As NFL games go, it was a disaster. It was November 11, 2007, the San Diego Chargers versus the Baltimore Colts. Peyton Manning, now revered as a legend quarterback, had thrown six interceptions trying to lead the Colts. Yet somehow, incredibly, he drove Baltimore down to the Chargers’ 11-yard-line with 1:34 left in the game. It was fourth down. They trailed by two points, 21-23. A 29-yard field goal was all that stood between them and a win. One play, close range, a comparatively easy kick.
Enter kicker Adam Vinatieri. An unlikely person to be in this position, Vinatieri shouldn’t have even been in the NFL. He really didn’t qualify. In college at South Dakota State, he put up an absolutely horrible 27-for-53 field goal record. He was once benched in favor of a defensive lineman who tried kicking instead. After college he waited tables and slept in the bed of his pickup truck. He had a kicking coach who sat in a wheelchair, and on a lark he drove 17 hours for a shot at an NFL training camp—which he miraculously made.
Vinatieri was the Colts’ kicker. Fourth down field goal attempt. The snap was perfect. The kick—not so much. Adam’s foot connected. But Vinatieri had a sprained MCL and a brace on his knee that he didn’t think felt quite right. Nevertheless, he knew the expectation in the NFL. Make the kick. No excuses. The ball went wide. The Colts lost the game. It was his fault. A sad story in college that led to a wild shot in the pros. And now he had let his team down. They needed three points in the final seconds on an easy kick. Adam didn’t deliver. Loser.
Only he wasn’t. In fact, Vinatieri is a name that many NFL fans should be familiar with. As a kicker he has certainly made some and missed some. But in an NFL career that has spanned more than two decades, Adam Vinatieri leads the entire league with the most points scored in pro football history: 2,673. Adam has scored more points combined than any other person who has ever played the game. His field goal percentage is 83.8%, one of the highest ever recorded. He has four Super Bowl rings. He’s a lock for the Pro Football Hall of Fame. That kicker who lost the game with the Chargers on fourth down with one minute left on the clock made $3.8 million in 2019 as a 46-year-old in the NFL. Greatest. Kicker. Ever.
Adam Vinatieri is a four-time Super Bowl winner. He has the most Super Bowl wins by a kicker. He is also the only player to score 1,000 points for two different teams. As of 2020, at 48 years old, Vinatieri is the oldest active player in the NFL, the third oldest of all time.
Everyone, at one point or another, is a loser. We all fail. Even the greatest winners in sports, in business, in life, face losses at some point. The longer you live, in fact, the more you will experience failure. The key to overcoming failure is to recognize that it can be beneficial. God wants us to learn from our failures. You cannot correct a problem you are not willing to face. But, by the grace of God, you can turn your failure into victory.
Accept reality. All human beings fail. God is fully aware of your limitations. The Scripture says, “For he knows our frame; he remembers that we are dust” (Psalm 103:14). Nobody has a perfect record in any area of life. Sometimes failure is the result of sin. Other times it’s the result of poor execution, or not enough preparation. Still other times it’s the result of the other guy just being that much better at it than you are. Sooner or later, you will fail. That’s reality. True success is not avoiding failure, but learning what to do with it.
In 2016 it was Hillary Clinton. In 2020 it was Donald Trump. An election lost. And then the excuses poured in. Russian collusion. Tampering with ballots. Corrupt officials. Not enough campaigning. Too much campaigning. Scandal. Fake news. The reality in both cases was clearer after the dust settled. The votes were counted in both elections. Yes, there were tiny spots of irregularity here and there—but not nearly enough to change the outcome. Clinton lost. Trump lost. Both had a hard time accepting failure.
The reality of failure can hit hard. It can shake us to the core. It can make us resentful and bitter. We may isolate ourselves as a result. Accepting that we failed is the first step to overcoming it. Depending on the situation, you may search for who is responsible, or what circumstance is to blame. But whether you know or don’t know, resolve to acknowledge what happened, and then prepare yourself to move on.
