I was good at being single. I was a good guy, doing the right things and saying the right things almost all the time. Then I got married.

I say the wrong thing regularly now and sometimes fail to do the right things. My wife doesn’t tell me I am a bad husband, but I can read my report card on her face when I look carefully. I made straight A’s as a single guy, but as a married man, I am a C student at best.

I like to succeed at whatever I do. My life appears to be a long series of successes, but I backed out of or quit most things where I thought I might fail. The activities of my life reflect survivor bias; if I could not make an A, I withdrew from the class.

The key to outward success is to focus on areas that call upon our strengths and to avoid those areas that expose our weaknesses. However, God wants us to achieve overall success as human beings, and not just outward success.

God sometimes call us to work in areas that expose our weaknesses. I don’t think God wants us to spend most of our time trying to improve the weaker areas of our lives to the exclusion of using our stronger abilities, but I am sure God does not mean for us to skip the parts of life that are difficult. I don’t get to drop out of marriage just because I was better at being single.

In his book, Pastoral Grit, Craig Brian Larson said, “When God calls me to a task that reveals my flaws, it threatens my self-inflated image.”  Larson often thought about leaving the ministry so that God could replace him with someone who might be more effective with charm and abilities he did not have. Eventually he realized “God has not called me to be everything to everyone… My inability to minister to some people does not mean I am unqualified for ministry. I may be poorly equipped to reach some, but I am tremendously qualified to reach others.”

I persevere despite my mediocre performance in marriage because I love my wife and because marriage makes me a better person. You might persevere in ministry for the same reasons – because you love God and because doing your best in ministry makes you a better person.

www.mtmgeorgia.org published a version of this post previously.

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