A reflection on discipleship
I reprimanded him for throwing a silly tantrum over a board game and demanded that he opened the bathroom door immediately. When he finally opened the door, he was still crying uncontrollably. I was bewildered by his reaction. I urged him not to take the losing to heart but it didn’t help. He was in a confused state and said: “I don’t know why I am crying, but I cannot stop crying, I need to cry….”
As I reflected, something hit me hard. I realized that among all the life skills that I thought he needed, I had missed out the one important skill, that is, the ability to handle failures. My son will face failures in life. When he faces them, will he have the grace and courage to accept them and grow through them?
Depression, bitterness, murder, suicides, mental illnesses are often caused by one’s inability to handle failures in life. I admit that I handle them badly too. I felt rebuked in expecting my son to handle failures well when I am struggling to handle them too.
Regrettably in this fast paced result-driven world, there seems to be little room to accommodate failures. I felt the need to provide a safe place at home for my children to “fail with ease”. My children needs to feel safe with me even when they fail. They must be assured that my love and respect for them will not dwindle a bit. It is surely better that they learn to fail at home rather than to learn to fail in the cold and unforgiving world.
As I turned my thoughts to the Gospels, I remembered the relationship between Jesus Christ and Simon Peter. Interestingly, though Christ predicted Peter’s denial, He did not prevent it. Our Lord is not a God who seeks for a perfect spirit, but rather a broken and contrite one. He is after all the Savior who redeems our past, our failures, our brokenness, and makes them right again. In Christ, Peter found space to fail. The touching beach scene of John 21 when Christ led Peter to rediscover his commitment to Him reminds us that our Lord seeks out those who have failed and redeems them for His glorious purposes.
Few days ago, I met a brother and sister who had strayed from the way. That night the brother messaged me, thanking me for being willing to tarry in the conversation though he had done much hurt towards me in the past. I encouraged him to look towards our redemptive Lord, to surrender his past to Him and to move on. That night, we made peace and liberty was in the air. We will be catching up soon!
God is our safe place. In Him we can find space to fail and grace to grow. May we likewise be to others a safe place to fail and to grow.