Overcome fear. It is better to attempt something and fail, than never to attempt anything because you are afraid to fail. Worrying about what might go wrong will prevent you from moving ahead. Stop being afraid of failure and determine to succeed. Focus on your goals, not on your fears. Many worthwhile achievements involve taking some risks. The Bible says, “God has not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind” (2 Timothy 1:7).
Failure can cause us to retreat over fears it may happen again, or happen differently, or that a new initiative may end up even worse. Fear is a powerful emotional response. It can stem from real threats, but it can also result from imagined dangers. Fear triggers both a physical and emotional response. “The physical response is also known as the ‘fight or flight’ response, with which your body prepares itself to either enter combat or run away. This biochemical reaction is likely an evolutionary development. It’s an automatic response that is crucial to our survival,” explains Lisa Fritscher of VeryWellMind.com.
The emotional response to fear, on the other hand, is highly personalized. Because fear involves some of the same chemical reactions in our brains that positive emotions like happiness and excitement do, it’s possible that fear can trigger in you a desire to be bold, resolute and to thrive in the midst of adversity. Ask God during your time of failure to help you respond emotionally in a positive way. Don’t be afraid to take the next step, the next risk. Mentally be ready to try again!
Deal with guilt and discouragement. Guilt is self-judgment rising from a troubled conscience. Initially, all sin produces guilt in the soul of the sinner. That guilt either drives us to God for forgiveness, or we drive it into our subconsciousness where it erodes our emotions. If we fail in sin, it produces guilt. But sometimes we fail for other reasons, and the guilt is still there. Guilt is a major factor in psychological problems. All too often we respond to guilt with defense mechanisms such as denial, blame-shifting, suppression, or self-justification. In turn, guilt feelings stimulate self-condemnation in the form of anxiety, inferiority, fear, worry, and pessimism. You will never really conquer failure until you stop condemning yourself. God’s grace is sufficient for your mistakes.
Charlie Brown has been trying to kick that football since November 14, 1951—the first appearance of the gag in the Peanuts comic strip.
Discouragement is a temptation “common to man” (1 Corinthians 10:13). In dealing with it, sometimes we need tenderness and other times we need toughness. But either way, discouragement is not to be wallowed in. It’s to be fought. If we linger in discouragement it can be costly. Its sense of defeat and hopelessness saps us of energy and vision. It can consume time in endless rethinking of why nots and what ifs. It can keep us from doing what we need to do because we don’t want to face it. And it can even be contagious, weakening others’ resolve and enthusiasm.
Jesus does not want us to be discouraged. In fact, He commands us not to be. Jesus says to His disciples just before what probably was the most discouraging experience of their lives—His brutal death: “Let not your hearts be troubled” (John 14:1). Note Jesus’s words, “let not.” These are not merely comforting; they are commands. He knew they would be tempted to fear. Things were going to look very bad, like the whole mission was imploding. What were they to do instead of being afraid? Believe! “Believe in God; believe also in me.”
In other words, “Don’t let your hearts be ruled by what you see. Let them be ruled by what I promise you.” Don’t let discouragement choke you. It’s dislodged by believing promises. God gave us the Bible so that “through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope” (Romans 15:4). And that’s what He’s saying to you and me too.
Accept limits. We need to face our weaknesses and accept personal responsibility for our actions. God knows our limitations, and we must accept them as well. We never learn the limits of our ability until we reach the point of total failure. Sometimes failure is an obstacle to leap over. But failure can also reveal a hard edge that we will not overcome. Failure may instead redirect us toward a different version of success.
While we have our human limits, there are no limits to God’s rule. This is part of what it means to be God. He is sovereign over the whole world, and everything that happens in it. He is never helpless, never frustrated, never at a loss. And in Christ, God’s awesome, sovereign providence is the place we feel most reverent, most secure, most free. Whenever God acts, He acts in a way that pleases Him. God is never constrained to do a thing that he despises. He is never backed into a corner where His only recourse is to do something He hates to do. He does what He pleases.
