It's amazing what we do with funny stories.  We apply them to whomever we wish.  For instance, you might hear one funny story with the legendary coach Bear Bryant as the primary actor.  When you hear it again, the primary actor may be Johnny Majors.  I heard a marvelous story sometime ago about Thomas Wheeler, Chief Executive Officer for the Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company -- in fact, he told the story on himself.  Lately I've been hearing it about President Clinton.  So the story goes with the new actor Bill Clinton in it.  He and his wife Hillary were driving through a city up east and noticed they were low on gas.  They pulled over at the first exit and came to a dumpy little gas station with one pump. 

There was just one attendant working at the place, and as he began to pump the gas, the President went to the bathroom.  Then it happened.  Obviously the gas station attendant and Hillary recognized each other.  They began to talk and laugh and were having a very animated conversation when the President came out of the bathroom. The President was surprised and the attendant was embarrassed by this.  The attendant walked away, pretending that nothing had happened.  The President followed him, paid for the gas and as they pulled out of that seedy little service station, he asked Hillary how it was that she knew that attendant and what they were talking about. 

She told him that they had known each other in high school, in fact they had been high school sweethearts and had dated rather seriously for about a year her first year in college. 

Well, the President couldn't help bragging a little and he said, "Boy, were you lucky I came along, because if you had married him, you would be the wife of a gas station attendant instead of the wife of the President of the United States." 

Hillary replied, "My dear, if I'd married him you would be the gas station attendant and he would be President of the United States. 

It's a matter of perspective isn't it?  Success and failure mean different things to different folks.  Today I want to talk about "how to fail successfully".  Does that sound like a oxymoron?  How to fail successfully.  No one wants to fail.  Everybody wants to succeed.  That being the case, if we are going to fail, we should do it successfully. 

"A few years ago Fast Lane magazine conducted a survey to find out whose lives its readers would most like to emulate.  Lt. Colonel Oliver North placed first.  Then President Ronald Reagan placed second.  Clint Eastwood was third.  Fourth place was a tie between Lee Iacocca and Jesus Christ.  What a commentary! 

"A young woman went into a Denver jewelry store and told the clerk she wanted to purchase a gold cross on a chain to wear around her neck.  The clerk turned to the display case and asked, 'Do you want a plain one, or one with a little man on it?"  What a commentary! 

Jesus tied for fourth place with Lee Iacocca and referred to as a little man on a piece of jewelry. 

That brings us to our Scripture lesson which will provide the foundation for our theme, "how to fail successfully."  Jesus had already been "successful."  Just recently He has stilled a storm on the sea (Mark 4: 41).  He had healed "Legion", the man who was possessed by demons and lived in madness in a cemetery.  And then came the healing of the woman who had been hemorrhaging for twelve years, and the raising of a little girl from death.  All of this is recorded in chapters four and five of Mark.  Jesus was obviously a success. 

Chapter six opens with Jesus coming to Nazareth and teaching in the synagogue and the people being amazed, asking the question, where did this man get all His wisdom and all his power?  They were amazed. 

It is in the midst of that success that Jesus calls his disciples and sends them out.  In His instruction He warns about failure.  Listen to verses 10 and 11 of chapter 6: He said to them, "Whenever you enter a house, stay there until you leave the place.  If any place will not welcome you and they refuse to hear you, as you leave, shake off the dust that is on your feet as a testimony against them." 

Is there not solid instruction here in our Scripture lesson -- and from Jesus himself -- instructions that there may come a time when it's really time to quit?  We can try too long.  At least Jesus is saying that there are moments when in order to keep on keeping on we need to give up -- face our losses and accept failure.  I think there is an understanding for us here -- maybe a guide to "how to fail successfully."  Let's look at the possibility. 

I. 

Mark this down first, "we can give up too soon." 

"Jesus, who knew human nature, kept warning His followers of this tendency..." (To Give Up Too Soon). He contrasted the wide road of ease and evasion with the narrow road of discipleship and durability.  He talked about yokes and crosses, and the demands of discipleship, exhorting people to count the cost so that they could finish what they started out to do.  Some who wanted to join Him, he advised to go home because He realized that they were not serious or committed enough to follow Him.  In fact, the Scripture reports that when it became clearer what following Him meant, "many of His disciples drew back and no longer went about with Him." (John 6: 66) (Donald J. Shelby, "When to Stop Trying".  Much of the material for this sermon comes from Don.  The three points of the sermon were suggested by him.) 

Is there a sadder word -- a more telling word: "Many of His disciples drew back and no longer followed Him". 

