Failure and Mess a Word

Failure and Mess a Word

One of the most difficult seasons in my walk with the Lord was being in a place of failure and mess. In my walk with Him I wanted to be good. I wanted to be perfect and please Him. I wanted to be faithful and obedient. I wanted to be a prayer warrior and intercede. I wanted to please the Lord.

However, I had no idea that my Father was working in me to set me free from the spirit of religion. You see, my walk with the Lord was very much based on what I need to do, on doing the right thing, and being the godly woman I need to be. It was based on the Law. Deep inside my heart the Lord showed me that I am afraid of Him. I knew He was right and I didn't know how to change that. I didn't want to be afraid of God. He said He my Father and calls me friend. How can I be afraid of Him? "Why am I afraid of You, Lord?

The Lord showed me that the fear comes from fear of failure. I am afraid to fail, mess up, be weak, be in need. Hidden fear was the foundation for my decision making. He had already showed me once that I cannot make any decision based on fear – fear of not having, fear of loneliness, fear of rejection, fear of betrayal, fear of failure. Even in my relationship with my husband I saw how fear was the basis for my decisions.

I remember a day when I wanted to get a new CD player to use in our car because the one in our car does not work. I love worshipping the Lord in our car while driving. My husband said I need to wait because we don't have the money to get one. That day when I went grocery shopping I went to look (just look) at prices of CD players. What do you think? I got one which I thought was inexpensive. On my way home as I'm driving I was thinking of what to tell my husband, and maybe he will be upset with me. The thoughts were just there. The Lord spoke to me and said "Elana, you are afraid of your husband". I said to the Lord "I am?, what do You mean?". I realized my thoughts were those of fear because of my failure to wait and not buy the CD player. I was afraid of how my husband will respond and why didn't I accept his advice. I realized I am afraid of how people respond when I fail.

This is when the Lord started healing me from the fear of failure. One thing after another in my walk with Him failed. The more I tried to be a good wife, a good mother, a good daughter, sister, servant, leader, the more I felt I was failing. I tried to pray for people and felt I was failing in that as well. Everything I did was somehow not working the way I wanted or expected it to be. It turned out to the worse.

This season of mess and failure was a time when the Lord was setting me free from self accusations and from the Accuser who was working in my life. All I saw and focused on was what's wrong and needs to be fixed in my life, in my relationships with people, in my prayer life, in my devotions and time with the Lord, in my worship, with my kinds and my husband. Name it, I wanted to fix it. Since all I saw and experienced was failure and mess I found myself giving up. I gave up my walk with the Lord (the way I thought it should be). I gave up praying because prayer became a chore for me. I gave up wanting to help and serve or give. I was doing it like a robot and not from the heart. It was a season I just wanted to let go of everything and not be involved in anything. Why? All I saw was failure and what's wrong.

The Lord started showing me how the Accuser was working in my life. He showed me how he was working in Eve's heart when he deceived her. All he pointed was on her weaknesses and who she's not.

"You're not like God, so if you eat you will be like God"

"You're blind and cannot see, so if you eat your eyes will open"

"You're not wise, eat and you will be wise".

Eve agreed with how he sees her. It was as if she was saying to the accuser:

"Yes, I'm not like God, so I should eat and become like Him"

"Yes, I am blind and don't see, so I should eat and have my eyes open."

"Yes, I am not wise, I so want to have some wisdom"

And she ate the lie. She believed what the Accuser told her about herself. He focused on who she's not and what she cannot.

The Accuser always points your focus to see:

• Who you're not
• What you cannot,
• What you don't have, missing and lacking,
• Where you're not in your walk with the Lord,
• Failure, mess, weaknesses, faults, and sin………. In yourself and as a result in others.

Eve did not know she shouldn't even respond to the enemy. He is a dead spirit and God said not to talk to the dead. So, why would we want to engage with a dead spirit who was already defeated?

We have the victory already, we just need to LIVE in it. The battle is not ours to fight or to respond to the enemy. We need to learn to avoid and ignore him completely. As long as we talk to him and respond he has an open door to enter our lives and mess up with our minds.

This was the time when I stopped completely doing any kind of spiritual warfare. I believed what the Lord showed me was true and I knew in my own walk how much my prayers were exhausting me. I stopped any engagement with the enemy and immediately talk to the Lord when he tries to point to my weaknesses and my faults. I move in thanksgiving and tell the Lord "Thank You that you are the Author and the Finisher of my faith. Thank You that you will finish what You started in me. Thank You for Your blood that covers all my faults, sins, failures and weaknesses".

