Come home

Are you tired of avoiding failure?

It’s easy to become lost today. A single moment of failure can cause your world to crumble around you. Life turns from familiar stability to chaos and uncertainty.

This is particularly true in the world of social media. Your life is on display and judged by people who hardly know you. So you post and post and post, trying to soak up as much love from strangers as you can. And as much as you try to cover your failures, they are there for everyone to see and judge.

What hope does our culture offer in response? If you want acceptance, you need to earn it! You need to cancel the right people, support the right organisations, express the right opinions, and wear the right clothes - oh, and look great while doing it.

Our culture says “nothing comes free”.

The hope our culture offers is nothing more than fairy floss. It looks great, tastes great, but there’s no substance.

Jesus offers something different.

In the Bible, Jesus tells a story about a wayward son. A son who left his family taking with him his inheritance. He spent money on partying and seeking fame, but as the money dried up, his friends and followers left him. Soon he had absolutely nothing. He was a failure both in the culture’s eyes and in his own.

As he lay down in a pigsty, the only accommodation he could find, he finally decided to go back home. But what would his family think of him? What would his father think?

Those questions were answered sooner than he thought. While he was still a long way from home he saw someone standing on the driveway. It was his father. His father ran towards him, embraced him and welcomed him home. He didn’t have to earn his place back, he didn’t have to make it up to father. He was loved and accepted unconditionally.

Jesus told this story because it’s a picture of how he responds to your failure. When you fail, you don’t have to earn your way back to His favour, his love is available right now.

Jesus stands on the driveway with his arms open waiting for you to come home.

If you think you’ve failed you can talk to Jesus about it. Talk to him like he’s a close friend, he is listening. He won’t shame you, he will show you love and grace.

Why not take a moment to talk to Jesus right now. Be honest about your failure, ask him to help you and accept his unconditional love.