All Fall Short

“For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Romans 3:23

We recently moved, and wow, was that a lot of work! It technically still is as we are unpacking, organizing, and getting rid of things that we don’t need. We tried to do our best in planning ahead, packing a little everyday, and being wise with what we could control. Unfortunately, we couldn’t control everything and have learned a lot about patience in human error. People are not perfect. Amen?

During the past few weeks, it seems that mistakes made by others have cost us hours of time and hundreds to thousands of dollars. I won’t go through every detail, but one example is that even though we completed our financial paperwork months in advance, the bank was one day late in filing their information so our move had to be delayed. This meant getting a hotel room, renting the moving truck for more days, and hours on the phone quickly arranging all of the changes. And honestly, this was not the most expensive human error that we had to fix during the moving process!

This time has really challenged me in thinking of how mistakes and sins affect others. They don’t even have to be mistakes that are made on purpose but simple oversight or ignorance. One moment of forgetfulness can cost someone else hours of stress or having to rearrange their schedule completely.

Have you felt this in your own life? Has someone else’s mistake cost you precious time and money? What about the flip side…has one of your mistakes cost someone else precious time and money? Maybe you delayed in paying a bill and someone had to spend time calling you or writing you a letter to remind you to pay it. Maybe you didn’t want to do something so you simply procrastinated. I know I’m infamous for procrastinating when I need to ask someone a question, and I don’t know what their answer will be. Ironically, it makes my anxiety last longer so costs me my own precious time.

I think something that we need to remember is that there is at least one thing we all have in common. We are all imperfect beings! In Romans, it says that we have all sinned and we have all fallen short. Yet, we are all given God’s grace! Pretty unbelievable that He sees all of our mistakes but still gives us grace. I want you to think of that the next time someone lets you down or makes a mistake that affects you. We have all fallen short and “we” includes you and me. God gives us grace so let’s give grace to one another.​

Take some time in prayer right now and confess your impatience with others, times that you know you have been imperfect, and ask God to give you some patience in the days to come.

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