This does not mean I ignore the sins and my negative reactions in situations in my life. I see what's coming out of me, I repent, reconcile with the people I hurt, and give the Lord this area of my life. I ask Him to help me walk in the victory He has given me and heal my wounds.

I am learning not to let the devil play with my mind when he comes to accuse me for my failures and point to it. I remember a day when I felt I was not a good mother with my kids. I would watch all these moms who are so creative and do arts and crafts with their kids and thought I am not a good mother because I don't like arts and crafts and all these coloring and stuff. It's just not me. I so wanted to become such a mom and all I saw how terrible I was in other areas of my relationship with them. I'm not a fun mom, I don't do this with them, I should be doing that. This was when it got so worse….. I felt like I should not be a mother at all. The Lord spoke to me and said "Elana, it is I who I decided that you should be a mother and no one can do anything about it. If I gave children it is because I say you are a mother".

Again, all I saw in my life was what's missing and lacking, what' not there, what I should be doing and having, where I need to be with the Lord, and who I need to be.

It is time to expose the Accuser who works in our lives to pull us down as if God is upset with our failures. He is not upset with us when we fail. He pours out grace and by His love He changes us to become more like who He is. We are already in His image and form. We just don't see it. But He does. God looks at us through His eyes and He sees who he said we are. In our walk with Him He wants us to see ourselves the way He does. He wants to give us new eyes, new perspective, new vision to see who we really are in His eyes, not who we think we are.

That brought a lot of freedom in my life and my walk with the Lord. It is His love for me and His much grace in the midst of my failures and mess that blew my mind. "How can You love me with all my mess?" I used to tell Him. "Why do you love me, didn't You see how I messed up big time?" All he did was loving me even more. Until I get it. It took me two years to get it. These were three years of mess with two years of much healing in my heart. I love who the Lord is. He is so gentle patient and kind. His love really amazes me.

All my life I knew how to fight failures and mess. I have learned to look at what's wrong so I can fix it and be better. I have learned to avoid the failure as much as I could so I would not get punished for it.

Since I grew up as a physically and emotionally abused child all I knew was harsh judgment for mistakes and failures. I didn't know what grace meant or how to receive it. It was the Lord who allowed me to go through the mess so He can bring healing to my heart and set me free from my fears.

I was trying to be perfect, be good, be faithful, be this and be that. I remember when the Lord said to me "Elana, I am the only One who is perfect. You are trying to be perfect. I am God alone and there is no other God beside Me". It took me a long time to get it……. To get what He was saying to me…… to get that I don't have to look at who I am not but to see myself in His eyes. To see who he says I am. I needed to understand that He did not make any mistake when He chose me. There is no mistake in love Jason Upton sings. I am complete in Him. He put me in the safest place ever – in His Son Jesus. I am dead, but it's Him who lives in me. So, when the Father looks at me all He sees is Jesus His beloved Son because I am hidden inside of Him.

Don't think it was in a day that I got it and I am still learning to receive His love for me and who he says I am. I am learning not to look at myself or others through the eyes of the Accuser who points to faults, but through the eyes of the Lord who points to who He is in me. He points to His love, His faithfulness, His grace, His patience, His blood that covers me. He is consumed with life, and does not put His eyes (the eyes are a lamp) under a basket. He does not put His eyes in darkness. If we put our eyes on darkness and all we see is what's missing and lacking, failing and messed up – our entire body will be darkness.

Matthew 6:22-25 NASB "The eye is the lamp of the body; so then if your eye is clear, your whole body will be full of light. (23) "But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness! (24) "No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth. (25) "For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body, as to what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?

Pay attention that the Lord speaks about not worrying about what' we're lacking right after he speaks about our eyes focused on darkness. He also mentions worshipping another master.

Why?

Because whatever we think in our heart we become.

Proverbs 23:6-7 MKJV Do not eat the bread of him who has an evil eye, nor desire his dainty foods;(the deceptions of the enemy) (7) for as he thinks in his heart, so is he; Eat and drink, he says to you, but his heart is not with you.

On the same token we can say whatever we see with our eyes we become. Seeing also means understanding with our mind. It has to do with the thoughts. If the image we see of ourselves or others is the image the Accuser shows us – we become that image. However, if the image we see is who the Lord says we are – we become that image. We become as He says and therefore as He is.

Ask the Lord to show you how He sees you in His eyes. This will bring much healing to your heart as you start focusing on who you ARE in Jesus and not on who the Accuser says you're NOT.

This a word I would like to share with you which the Lord has given to a few days ago. I had shared it with a dear brother in the Lord and his wife. I pray the Lord will speak to your heart.

In a place of failure….

