Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

Failure. It is something we all deal with and can be incredibly devastating, even debilitating at times. There were times in my life where I felt like the Linkin Park song, “In the End” was my anthem. I felt like I would try to do better, try to succeed even harder just for nothing to happen and all of my efforts to amount to nothing.
 
If you know my story, you know that I struggled with an eating disorder as well as a few anxiety disorders. At the time, I felt that these were my greatest failures. I wasn’t doing well in school, I was thinking about dropping out of college, I almost quit my job because of this—I had truly felt that I had failed not only myself, but my family, and most importantly my God. I truly believed that God was letting me suffer as punishment for not being a good enough Christian, or not trusting Him fully.
 
I remember one Sunday in church, we began talking about this concept of the “wilderness”. When we are walking through the wilderness in life, we are looking everywhere but to God for answers. We need to stop and look to Him to be our light and our path. This struck a chord with me and that day I decided to stop trying to dig my way through the wilderness but to stop and look to God to be my protector and guide my path as I was on my way out of this very dark and scary place.
 
I began counseling and seeking wisdom from professionals, it was there that I remembered that God takes our darkest moments and redeems them as a means of making His perfection, grace, and mercy known to the world. He did just that! My recovery wasn’t linear, please hear me on that. I still have days where I feel like I am stumbling over stray branches or taking wrong turns. There are still days that are hard. However, I am remembering that the Lord is consistently taking that time of “failure” and turning it into a time of incredible redemption and faith. Every time you take two steps forward, praise Him. When you take a step back, praise Him. When you go rolling backwards down the hill, still praise Him. He is making a way for you and using every failure as a means of bringing glory to Himself in the period of redemption.
 
“Look, I am about to do something new; even now it is coming. Do you not see it? Indeed, I will make a way in the wilderness, rivers in the desert.” Isaiah 43:19b