Accepting limits isn’t giving up. It’s an act of humility. In the context of our relationship with God, it’s an acknowledgment that we submit to a higher Authority. We often think of humility as a rather dreary virtue. We know we need it, but we don’t expect it to be much fun. Kind of like going to the dentist. C. S. Lewis argued the opposite: “to even get near [humility], even for a moment, is like a drink of cold water to a man in a desert.” Tim Keller taught something similar: “There’s nothing more relaxing than humility.” As he explained, pride grumbles at everything, but humility can joyfully receive life as a gift.
So perhaps we get it backwards: we think humility is an impossible burden, but in reality it is as light as a feather. It is pride that makes life gray and drab; humility brings out the color. Success can bring us a certain pride of accomplishment, so we may believe that when failure brings humility, it’s a negative. Humility is not self-hatred, self-neglect, or self-punishment. The Bible never says, “Hate yourself; instead love your neighbor.” It says, “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
Many in our society struggle with a sense of shame, inferiority, and a lack of self-worth. We must sharply distinguish such feelings from the goal of humility. True humility always produces joy. When we acknowledge our limits, and are reminded that we serve a limitless God, we are humbled. We are also reminded that God is for us, and that we may find success in the next attempt.
Never give up. Perhaps the greatest response to failure is simply this: don’t quit. Keep going. Try again. Try harder. Try something different. Thomas Edison tried over five thousand different types of light-bulb filaments before he found one that would work. His willingness to endure many failures gave us the modern electric light. Jesus uses our struggles as a way to develop our relationship with Him (1 Peter 1:6-9). Just as storms point out the weak and strong parts of our house, struggles point out the weak and strong parts of our faith. Jesus built a strong house with us as the members, and we can remain faithful to serving Him because He remains faithful to helping us.
True commitment to Jesus is demonstrated through persevering over the long term, not just the short term. In Hebrews 3:6 we see that we must maintain our hope in Jesus and hold firmly to the confidence that He will do what He says He is going to do. No matter what, every situation has an opportunity for perseverance that builds trust to keep going and hold firmly.
God has given us the ability to persevere by responding to struggles with the confidence that He knows, plans and directs our lives for the good. We may face struggles while serving Him, but when we trust Him through those struggles, we can claim victory through perseverance. As much as anything else, dealing with failure well is having a can-do attitude that picks up and turns forward to grab hold of the next opportunity. In a culture that immediately looks for how to claim victimhood status in any given situation, this thinking is increasingly difficult and rare. The Bible reminds us of perseverance: “Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial, for when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him” (James 1:12).
One final word about the kickers. They can win or lose a football game on one play. And they often do. But probably more than any other players on the team, kickers learn how to move beyond failure. They’re not out on the field all that much, and their contribution is more as an individual than other members of the squad. A quarterback relies on his runners, and blockers and receivers. But a kicker—he’s just a guy who relies on his own foot. Kickers review, learn, understand and improve. They get a pass-fail on every play. And they get right back in the next game to give their all again. Interestingly, the results across the NFL for kickers is astounding. Since the 1960s there has been steady improvement by NFL kickers across the board, at all skill levels and at all distances. Each year they are kicking better and better. Kickers have not only improved their own stats, they’ve lifted the entire game.
The kicker accepts reality. He overcomes fear. He deals with guilt and discouragement. He accepts his limits and acts with humility. And most importantly, he never, ever gives up. Of his kicking experience, Adam Vinatieri has said, “Every time you step out onto the field you have to redo it. Just because you’ve done it in the past doesn’t mean anything. The game-winner in the Super Bowl at the end of the game is never an easy kick, no matter how many times you’ve gone through it. None of us are perfect. Every kicker that’s in this league has kicked a million or so balls. You just have that swing; you know what you have to do, and you go out there and do it.”
