{"id":6695,"date":"2014-03-02T01:00:10","date_gmt":"2014-03-02T06:00:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/allandouglas.dougbittinger.com\/blog\/?p=6695"},"modified":"2025-04-21T01:56:40","modified_gmt":"2025-04-21T05:56:40","slug":"success-failure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/success-failure\/","title":{"rendered":"SUCCESS AND FAILURE"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Calvin<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Someone has said, “Success knows no strangers while failure has no friends.”\u00a0 On first reading it seems to be a fairly accurate observation.\u00a0 We do tend to applaud those who succeed and shun those who have failed.\u00a0 Society gives the limelight to those who have done extraordinarily well, yet it hardly gives a footnote to those who have not met public expectations.\u00a0 The friendship factor favors the successful.\u00a0 We clamor for companionship from those who can teach us how to be winners.\u00a0 We are indifferent to those who have allowed life to lose its zest.\u00a0 Business, politics, entertainment, and sometimes even religion focus upon beautiful people who appear to be bright and successful.\u00a0 Therefore our beginning statement seems to have some validity.<\/span><\/div>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 On the other hand, however, the issue of success and failure may be as much a matter of perception as reality.\u00a0 If we perceive ourselves to be successful, most likely we will have a more exuberant personality.\u00a0 Yet, if we perceive ourselves to be failures most likely we will be inhibited and withdrawn.\u00a0 From this perspective neither success nor failure is as much a matter of numbers as it is a matter of attitude.\u00a0 Successful people who have lost the challenge of achievement feel like failures.\u00a0 People who have failed are sometimes motivated to survive their setbacks and focus their sights on higher goals.\u00a0 In many ways we are who we think we are and we do well not to think more highly or lowly of ourselves than we ought.\u00a0
\n<\/span><\/div>\n
\u00a0\u00a0 The scripture’s definition of success and failure does not conform to the world’s dictionary.\u00a0 From the world’s viewpoint Jesus did not look successful as He hung on the cross.\u00a0 At one point He may have felt failure and forsaken by God.\u00a0 Yet, as He moved through those moments of horror and put it all in God’s perspective, He punctuated His achievement with the words, “It is finished.”\u00a0 His assignment was over.\u00a0 He had participated in Life’s most successful event.<\/span><\/div>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The apostle Paul did not feel he had arrived at any great level of distinction, but he pressed on to the goal and the prize of his high calling in Christ Jesus.\u00a0 He had a success mentality that encouraged him to do all things through Christ who strengthened him.\u00a0 He would not allow himself to be defeated by harassment, persecution,\u00a0or pain.<\/span><\/div>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Here we sense that real success is a matter of commitment while failure is a lack of it.\u00a0 Perhaps we can construct a new saying, “Success is a stranger to those who allow failure to defeat them.”\u00a0 Where are you on the scale of productive living?<\/span><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

     Someone has said, “Success knows no strangers while failure has no friends.”  On first reading it seems to be a fairly accurate observation.  We do tend to applaud those who succeed and shun those who have failed.  Society gives the limelight to those who have done extraordinarily well, yet it hardly gives a footnote … Continue reading “SUCCESS AND FAILURE”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[55],"tags":[58,57],"class_list":["post-6695","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-matters-of-faith","tag-relationships","tag-religion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6695","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6695"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6695\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19150,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6695\/revisions\/19150"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6695"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6695"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pineymountainfoster.org\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6695"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}