do you feel you are a failure?...

fatigue robs you of confidence and so does failure. matthew 26.56 (niv), all the disciples deserted JESUS and fled. these guys felt like a group of losers.

peter denied him. now they're having a pity party. they're second-guessing themselves. they're saying, “what went wrong?” JESUS was supposed to be the messiah and now HE's dead. why me? who cares? what now?

how do you handle failure? listen, if at first you don't succeed ... you're normal! welcome to the human race. life has its setbacks. murphy was an optimist. somebody said, "just about the time i think i'm going to make ends meet, somebody moves the ends."

another one is fear. fear robs you of confidence and that's the greatest one.

john 20.19 (lb), the disciples were meeting locked behind closed doors in fear of the jewish leaders. they were in fear. they had seen what happened to JESUS. and they weren't too excited about what might happen to their own lives.

do you ever play the “what if?” game? what if i fail? what if i never get married? what if i get cancer? what if somebody recognizes me in k-mart? the fear game!

we tend to imagine the worse. have you ever been driving one way and the h.p. makes a u-turn and starts following you? or your daughter comes home late at night from a date with a big grin on her face?

what do you worry about the most? the greatest worry is the fear of death. that's what easter is all about.

people don't want to talk about death. it's the last taboo. invite some people home for coffee and say, “let's talk about death” and watch what happens.

but hebrews 2.15 (cev) says that HE (JESUS) also died to rescue all of us who live each day in fear of dying.

what you're afraid of is the fear of the unknown. you can get to know GOD. that's what easter is all about. you don't have to be afraid of death. JESUS broke the bonds of death.

just a thought from the front porch…