8. Not Just Sin, but Mistakes Cost

Iowe so much to my parents who may not have known Jesus personally during my childhood, but who had many Christian values and taught us right from wrong. They helped me learn how to work hard, which laid a vital foundation in my life before I ever came to Jesus. Working hard at school, in sports, and in Boy Scouts also helped me more than I realize. The Scouts sent me on an advanced leadership training course when I was very young. Tell me, do you think the living God was preparing me for something I could have never imagined?

I learned quickly that mistakes are costly and they often bring difficulty in more ways than one. As a little boy, I made the mistake of balancing a penny on my nose, which I proceeded to swallow. My mother insisted that I come home from school every time I had to go to the toilet. The Washington Primary School was near our home in Wyckoff, New Jersey, and so we got the penny back! I made another mistake on a frozen lake during ice skating season and fell through the ice. Thank God someone was there to pull me out.

All my life, especially after becoming a follower of Jesus, I have been an avid reader. While I have read books, newspapers, magazines, articles, and now endless email attachments, no reading material has been more important than God’s Word, the Bible. The Bible is filled with stories of great success and great failures and we can learn from both.

It seems that no matter where you read in the Bible you are always reading about mistakes people make (unless you are reading about Jesus!). I think as believers in Jesus it is important that we don’t think all mistakes are sin. They may have some roots in our fallen nature, but they are not always outright sin needing repentance. Satan likes to use our mistakes to get us discouraged or down on ourselves. When we allow ourselves to get discouraged we open ourselves up to sin or wrong attitudes and behavior—that is when we get into much more trouble spiritually. When we make a mistake, we must bounce back, look for plan B, and press on. We could all be helped by the book Second Choice by Viv Thomas.

History shows the domino effect of mistakes, with one mistake leading to another. We lost our first ship Logos (which was once home for our whole family!) on some submerged rocks in the Beagle Channel in the very south of Chile and Argentina. Our analysis showed a series of mistakes by different people which led to that fateful day in 1988. God was merciful and there was no loss of life—and He even used the publicity from that event to help get the funds and people for a much better ship, Logos II, which later led to Logos HOPE.

History also shows that everyone makes mistakes. Of course, the fewer mistakes the better. We must not allow what we believe about the sovereignty of God, or about what I call messiology, to keep us from a strong common sense commitment to do things right and make as few mistakes as possible. I wish that I had been warned at Bible college just how hard life is and how many problems and difficulties we would all face. We need to reread and study passages like James 1 and 1 Peter 1. I never realized how just having the money to buy food is such a huge issue for so many people. I sometimes gave the false impression that if you prayed enough or had enough faith, everything would work out okay.

Now looking back at sixty years in Christ, for so many people I have worked with over the years it has not turned out okay! Many have not been successful in their ministry or jobs or even in their marriages. There are quite a few who after the faith, prayer, and evangelistic life of OM, returned home and could not get a job or hold one down. Some of the marriages of people who met in OM have broken, often because they had not thought about the problems they would face in the future. Put this together with other mistakes we easily make and you have a formula for trouble—often big trouble. I meet such people all the time and try to share radical grace. I say, “If you have failed and missed plan A, then praise the Lord that plan B can be just as good.” Some have made many mistakes and had many failures and feel they are probably on plan H or M. I say, “Praise the Lord for a big alphabet.” People usually laugh at this point but in the end, the truth is that some of those mistakes could have been avoided. While embracing radical grace, we must also beware of fatalism in any of its forms. Some of our mistakes are rooted in sin, while others reveal a lack of wisdom and discernment. One of the reasons I have read so widely is to learn from the mistakes and failures of others, and in my lifetime I have read about thousands of them.

How can we avoid mistakes?

Saturate ourselves with God’s Word, giving ourselves to prayer in all aspects of our spiritual walk with God. I have emphasized this in all my books.

Learn discipline in all the basic areas of life—while also steering clear of legalism every step of the way.

Read and study hard. Have a system to remember important information.

Write things down. If you travel, have a list of things you must not forget. Our phones and other gadgets can help, but it still demands discipline.

Plan ahead and count the cost, as we are urged to do in the last verses of Luke 14. I could write a whole chapter on this important concept as some of the biggest mistakes I have seen are in this area. Many people have come to me and shared about their great vision and dreams but most of them never materialize or last long. Often they did not count the cost or were not ready to pay the price. When you have time, try to think of the pros and cons for a particular step or action you are about to take.

Seek advice. It’s especially helpful to talk with several trusted mentors, which can help you avoid (or at least spot) wrong advice.

Learn how to check on one another and learn from each other. Walk in humility and let pride die, ready to quickly confess weakness.

Develop good systems. Have a good system with backup for all addresses, phone numbers, etc. Have a system for filing things. The folders on my laptop are now a key part of my life. What a great tool to use in God’s work. I have a little black backup book for phone numbers—I use it all the time! If we really love people and want to encourage them, we will go the extra mile to keep their basic information. Gordon MacDonald’s book Ordering Your Private World has helped a lot of people. If you read widely you will find practical advice on almost every aspect of life and it is a great mistake not to learn from it.

Learn what I call “Holy Ghost Caution.” There was a wonderful missionary who was out walking in the hills of England, but he did not have on the right kind of shoes. He walked too close to the edge of a cliff, slipped, and fell to his death. I will never forget getting the phone call the next day about this dear friend’s death. The problem is, I could share another few hundred similar stories that I know about. That is why I am taking time to write this book and especially this chapter.

You may think such ordinary concerns are not as important as insights about the Christian life and discipleship, but separating the so-called sacred from the practical is a great mistake in our thinking. You decide each hour of every day what you will do, where you will go, and how you will behave. We must bring it all together under the power and guidance of the Holy Spirit. Even at my age there are lessons to learn.

Each great biblical reality and teaching must be relearned at different phases of our lives. We must not just live well, but learn and be ready to die well. As we get older we must remember these great words from James 1:22: Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.