There is really only one way to be a loser!

Tuesday Morning Epistles

Kyle Rote Sr. was a consensus All-American football player at Southern Methodist University in 1950 and was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame sixteen years later. He was the first pick in the 1951 NFL Draft by the New York Giants, where he played with distinction for the next eleven years. His son, Kyle Jr., chose soccer over football and became one of the first well-known, American-born professional soccer players. The younger Rote once said, "There is no doubt in my mind that there are many ways to be a winner, but there is really only one way to be a loser, and that is to fail and not look beyond the failure."

I can't begin to tell you how many people I have known who have let a personal or professional failure imprint them for life—never rising above the place where they "crashed and burned." Some have allowed one failure to destroy their lives and profession. Others, on the other hand, have determined that their failure would not be fatal. (Simon Peter was one who not only survived his denial of Jesus but went on to become a leader in the New Testament Church.) Those who have followed in the tracks of Peter have recovered their integrity, have earned back their good reputation, and their future became more successful than anything they had done in the past. I applaud these folk. They redeemed their past, and with God's help they re-directed their failure to project them forward. And God has blessed them.

This week's "Tuesday Morning" is entitled "Failing Forward." It is the title of a book written by Dr. John Maxwell. Continue reading whenever you are ready. Then—please do this—forward this message to a friend who is burdened down with guilt and pain over a failed past. This essay is not a sermon. It is a way through the wilderness. I am praying now that someone you know will be encouraged and will re-direct their life to follow the plan that God has had in mind for them all along.

by Tom Barnard
A Senior Encourager

Blessings on Ya!
Pastor Kitner