How Deep of a Pile of Grace Are You Standing In?

Luke 17:3-5 If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him. If he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times comes back to you and says, 'I repent,' forgive him." The apostles said to the Lord, "Increase our faith!" Romans 5:1-2 Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we  a  have peace with God through our  Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand.

In my last article, I told you about a major mistake I made, so today I want to write about how to manage mistakes, to think about mistakes in a productive way. 

Reflecting on your mistakes can be difficult, but it is important.

If you’re like most people, you don’t want to talk or even think about your mistakes; however, knowing how to manage them is a very important part of understanding how to lead. Your awareness of where you stand before God is of more value for your own leadership progress than anything you learn from a dozen leadership books. 

And how do you gain that awareness? Through reflecting and studying your own leadership moments—positive ones as well as mistakes. In fact, I would go as far as to say that your future leadership depends on your reflection on and study of yourself. 

"In fact, I would go so far as to say that your future leadership depends on your reflection on and study of yourself."

When reflecting on your mistakes, it’s important to think about:

1. How God has treated you when you’ve made mistakes.
2. How your earthly leaders have treated you when you’ve made mistakes.
3. How you treat others when you make mistakes. 

Today, we’ll focus on how looking at how God treats you when you make mistakes influences the other two areas.

How God has Treated You When You’ve Made Mistakes

You all probably agree that, while mistakes can result from sin, not every mistake is a sin. However, I think we all can also agree on the fact that sin mistakes are worse than simple errors. Because of this, it’s important to reflect on how God responds to us when we make sin mistakes. By doing this, we can gain great insight into how we should respond to ourselves, as well as others, when we make mistakes.

In today’s first scripture passage, the disciples could not believe that when someone committed a sin mistake against them, they were (and we are also) to respond with a grace that is virtually unlimited. It did not make any sense to the disciples then, and it certainly would not make sense to many of the leaders we know today. 

Our theology of leadership is not one of unlimited mistakes. Of course, this passage discusses a heart that can forgive without limit, not a command to overlook all the mistakes that those who work with you make. After all, God does not instruct us to overlook everything. In 1 Corinthians 5 (NIV), Paul instructs the church to "expel the wicked man from among you,” a strong consequence for wrongdoing.

However, in a sub point of our second scripture, God gently tells us that he is accepting us IN SPITE of the fact that we’re standing in a pile of mistakes. The "grace in which we now stand" begs a question and an answer. The question for today is: "How deep are you in?” Do you believe God accepted you when you were ankle deep or when you were in over your head? The fact is—we all were, and still are, in over our heads.

How “Deep We Think We Are In” Affects How We Manage Others

There are leaders who realize that we’re in over our heads and leaders who think they are in ankle deep. How deep you and I think we are in will ultimately reveal how we handle and manage people. When we realize the enormity of our mistakes and subsequent enormity of God’s grace, we’re less likely to be like Matthew 18’s unforgiving servant, who was unwilling to forgive his debtor little despite the fact he had been forgiven much. 

 Leaders must realize the enormity of God's gra

However, how we view the mistakes of our childhoods also has a great impact on how we view our and others’ mistakes today. I cannot write nor comment about how your childhood has shaped your view of mistakes, but I do suspect some leaders probably need to be counseled as a result of their history. I think a few of you should think about that.

But whether the wounding occurs in childhood or adulthood, a wounded leader can negatively affect those he leads. A few years ago, I met with a pastor prior to presenting a seminar at his church. He told me that he won’t take any more action in his church because of the beating he took after making a rather simple decision. He told me his church had become graceless. Places where leaders are wounded probably precede environments where "people shoot their wounded.” It can become a vicious circle.

However, environments based on grace look just the opposite. Early last August, Google admitted it made a mistake when it shut down its highly promoted "Wave" email network. As far as I can tell, no one got fired; they did not need someone to take the role of the sacrificial lamb and "pay the price.” In fact, you may have heard of Google’s work environment, where brainstorming and mistakes are encouraged. It does not matter whether Google’s leadership understands the theology of their graceful environment, or whether they are Christian or not. This environment helps the company succeed because grace is truth.

 So how deep a grace pile do you think you are in? Are you up to your knees, up to your eyeballs, or in over your head? Would your heart toward the mistakes of others be the same depth as the pile you think you are in?

I challenge you to think about it.


Photos courtesy of Mararie and Phillie Casablanca