Tattoos... lots of folks have them. I mean lots! I have seen the cute, the cool & the interesting ones and then there are those "others"......you've seen them too. The ones that make you look at the person and just say, "why" or "bless your heart". The thing about them, is that they're ALL permanent. Not a huge shocker, I know? Ha! Seriously though, I was reading a few facts about tattoos as I was thinking through this blog and I read some things that actually are a little mind-blowing - 1. To get a tattoo, the skin is pierced between 50 and 3,000 times a minute by a tattoo machine. 2. Modern ink may contain pigments from ground plastics, such as Acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS), which creates extremely vivid tattooing with clearer, longer-lasting lines 3. Early tattoo methods included using chisels, rakes, or picks. Soot-covered thread was also used. The thread would be sewn through the skin. [From www.facts.randomhistory.com]
There is another way that we can tattoo ourselves that doesn't require a needle, tube, motor & foot pedal or chisels, picks or soot-covered thread (BLEH!)...it's a tattoo that permanently changes the way we see ourselves. It's almost always self-applied, invisible to others, but the effects of it can be seen by all. It's actually just a bruise, but we see it as a tattoo. It's a little word called, failure.
Failure, like a tattoo, doesn't have to be taboo, ugly or awful. Yet, so many people view their failures as [permanent] tattoos that never go away; they put a mark on their life that no one can remove without scars & pain. Yet, Isaiah 61:3 says, "To all who mourn in Israel, He will give a crown of beauty for ashes, a joyous blessing instead of mourning, festive praise instead of despair. In their righteousness, they will be like great oaks that the Lord has planted for His own glory." That tells me that failure is NEVER a tattoo! Bruises can be nasty, slow you down, incite a barrage of questions that will force you to talk about what happened, but as you protect the area for a time, yet keep moving, healing takes place. The bruise becomes a distant memory.
Failures can be the same. If we choose to see them as bruises instead of tattoos, we learn and grow from those experiences. God's mercy is able to freely work in our lives and we keep moving forward, rather that get stuck in the permanency of the tattoo of failure. Psalm 130:7 says - "O Israel, hope in the Lord; for with the Lord there is unfailing love. His redemption overflows." Redemption gives every failure the potential for greatness. Not all failures will set us on the path of immeasurable success, but the correct view and actions on our part in response to our failures will always bring successful growth in our lives.
My husband's group, Higher Ground, just released an album and I couldn't help but think about the lyrics in one of the songs. It's titled, "Made For Greatness" and the line that stood out says, "failure is not in the fabric of our lives". We are human, our nature is tainted with sin, we aren't perfect, therefore there will be decisions made, words spoken, thoughts appearing that won't line up with who we should be in Christ. Those can quickly, turn into failures, huge ones. We're fallen people, we are born with a sinful nature. BUT, God made us for greatness and we are not meant to remain in our failure. Admit whatever failure you may have made and allow God to bring you back to a place of greatness in Him!
That subject line though...haha!
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