The Lord has not left you and He is not upset with you. He loves you as you are. He loves you and did not make a mistake choosing you. He chose you as His child because He loves you. He chose you just the way you are not because of who you're not, or what you cannot. He chose you because of who He is. It is Him who reaches out to us, not us reaching out to Him. He came to this dark world to save His children and give them hope in the midst of their darkness.

No matter how dark the pit is, He is right there with you. He jumps right into the pit with you and hugs you as His child. He will never ever leave you. He will never ever let go of you. It is Him holding on to you, not you holding on to Him.

When Peter thought he was the greatest of them all and was sure his faith was so great... he said to the Lord "I will die for you". Peter trusted his own faith and his own love for the Lord. The Lord allowed the enemy to sift Peter just so He could show Peter: "Peter, it's not you holding on to Me, it's Me holding on to you". It's Me who prays for you as you groan and cry, it's Me who lifts you up, it's My faithfulness to you, not your faithfulness to Me".

Many times we so want to perfect before Him, to do all the right things, to be right with Him, to be faithful, loving... we focus on who we should be, we focus on who we're not. We focus on what we cannot and we want to fix it. All we see is what is missing, lacking, failing in our life and in our walk - and we try to be better.

But the Lord is saying "You are already complete in Me. I love you as you are wherever you are. I am not here to point to your sins because I have dealt with sin already on the cross. I am here to let you know Me, know My love for you, know who I am and who I want to be for you.

I am here to show you the dreams that I have for you and take you places in the Spirit with Me - will you come? Will you join Me? will you take your eyes off the darkness and focus on what's missing and lacking in you? I will finish what I started in you. Can you judge and accuse yourself for who you are not yet? Can you look at the picture of your life and see it incomplete and judge it before I finished drawing it? Let ME, only ME finish the works of My hands in you.

I know where you are. I know your struggles. I know how the Accuser is pointing a finger at your failures, showing you who you're not, what you can't, what you don't have. Rise up My child, rise up and give thanks for who I have made you. Be content for where you're at, and what you have. I do not judge you or look for your faults and what's wrong in your life. Fix your eyes on Me, on who I AM, on what I can do. Don't fix your eyes on what's failing, missing, lacking, and messed up in your life.

You are in right standing with Me. I have declared it that you are righteous. I did not make you righteous based on what you CAN do, or KNOW to do. I have made you righteous based on who I AM. It's about who I AM, not about who you're not. Don't look at who you're not, because I don't. I see you in My Son Jesus. I put you in Him and I see Him when I look at you.

Rise up My child, rejoice and be set free to walk with Me right where you are. Don't look at where you need to be and feel "I'm not this and I'm not that". It's not about who you are not, it's about who I AM. Look at Me, turn your back to the lack, failures, mistakes, mess, don't focus on darkness. I am the Light and I don't make mistakes. There is no mistake in My love for you. I know whom I have called.

Rise up My child and believe in My favor. I will open the door for My word to go forth from your and reach to My Bride. Let Me show you My love for you and you will testify of the things you have seen and heard. You will be able to strengthen your brothers as you come out of this pit. I will give you wings to fly like an eagle and you will have a new vision, new eyes to see, new view. I will give you My eyes to see how I see you, to see how I deal with failure and mess, to see and understand that I have dealt with sin already, to take you out from accusation to a place of freedom.

I will help you walk in the freedom I have given you already - be free from self accusation and rise up. It's Me reaching out to you, it's Me coming to you as you fix your eyes and mind on Me - wait for Me for I am coming to you. I will visit you and you will know that I love you. You don't believe Me that I love you, but I will turn your life around and shower love on you in the midst of your mess, you will be overwhelmed. You will say "why do You love me with all my mess?". It's because I want you to be established in My love for you. I want you to know that it's Me who loved you first. I gave My life for you and I will never ever let you go out of My sight. Wait and see and taste that My love for you is good".

Revelation 3:7-8 MKJV He who is holy, He who is true, He who has the key of David, He who opens and no one shuts; and shuts and no one opens, says these things: (8) I know your works. Behold, I have given before you an open door, and no one can shut it. For you have a little strength and have kept My Word and have not denied My name.

"Prepare for the water for I am about to shower My goodness on you". Prepare for the water. Praise the Lord, thank Him, sing and dance before Him you and your family, for the water is coming.

2 Kings 3:15-18 NLT Now bring me someone who can play the harp." While the harp was being played, the power of the LORD came upon Elisha, (16) and he said, "This is what the LORD says: This dry valley will be filled with pools of water! (17) You will see neither wind nor rain, says the LORD, but this valley will be filled with water. You will have plenty for yourselves and your cattle and other animals. (18) But this is only a simple thing for the LORD, for He will make you victorious over the army of Moab!

