One of my favorite movies is Apollo 13. The movie centers on the failed Apollo 13 mission to the moon. The mission control team was certain the chance of getting the astronauts back to earth alive was slim to none. When the head of mission control was asked what he thought he said, “Failure is not an option.”Have you ever not tried something because you were convinced you would fail before you started? Have you ever worked really hard only to fail? The fear of failure is probably one of the greatest tools Satan has in his arsenal today which holds back the church.
In the passage today (Luke 5:1-11) we see that after a long night of unsuccessful fishing, cleaning their nets and getting ready for the next day, Christ tells them to drop their nets one last time. They were tired and had already experienced failure, but they did as they were told. And when they pulled their nets up, they were so full they began to break, and the sheer weight of fish in the nets caused the boats to nearly sink. Though they had a long night of empty nets Christ showed them failure was not an option. The impossible is possible in Him.
Do we live there?
Is the impossible possible in Christ?
If we really believe the impossible is possible with God then our spirit will respond like Peter and fall down at the feet of Jesus in humbleness and awe. If we really believe that the impossible is possible with God then we should be seeing God do great things, unless we have already cleaned our nets and put them away for the night. Maybe it is time to pull them out and drop them on the other side of the boat.
Mark
8 comments:
"unless we have already cleaned our nets and put them away for the night" Ouch! Way too convicting Mark, thanks (I think?).
Bill H
"Though they had a long night of empty nets Christ showed them failure was not an option. The impossible is possible in Him."
I woke up this morning feeling a heavy burden to let go of something that I have been holding up to for quite some time now. I have wrestled with it, tried to control it but to no avail. Many times I wonder if ever my "net" will be filled. Today I have a word to hold onto. Thanks Mark.
Blessings,
Bryan
Mark, great job! Yes it is true we often relay too much on our own strength, and yet our faith only gets stronger when we trust God even when it seems unreasonable according to human standards. But when we trust God he can truly do incredible things in our life!
Mark,
Good illustration, "Failure is not and option" I like that old saying that i hear sometimes in my line of work, "The difficult will take some time, the impossible will take a little longer."
In Luke 1:37 the angel told Mary, "For nothing is impossible with God."
I had another thought as i was reading your blog: When God blesses us as He often does, it sometimes results in more work. At the very least their obedience would mean that they would have to clean their nets again. But the result of the bumper crop of fish tore their nets which requires more mending, (maybe that was why they followed Him and left all their stuff -- looked like too much work) :) just kidding.
Andy
Your words challenge me. So often I struggle with fear of failure. I think journaling (which I have done too sporadically) helps me remember the many times when I persevered the success that followed was clearly all God.So often "success" didn't look the way that I thought it would.
"unless we have already cleaned our nets and put them away for the night". How many times do we think, "Okay, I'm through"? When in reality God isn't through. We have put everything away and Jesus says "no not yet - there is still more" more work to be done, more lives to be saved, more of the world to be reached! You are not dthrough til I say your through.
This is a great encouragement Mark. I definitely have a fear of failure. I hate to fail and I will work very hard on certain things so I won't fail...just to fail anyway. This is how I personally felt in Greek class. My motto became Failure...When your best just isn't good enough.
It definitely wasn't the right attitude to have, but that is definitely how I felt. The great thing is that God is not going to call us to something that we are not able to do. I am often afraid to try more and see what God could do with me because I am afraid of failing.
God didn't leave the fisherman where they were at. He could have called them before He filled their nets with fish. But He showed them who He was first. I have seen God working in my own life over and over again. I know that I can trust Him...I just have to be willing to continue to follow Him no matter where He leads me.
><> Josh
Isn't that just the way God usually works, we are ready to quit and he does his work. It is too often that I find myself at the end of me, I start to look for Him. If I would look for him sooner I wouldn't get so discouraged! Thanks Mark
David S
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