Formation Through ‘Failure’

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Students hate to fail.

OK.

So do we.

Yet I’m convinced that our failures — as plentiful as they are — are the hallowed ground of some of the great potential formation we can experience…

If we’ll allow for it.

But I don’t think we typically do.

More often than not, we are too embarrassed or ashamed of our failures to sit with them long enough to learn from them — to grow as a result of them — to understand what landed us in this place of failure so that we might be able to avoid similar scenarios from happening again in the future.

It’s just as true of us, as it is our students, as it was of the ancient Israelites.

We fall.

We fail to learn from our fall.

And we fall again.

You’d think we would learn.

And maybe some of us have.

But what about our students?

They’re in a season of life when failures abound.

And they need to learn how to learn from them.

But how?

  • How do we facilitate and foster a formative environment in the midst of failure?
  • Is it possible for us to do this for students… if we have not learned to do this for ourselves?
  • What is the best we can hope for in this scenario?

I’d love to know what you think about this!

Please take a moment to share your thoughts in the comment section below.

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About the Author

Guy Chmieleski

Guy is the Founder of FaithONCampus.com. He is also the University Minister, at Belmont University, located in Nashville, TN. FaithONCampus.com is designed with campus and college ministers in mind, and is here to serve as: a resource, catalyst for conversations and encouragement for our shared work with today’s college students.

  • Karen

    So often as our churches and youth ministries were striving for “excellence”, we might have lost touch with the ability to move students into leadership positions where they could royally fail-while they were still with us and able to be dusted off, picked up, and taught how to be loved through it.

    • Anonymous

      Hi Karen! I think you’re right… the church is definitely a place where space can, and should, be cultivated for growth and learning through failure, but it’s not the only one… the home, teams, casts, bands, circles of friends, etc… there are so many contexts that could become the fertile soil for formation… but we must be willing to rethink our ideas about, and approach to, failure. We’ll have to fight all of the cultural stigma surrounding failure in our success-oriented Western society in order to do this though.

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