“The Lord is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and rich in love.”
— Psalm 145:8
Hannah felt like a failure. She was a quitter, and she hated that quality in herself. She set big goals and worked hard at them — until things got hard. For her social studies project on Texas, she planned to build an oil well that showed actual drilling. Halfway through, she got discouraged and quit, settling for a C instead of an A. She went out for the junior track team, but four days into practice she had blisters, and her legs hurt so badly she quit. And now she’d done it again. She’d started a paper route, but hated getting up at 5:00 a.m. every day. Within a week, she quit. She felt guilty, and she wanted to talk to God about it, but she was afraid. Surely God was mad at her for dropping out again.
Hannah didn’t know the Lord as well as she thought. He wasn’t shaking his finger at her in anger. God isn’t like that. Instead, the Lord picks us up, dusts us off, and gives us encouragement to try again. “The Lord is merciful and gracious; he is slow to get angry and full of unfailing love” (Psalm 103:8 NLT). Don’t be afraid to go to your heavenly Father with your failures. He loves you. He’ll help you start over as many times as it takes.
More To Explore: Psalm 86:5
Girl Talk: When you set out to do something, how successful are you? How hard do you work?
God Talk: “Lord, I don’t want to be a quitter. Please be with me as I work. I want to work hard and make you proud. Amen.”
From Shine On, Girl! by Kristi Holl