Please watch this video on the Youtube and let the Lord minister to you and show you His love for you. I pray He will speak to your heart as you listen and fill you with His love. I pray for a revelation of His love for you, for His confidence, His strength, His peace and much rest.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0pxBay2r2SI

I am also pasting one of Graham Cooke's messages on Failure. The Lord ministered to me through his teachings and especially this one in my season of mess.

Please read this, it ministered to me in time of dealing with mess and failure when my walk with the Lord was dry and no relationship with Him. It was a place of mess where He taught me so much in that place and showed me so much love and grace and I didn't understand why He is doing it. He wanted to show me to accept where I am with Him and leave it to Him to change me. I tried by my own works to change myself and be better. I kept failing. He told me "I accept you as you are, can you be pleased with where you are with Me? Can you let Me work in your life and get you where you think you need to be?"

"Lord, thank You for who I am and thank You that it's not about who I am not, but about who You are".

Much love,

Elana

"Making the Most of Failure" by Graham Cooke

What we think about God is the single, most important thing in the world. How we perceive Him will dictate how we live our life. How we see ourselves in relation to Him will orchestrate all that we are and do in this world. We live in a success-driven world. So, in particular, seeing any failure in relation to the heart of God is absolutely vital. God is love, and the nature of that love must be the driving force behind everything that we do or attempt. God is not human. He is the sum of everything. He is not just the Creator of the world - He is the Creator of all things, including love. He does all things well, including love. His standard for everything is excellence. The benchmark for success in the Kingdom of God is so high no one can reach it without His input. And yet He chooses mostly failures to represent Him. "For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called. But God has chosen the foolish things of this world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty; and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are, so that no flesh should glory in Hs presence. But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God - and righteousness and sanctification and redemption - that, as it is written 'He who glories, let him glory in the Lord.'" (1 Corinthians 1:26-31 NKJV) So it's official. God loves a failure!

"He Does Not Need to Be Seen in the 'Right' Places with the 'Right' People" He did not want the beauty of His nature and the glory of His kingdom solely to be represented by the great, the good, and the clever. He did not want a Who's Who of humanity to portray His own magnificence. He does not need to be seen in the right places with the right people. Jesus was criticized viciously for hanging out with the very people that society detested. He chose to become despised and rejected. God does not have an image problem. He chose people who had a history of failure. He picked people who had a history of not learning and who repeated their mistakes continuously. God chooses people who were despised as being stupid, by people who should know better. He accepted people who would require lots of training just to be normal, let alone successful. He chose them because He wanted to love them in such a way that they would always be safe and whole...whether they were successful or not. He chose them so that His love for them could heal them of their foolishness. He has a wonderful capacity to enjoy us in our weaknesses. He has a plan to make us successful through failure. We can fail successfully or we can fail badly. To fail successfully, we need to know who we are in Jesus.

"Our Mistakes Are Already Covered" We are in Christ, and He is in us. The Father has a plan for our personality as much as He has a design for changing our character to make us more like himself. A big part of that plan, therefore, is to love us in exactly the same way that He loves Jesus. We are not loved when we succeed in Christ. We are loved fully because we are in Him. God loved us powerfully when we were lost in sin. We fail successfully when we realize that our mistakes are already covered. No matter how well or badly our life is going, we learn to live under the smile of God. Know that in the love of God we cannot fail. We can only make mistakes, and every mistake has already been covered by the cross. Where were you when Jesus died? You had no existence. All our sins and mistakes were in the future, and they were covered by that one incredible act of sacrificial love. All our past, present, and future sins and mistakes have already been covered. Our future has been secured in the love of God. Shame is not on God's agenda for us. He allows us the wonder and joy of repentance - literally "to think again," to think differently, and to become what we think about.

"Loving Learning Enables Us to Become Wise and Also Beloved" We fail successfully when we discover that God wants us to love the learning that exists in every situation. All forms of accountability are about loving the learning that is present in every circumstance. That learning produces the fruit of self control, which in turn guarantees lasting change. God knows that when we do things for the first time, we learn how not to do it. Loving the learning in every situation enables us to become wise and also beloved. Wise - because we learn from our mistakes and grow. Beloved - because our sense of acceptance comes from being in Christ and not from our ability or performance. Therefore, if we fail at something, we can still grow in the love of God. The joy of repentance and the beauty of God's unchanging nature guarantees forgiveness and acceptance.

