Mistakes

There is no pride in my tone when I say that I'm a repeat offender.  It's true.  I rarely learn my lessons the first time around.  

When I look back at my life-education, and by 'life-education' I'm not talking about book learning.  I'm taking about--the school of LIFE.  

At this institution of higher learning, I am a scholar.  Some of the painful lessons I've learned could also be called mistakes.  And we all know that past mistakes have a way of pressing in on a person to the point of physical agony.    
  

I know that sounds painful, and it is.  Remember, I'm a scholar when it comes to mistakes.  

The one good thing to say about past mistakes is that during these agonizing times,  we often learn our best lessons--over time of course--never right away.  

When I read the Bible, I discover that I'm in excellent company when it comes to people who have made mistakes and didn't give-up.  In some of these Bible stories you could say that these people push the 'mistake card' all the way to utter failure.

Moses messed up when he killed the Egyptian guard, and still, God used him to delivered the children of Israel.  Gideon didn't start out a brave solider.  He was fearful, but later he was called a great warrior.  Peter was afraid when he was asked if he knew Jesus--by a little girl.  He denied Christ...three times...but after the upper room experience in Act 2, he preached the name of Jesus to thousands.  

I'm thankful that despite my weakness, failures and mistakes--God will still use me.

In 1 Corinthians 1:27-30 the Message Bible says this:

"Take a good look, friends, at who you were when you got called into this life. I don’t see many of “the brightest and the best” among you, not many influential, not many from high-society families. Isn’t it obvious that God deliberately chose men and women that the culture overlooks and exploits and abuses, chose these “nobodies” to expose the hollow pretensions of the “somebodies”? That makes it quite clear that none of you can get by with blowing your own horn before God. Everything that we have—right thinking and right living, a clean slate and a fresh start—comes from God by way of Jesus Christ.”

Today, I'm thankful even for the mistakes I've made in my life because God uses flawed people--people who don't always learn the first, second or even third time around.  

My past with all the mistakes I've made and all the future mistakes I'm sure are coming--are all a part of the amazing me--that God deliberately chose.