“And Samuel said to the people, ‘Do not be afraid; you have done all this evil. Yet do not turn aside from following the Lord, but serve the Lord with all your heart.’” – 1 Samuel 12:20
Failure is going to happen from time-to-time in our battle for holiness. Once we put our faith in Jesus Christ, He calls and empowers us to change and become increasingly like Him. That’s a lifelong journey with many ups and downs. It doesn’t generally look like instant victory over every sin that plagues or tempts us. Indeed, along that journey to holiness we’ll likely discover new sins that tempt us. There will be times in which we experience great spiritual success. Then there will be times we once again sin and fall short of the glory of God.
The battle for sanctification – consistently living up to the holiness which God already credits to us in Christ – lasts a lifetime. We should experience upward progress throughout our lives, but there will be plenty of setbacks along the way. After those setbacks the enemy will try to discourage us, to convince us that we’re unworthy, that we’ll never get past our besetting sin, that we’re failures, that God can’t possibly still love us after yet another betrayal of His love.
Those are lies! While we must never be satisfied with our spiritual weaknesses and failures, we must be satisfied in God’s grace and mercy. This satisfaction enables us to keep battling, confident in God’s redeeming love. We must ask forgiveness for our sins and rest in God’s abundant forgiveness. The apostle John expresses our situation perfectly in 1 John 2:1, “My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” These words come shortly after John wrote, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” There is ALWAYS forgiveness available when we ask, even we ask through tears of frustration and failure for the millionth time.
So when you sin, don’t give up – either on pursuing God or on pursuing holiness. Confess your failure to God and receive His forgiveness afresh. Let that failure deepen your love and whole-hearted worship of the Lord.