December 30, 2005

Dear WCPC family:

I don’t know if you keep up with professional football, specifically the Houston Texans, but if you do you know that this Sunday—their last game for ’05—they will lose by winning. If they lose their final game they will have the number one draft pick in April and will in all likelihood take Reggie Bush, this year’s Heismann Trophy winner. If they win, they will probably pick third or fourth depending on how the other losing teams do. In other words, if you’re looking at the future, they win by losing.

We often do. Now don’t misunderstand me. I love achieving. I love winning. I love it when a plan comes together. But what I’ve often discovered is that I learn more by stumbling, by falling, than I do by achieving. Maybe it’s something about our nature.  When things are going well, we think somehow it has something to do with us, with our ability, with our strength. We congratulate ourselves, as others do as well. When we stumble, when things don’t turn out the way we plan, we are humbled. We examine ourselves more. We recognize that even if we like being independent, self-reliant, in the final analysis, we are very, very dependent. 

I think Paul understood the principle I’m trying to describe. In II Corinthians 12:9–10 he writes, “But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’  Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecution, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” 

As you reflect back on ’05, I’m certain all of us can identify areas of success and achievement. We should give thanks to God for such blessings. But certainly for all of us there were some areas where things didn’t go the way we had planned. Maybe we stumbled a bit out of the starting gate. As you reflect on those experiences, here’s my challenge to you. Do you see, in the rearview mirror, how God was using them to shape and change you more and more into the person who more closely resembles His Son?  Certainly God can and does use success to mold and shape us, but most of the time, at least it’s been my experience, it’s in the valleys when real growth happens. There we get in touch with Him and with ourselves. My mother had an expression: “When you’re in the valley, be certain to pick some flowers.” 

What will a new year bring? I wish I had a crystal ball and could answer that question for you. I don’t. No one does. We don’t know what the future holds. There will be victories and defeat. There will be successes and failures. However, even though I don’t know what the future holds, I have confidence in the one who holds the future.  He is at work in all things, and particularly I have found, in the broken places in my life to help me discover the abundant life Jesus offers.

Happy New Year!

David Jones