No Fear in Failure

So this past Thursday was one of the most exciting days of my entire high school career (actually, that may be an exaggeration....but it was still a pretty great day). "Why was this such a great day?" you may ask. Well, the reason is this: I GOT A ZERO ON MY MATH QUIZ!
This probably seems like a really ridiculous thing to get excited about, and on most days I would agree with you! But for this one extra special day, getting a zero was one of the greatest feelings ever! I guess this will take some explaining for you to understand why I wasn't crying my eyes about getting a zero, so here it goes. In math we have to take trig quizzes (sort of like the multiplication tests from fourth grade, except for high schoolers and harder...) and we had to take five of them, but after we took all five our teacher was going to drop the lowest score. On the first four quizzes I got a perfect score, so when it came time to  take my fifth quiz, no matter what I got I would still have a perfect score on the four quizzes that counted, meaning that I was free to not worry about my grade and let go and get a zero! I put a lot of expectations and standards on myself, so to have the chance to not worry about being perfect is one of the greatest feelings ever! And the best part is that I get to experience this feeling EVERYDAY! One of my favorite songs is called "Jesus Paid it All," and I think it does a really great job of explaining what I'm trying to say. This is how the chorus goes....
Jesus paid it ALL
All to Him I owe
Sin had left a crimson stain
HE washed it white as snow
So basically, as a follower of Christ I get to live each day with the knowledge that Jesus paid it all! And living in that grace is probably the most liberating feeling ever! I know that no matter how many times I mess up (which is A LOT!) I don't have to worry about God turning his back on me because, guess what? Jesus paid it all! In my trig quiz, no matter how good I did, there was no way for me to make my score any better than it already was. And my salvation works the same way, no matter how many times I give food to the homeless, or go on a mission trip, or read my bible, or how much money I give, my salvation still comes from God alone! And for this, I will forever sing praises to my heavenly father! My favorite line from the song I talked about earlier goes like this: "Oh praise the one who paid my debt and raised this life up from the dead." Jesus paid the price that I can never pay, no matter how hard I work, so now I have new life in Him! Galatians 3:13 says, "But Christ has rescued us from the curse pronounced by the law. When he was hung on the cross, he took upon himself the curse for our wrongdoing." So each day my goal is to praise God with my life and my actions because of the price he paid for me!
--
My old self has been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. So I live in this earthly body by trusting in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
Galatians 2:20