A DEEP-SEATED SENSE OF FAILURE

I had a long and uncomfortable dream the other night. In my dream, first I was confronted for failing as a husband and father. Someone else told me that I was a disorganized and uncaring teacher. Then someone else accused me of starting our church without proper reliance on the Lord. And further, that we were not following up to find out why people were leaving. The next day, someone who had visited on a Sunday a few weeks ago said that we should have followed up to invite them back. It felt to me like my dream was continuing, only this time I was awake.

Apparently, I am haunted these days by a deep-seated sense of failure. Coming off of a time of sabbatical, I knew that this semester would be a busy one, but here at the end of it, I find myself losing on every front. I am not home enough, because I'm doing too many things at school. Yet, I am not doing enough at school. And in the midst of running too fast and too long, I hardly do anything with the church. It's not that I'm a slacker, I don't think, but that I am over-committed to too many things at once. And there is no easy end in sight, I'm afraid.

I know where my priorities should lie. I need to be home. But part of my duty as husband and father is to be diligent in providing for the family, and that involves being responsible at work. When I try to be responsible in both areas, I neglect others, like my extended family and my church.

I learned some time ago that a workaholic is not a super-diligent person, as I used to think. To be called a workaholic was almost a compliment to me, like saying I am so responsible and disciplined that I have gone above and beyond the call, and am somehow worthy because of it. No, a workaholic is not a SUPER-diligent person, but a SELECTIVELY-diligent person. I am responsible when I am at school 60 hours a week, but that means I'm not somewhere else during those hours. When I select being diligent as a musician, I select being irresponsible as a homeowner. When I am generous with someone, it means I have nothing for someone else.

And so, I am a failure. A failure in not being more than one place at a time. A failure at not fulfilling all of my implied promises. A failure at saying no at the right time. A failure at not saying yes at the right time. I stop living with a thankful heart and start living with a guilt-ridden heart. Or maybe that's how I got out of balance in the first place.

I think that more than once the apostle Paul reached this point. He felt like a failure, despaired even of life itself, begged the Lord to remove a thorn from his flesh. Yet his answer was that God is made perfect in his weakness. So tonight, like Paul, I will rejoice in my weaknesses, boast of my faults, confess my sins, and live with nothing in my hand. And when I do, strangely I find God, faithfully, gently rebuilding me from the inside out. For when I recognize that I have failed, that is the first step to letting Jesus succeed through me.

"LORD, I have nothing but Jesus. And He is enough. Take my weakness and use it for Your glory. That's all I have, but I sacrifice even that on this altar, in the name of Jesus, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. Amen."