s “Honor Roll of Faith,” the writer of Hebrews says, “God is not ashamed to be called their God” (Heb 11:16)—that’s Noah, Abraham and Moses, David, and some other sinners.
• Noah got drunk after saving himself and his family from the fate of the world.
• Abraham lied twice about his wife and subjected her to the possibility of having to surrender her body to another man.
• Moses spoke rashly with his lips and didn’t get to enter the Promised Land.
• David committed adultery and then had the woman’s husband killed to cover up the sin.
How meaningful the words of David: “Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven, and whose sins are covered; blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin” (Rom 4:7-8).
Failure isn’t fatal unless it is final, and it isn’t final if, in faith, we get up one more time than we go down.
