Key Verse: Verse 13 – "Say, I pray thee, thou art my sister: that it may be well with me for thy sake; and my soul shall live because of thee."
Key Words: Say, I pray thee, thou art my sister
Can you see Abraham as a failure? He was. He failed when he faced the crisis of a famine in the land.
Many people who appear to be at the height of their careers hide a great inner sense of failure. Alexander Maclaren, the great British preacher, delivered a wonderful address to a large crowd, but turned away overwhelmed with failure. “I must not speak on such an occasion again,” he said.
Were his expectations too high? Or did the devil bring him grief when he should have felt great joy?
How a leader handles failure (or simply feelings of failure) will set much of the agenda for the future. Peter appeared washed up as a leader after his denial of the Christ, but repentance and love reopened the door of opportunity, and Peter’s leadership touched all the rest of Christendom. “Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound.”
Most Bible characters met with failure, and survived. Even when the failure was immense, those that found leadership again refused to lie in the dust and bemoan their tragedy. In fact, their failure led to a greater conception of God’s grace. They came to know the God of the second chance, and sometimes the third and fourth.
The historian James Anthony Froude wrote: “The worth of a man must be measured by his life, not by his failure under a singular and peculiar trial. Peter the apostle, though forewarned, three times denied his Master on the first alarm of danger; yet that Master, who knew his nature in its strength and in its weakness, chose him.”
Every leader must understand that just as success is fleeting, no failure is final. So don’t become too high when things are good, nor too low when things aren’t so good. Just keep going.
What to do:
✞ Remember during the good times and the bad – steady she goes!!
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