Feb 4

1. Last Sunday we read about the time God sent Jeremiah to do God’s work and speak God’s word. Jeremiah protested; he didn’t think he was qualified. He was very reluctant to do what God asked; he felt all alone, and he was afraid. This week we read about the time God sent Isaiah on a similar mission. Isaiah didn’t bat an eyelash – or, at least, if he did protest, it didn’t get recorded. “Here I am! Send me!” He was as eager as a school child when the teacher says, “I need a volunteer to . . . .” and half the students raise their hands, “Pick me! Pick me! I’ll do it!!” That, of course, is before they learn that requests for volunteers can sometimes lead to very risky ventures! Now we’re all a bit wiser – we know that if we do what teachers ask us to do, we could fail. And we also know that if we do what God asks us to do, we could fail.

2. Where does “fail” fall on your fear list? All the way up at the top? Middle? Way down at the bottom? There was a time in when I often thought “I don’t ever do anything very well, so why should I even try?” That was the fear of failure looming large in my life. Not everyone has that fear. Some go ahead and push through it. Like the man who wanted to create a delicious fruity soft drink. The first try he used orange flavor and called it 1-Up. It wasn’t very good, so the second one he added lemon and called it 2-Up. On and on for six tries he tinkered with the flavors, and by 6-Up he had removed all the orange, so it was very lemony, but he still didn’t like it. Feeling that he had failed completely, he quit. His partner, tho, took that 6-Up and added the juice of a lime to it, called it 7-Up – and the rest is history!

3. Then there was the man who felt that he was a total failure. He made an appointment with his pastor, who was wise and gentle.^{^[i]} “Pastor,” said the man, wringing his hands, “I’m a failure. More than half the time I do not succeed in doing what I know I must do.” “Hmmmm,” murmured the pastor. “Please say something wise, Pastor.” pleaded the man. After much pondering, the pastor replied, “This is the wisdom I have for you: Find The New York Times Almanac for the year 1970, look on page 930, and there you will find peace of mind.” Confused by such a strange advice, the troubled man nevertheless went to the library to find the source of his peace. And this is what he found on page 930 of The New York Times Almanac for 1970: lifetime batting averages for the world’s greatest baseball players to date. Ty Cobb, the greatest slugger of them all, had a lifetime average of .367. Even Babe Ruth didn’t do all that well. So the man returned to the pastor and asked, “Ty Cobb, .367? That’s what will give me peace of mind?” “Correct,” answered his pastor. “Ty Cobb, .367. He got a hit once out of every three times at bat. He didn’t even hit .500. So what do you expect?“ A light came on in the man’s head. ”Aha,” he said. Now he realized he was wrong to expect that he had to succeed every time he tried.

4. Neither one of those little slices of life are found in the Bible. But the Bible is full of stories of people who failed – or, at least, thought they failed. One of the “seven” last sayings of Jesus as he was dying on the cross was a quote from Psalm 21 “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Those are surely the words of someone who, at least for a moment, believed he had failed. And yet, we know what happened next, don’t we? God raised him from the dead, and immediately he began his new task as holy counselor, holy comforter, to those whom he had called to go with him. Even today, we feel his counsel and comfort with us, as we gather around his Table. Fear of failing? No way! Robert Schuller has said “I would rather attempt to do something great for God and fail, than attempt to do nothing and succeed.”^{^[ii]} Jesus told his disciples, “With God, all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26). Paul wrote to the Philippians, “We can do anything through Christ who strengthens us” (Philippians 4:13). Thanks be to God!

^{^[i]} “Success or Failure,” an anonymous story found in More Sower’s Seeds – Second Planting edited by Brian Cavanaugh, Paulist Press, 1992, page 84

^{^[ii]} The Acts 16:5 Initiative, Volume 1, by E. Stanley Ott, The Vital Churches Institute, Pittsburgh, 2005, p. 1-11