"God Does Not Get Disillusioned With Us" We fail successfully when we realize that God is not even remotely embarrassed by our weaknesses. He defends us to all our detractors. He is not ashamed to call us brethren. We are in Christ and cannot be condemned (Romans 8). The One who loves us the best, knows us the best. God does not get disillusioned with us because He had no illusions in the first place! We fail successfully when we allow ourselves to be comforted. Our mentor is the Holy Spirit who helps us to laugh at ourselves. He is the Comforter sent to lead us into all truth. When we are embarrassed at the truth of our current mindset or behavior, He comforts us so that we are not paranoid about screwing up. Then He helps us with the learning. Every test is repeatable. We cannot fail the tests of God because we get to take them again and again and again, until we pass. Even in the consequences of our action, the love of God reaches out to cover, protect, and nurture us in our wounded-ness.

The Biggest Thing We Get to Learn The biggest thing we get to learn is that God loves me for me! Not for what I can do. God's love helps us to relax about ourselves. The grace of God is given to us to enable us to feel loved when we mess up. God's grace enables us to feel good about God and, therefore, to have mercy on ourselves and others. We are a work in progress. No one condemns the artist of an unfinished picture. Instead we look at what is there, and we picture what it could become. We wonder, we imagine, and we are excited by the possibilities. In my weakness I am lovely to God. It's the sheer beauty of God that sets me free to be loved outrageously. He allows us to fail when He could have prevented it maybe because He wants us to see how much we are loved when we can't do anything right. He gives us freedom to fail, and His intention is to show us that we are still His beloved. His love for us is not based on how well we do. We desire excellence because He is excellent. No wonder then that David said, "This one thing I ask that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life. To behold the beauty of the Lord and to (think about Him and all that He is) meditate in His temple." (Psalm 27:4) In failure we can understand how lovely we are to the Lord. That is failing successfully.

"Does He Allow Us to Fail?" We fail badly when we imagine that failure should not be part of our inheritance, when we believe that failure is not a part of God's plan. Does God cause us to fail? No. Does He allow us to fail? Obviously. Does He use our failure to improve our relationship with Him? Everything God does is relational. Every circumstance can be turned around so that we discover the height, depth, length and breadth of God's love. When we hit the heights, God's love is present. When we hit the depths of despair, sin, and ugliness, His love covers everything we hate about ourselves. In the pit of depression God's loving kindness builds a stairway to recovery. No pit is so deep He is not deeper still. His love is high enough to lift us above everything, deep enough to rescue anyone from anything, long enough to last for eternity, and broad enough to cover every failure.

Choose to Look Into the Face of Jesus We fail badly when we choose not to look into the face of Jesus. In failure, God always moves closer to us. People distance themselves from failure and failures. Not so with God. His heart beats for us. He has given us a Comforter so that we can feel His heartbeat. In recent times I have gone through some of the most painful things in my life, but I have discovered the Comforter afresh. My current failures do not haunt me because the Holy Spirit has exorcised the ghost of shame and dishonor. I am comforted. I am learning. I am the beloved of God. My name is Graham, and I am a man greatly beloved of God. He does hide from us occasionally, but that is to draw us into His realm. He manifests Himself to us when He invades our time-space world. When He hides, it is to teach us wisdom by revelation. God's hiddeness is always about us discovering deep truth. (For further information see 'Hiddeness and Manifestation' from the Being with God series.)

"God's Glory Cannot Be Tarnished by Our Failure" Failure is not so much falling down as refusing to get up once we have fallen. We fail badly when we imagine that God is annoyed by our failings and will punish us or make us pay for messing up. In the process of discipling us, God has budgeted for our failure. Our failure cannot diminish the Kingdom; therefore, it cannot diminish us. In failure the Father budgets to be to us exactly what we need at that precise moment. I Am is with us. Intentional love is present, and it is more lavish than we can imagine. His love can be so extravagant that it picks us up and makes us want to try again. God's glory is not enhanced by our success nor can it be tarnished by our failure. God is simply above all of that. What if most of God's glory is derived from people who are astonished and amazed to be loved so fully in the face of their own inabilities and weaknesses? What if it is part of our own glory in the Lord for us to be loved so wonderfully when we are at our most brainless and ignorant?

"He Is the Same Whether We Succeed or Fail" My own failures are many. My capacity for weakness on days seems undiminished. I am an embarrassment to myself, and yet, I am loved so wonderfully. There is perhaps one difference that my experiences with God have given me. I no longer weep tears of shame. I cry tears of joy and wonder. I am amazed by God and His power to love me. He makes all things work together for good. I'm not much of a challenge to His genius and creativity. We can discover God just as much in failure as we can in success because God never changes. He is the same whether we succeed or fail. We will all fail at times. We must learn to do so more successfully! God's love makes us free to fail, Fail in a way that makes you whole and makes the Lord smile!

Graham Cooke