Still thinking about mistakes (see a few entries below) And the Giants / Packers game of Sunday night. In the Sports section today there was a nice piece about Lawrence Tynes who kicked the winning field goal in the N. F. L championship game.  Earlier in the season Tynes had missed so many field goals and extra points that the Giants coach Tom Coughlin had started looking for other kickers.  Earlier in the game Sunday Tynes had missed two fourth-quarter field goals as well.

The article said, “Kickers are ultimately judged by their failures. And how they respond to them. ‘Because everyone misses,’ Giants punter Jeff Feagles said. ‘Then what?’”

On Sunday night Tynes went into a game with wind chills around -20, having missed twice before, and nailed a 47-yard field goal.

“Forget what lies behind. Reach forward to what lies ahead.”

In a sermon a few weeks ago I used a quote from Ernest Hemingway’s short story, “The Capital of the World.” People are still asking me for it. It speaks to a deep longing we have to hear we are wanted. Embraced. Accepted. How many times do we ever hear that in this life? Not often enough, as Hemingway knew.

Here is the quote:

“Madrid is full of boys named Paco which is the diminutive of the name Francisco, and there is a Madrid joke about a father who came to Madrid and inserted an advertisement in the personal columns of El Liberal which said: PACO MEET ME AT HOTEL MONTANA NOON ALL IS FORGIVEN PAPA and how a squadron of Guardia Civil had to be called out to disperse the eight hundred young men who answered the advertisement.” 

How enjoyable it is to watch some of the election coverage. When the Iowa and New Hampshire contests were going on, I watched while the pundits praised the record numbers of new voters now engaging in the process. Democracy has already won. Whether Obama can keep the momentum or not, he has already given a gift by energizing people into the process.

I am thrilled to see my son turned on and energized about the election. I’m thrilled to hear about college students in our church returning home from Christmas breaks early to campaign for their candidates.  And I’m thrilled that people are sporting signs saying, Hope for Change.

I’ve been thinking a lot about mistakes; primarily my own.

We all make them of course. There’s no question we are all going to make them again. And again. And again.  Making mistakes is as regular as eating. This is made splendidly clear in our confession, “Forgive me for the things I have done and the things I have left undone.”  (Mistakes are not just about actions you know, but non-actions as well.)

Why does something so routine become the very things I dwell on, toss and turn over? I can allow my sins - my mistakes - to define my days and nights. I run away from the scene, duck from the person and can endlessly justify my actions to myself. In short, I give my shame the power to define me.  And when that happens I give the sin (and the shame) far more weight than I give to the power of forgiveness, or the power of love or the power of God to use even my mistakes in His work of restoration and redemption.

Jesus dealt with sin in such a promising sort of way. Recognizing its weight, clearly forgiving, but then very plainly saying, “Go and sin no more.”