Failure

Sometimes I just can't deal with perfect Christians.

I want to start a new sociological category, no, even better, a new Religion. I would call it RF (Religious Failures). I would be its undisputed champion, the undisputed champion of failing. It would be the largest group in the church, in fact, in the world. I would be its best example, its leader, it’s King of the jungle. I don’t enjoy it when I fail. I don’t love the failure, the pain, or the problem failure may cause but what I do love is the unmasked truth that failure represents. Failure rips the ski mask right off your face. It leaves you exposed, facially naked!. It takes away every precaution I’ve taken to prevent failure from occurring. It exposes my inability to protect me from myself! I’m helpless at the instant of each failure,
But I’m not alone… because…

Jesus has a fatal flaw: He can't stay away from the failed. He is a friend of failures, a lover of failures. Everyone else has given up, He seeks them out...

The woman who failed at five marriages; John 4:17-26 “I have no husband,” she replied. Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.”

“Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”

“Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”

The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.” Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.”

The crippled man by the pool, who had failed to get his timing down for 38 years in a row...the disciple who failed at following; the thief who failed at keeping the law; the adulterous woman who failed at moral purity; the doubting disciples who failed to believe.
God uses very flawed, damaged, and "imperfect" people to accomplish great things for His kingdom interests. After all, damaged, imperfect, and flawed people are all He has to work with, including you and I! The expansion of His kingdom is not held hostage by the development of our character. Faith works by love, not by holiness and this is offensive to all spiritual over-achievers.
Some say this makes grace a license to sin. This absolute truth of radical grace is very offensive to the religious sensibilities of propriety: how unholy people can be used to accomplish dynamic, holy results. It is, nevertheless, the way it is. Does this mean we do not deal with sin or behavioral issues? Does this mean that our transformation into the image of Christ is of no value? GOD FORBID! Transformation is EVERYTHING that matters to us subjective and for all eternity!

HOWEVER....it also does not mean that in order to go forward through human vessels, that God's kingdom requires a preconceived notion of some level of personal holiness, (it begs the question....how holy do you have to be, and who measures it?).
The thief who failed at keeping the law...

Luke 23:32-43 “Two other men, both criminals, were also led out with him to be executed. When they came to the place called the Skull, they crucified him there, along with the criminals—one on his right, the other on his left. Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” And they divided up his clothes by casting lots. The people stood watching, and the rulers even sneered at him. They said, “He saved others; let him save himself if he is God’s Messiah, the Chosen One.” The soldiers also came up and mocked him. They offered him wine vinegar and said, “If you are the king of the Jews, save yourself.” There was a written notice above him, which read: this is the king of the jews. One of the criminals who hung there hurled insults at him: “Aren’t you the Messiah? Save yourself and us!”

But the other criminal rebuked him. “Don’t you fear God,” he said, “since you are under the same sentence? We are punished justly, we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong.” Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” Jesus answered him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”

What? Where's the level of holiness in this guy? What makes him uniquely qualified?

Ephesians 2:8-9 “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.”

Whenever I feel that my “good work” has, in some way, qualified me for heaven I remember these lyrics from Russell Fragar of Hillsong…

Can’t stop talking about everything He’s done
It’s the best thing, happened since the world began
It didn’t come cheap but I got it for free
It’s the hope of glory, Christ in me

There’s hope for all our failures in the reality of God’s amazing, unconditional, loving grace!