Dare I ask you if you remember the sermon I preached on Demas at the beginning of the Lenten season?  It would please me if you would remember the sermon I'm preaching today for the rest of this week -- so I have no illusion that you might remember a sermon preached ten weeks ago.  Have you heard the story about the fellow who went as a guest preacher to a church?  When the sermon was over he was being greeted by people -- they stood in line to express their appreciation.  In the line there came a young man who shook his hand and said, "You preach too long."  That's all he said and it unnerved the guest preacher a bit. He continued to greet the people but in a moment this same fellow was in the line again.  He took the preacher's hand and said, "You didn't say very much.”  Well that really unnerved the preacher but there were other folks in line and he continued to shake their hands.  In a moment there came this same fellow again, shook his hand and said, "You ought to stick to the Bible and not your own philosophy.” 
Well, that really got to the preacher and he was unnerved.  A woman had been standing by waiting for her turn had seen and heard everything that had gone on with this young fellow, and so she shook hands with the preacher and said, "Don't worry about Johnny, you know he's mentally retarded, and he really says only what he hears other people say." 

So I don't expect you to remember my sermon on Demas -- let me rehearse it a bit. 

Demas was mentioned only three times in the New Testament.  The first time, Paul mentions him, first in a lineup of other disciples, and he says, "Demas, my fellow worker".  The second time he is mentioned is in company with Luke.  Paul says, "Luke, my beloved disciple and Demas".  And then the third time there is this tragic commentary, "Demas has deserted me because he loved the world too much."  His is the story of giving up too soon. 

One writer concluded, "The most important thing in life is not to run away."  Do you feel the impact of that?  You do, if you've ever been tempted as I have been -- to run away -- to quit.  Have you ever been in that kind of place? I have.  When I desperately wanted to throw in the towel, to throw up my hands.  I remember a time early in my ministry. I had gone through some struggles -- tough struggles in the church in Mississippi.  It didn't seem as though I was going to make it, that people were going to accept my preaching, it didn't seem that my ministry was making any difference -- and I wanted to quit. 

Thank God, for a man named Tom Carruth.  He had taken an interest in me, had encouraged me and had invited me to attend an E. Stanley Jones Christian Ashram -- that was a Christian renewal movement patterned after the Hindu Ashrams in India, put in Christian context with Christian content and carried all over the world by the renowned missionary/evangelist, E. Stanley Jones.  Tom Carruth extended the invitation one more time for me to go with him to an Ashram in Clearwater, Florida.  I remember that my friend Jerry Trigg and I drove all Sunday afternoon and all Sunday night to get to that Ashram on Monday morning.  It changed my life.  Had it not been for that, I may have quit too soon. 

We need to remember that.  We can quit too soon.  Here it is in the words of a poet. 

"When things go wrong as they sometimes will, 
When the road you're trudging seems all up hill, 
When the funds are low and the debts are high, 
And you want to smile, but you cannot help but cry. 

When the jumbled pieces no longer fit, 
Rest, if you want, but don't you quit. 
Stick to the fight when you are hardest hit -- 
It's when things seem worse that you must not quit." (Shelby, "When to Stop Trying") 

So that's the first warning:  we can give up too soon. 

II. 

And now a second lesson that Jesus would teach us about how to fail successfully.  If it's true that we can stop too soon, it's also true that we can keep trying too long.  We can keep driving on, pressing on regardless of what takes place with great commitment and tenacity, but end up wasting our time and ruining the joy of life.  "Stubbornness can be a character strength but it can also be a weakness of character." 

My friend, and mentor, the great Quaker Douglas V. Steer, tells a story that comes out of Maine.  A short in stature young blacksmith in a small town fell in love with a tall local girl, but he was so short that he was too bashful to tell her.  One day she came into the smithy to call for a tea kettle that he had fixed for her and she had thanked him so nicely that he suddenly found courage to ask her to marry him.  She consented and he got up on the anvil and put his arms around her and sealed it with a kiss.  Then they took a walk out through the fields together and after some time he asked her for another kiss.  When she refused, he said, "Well, I'm not going to carry this anvil any longer." (Printed 1978 for Wider Quaker Fellowship with permission of Douglas V. Steer) 

You get the point -- there comes a time when we put the anvil down -- because we can keep trying too long.  It's not easy -- but we have to find that rhythm -- that balance between not giving up too soon -- but also not continuing too long.  There is a time to stop trying.  When things do not work and you know it; when people do not respond and you feel it; when the situation goes from bad to worse and you can do nothing about it;...when a broom is not enough to hold back the flood swollen river from your door.  In Nazareth, Jesus met opposition He perceived as unyielding, so He stopped trying and He went elsewhere to minister.  When He sent out the disciples on their mission, He advised them: "If any place will not receive you and they refuse to hear you, leave and shake off the dust that is on your feet as a testimony against them."  We can keep trying too long. (Shelby) 

III. 

And that brings me to this last word.  It's another way of saying what I just said:  We can keep trying too long -therefore there comes a time to stop trying. 

When nothing moves, it's time to move on.  When nothing works, it's time to change... It is no disgrace to admit defeat and to face the fact that we have failed.  Love has a right to be wrong and if we cannot be wrong, we will never be right.  The real victors in life are not those who have never stopped trying, but those who were wise enough to stop trying in order to try something else.  The truly successful people are not those who have never failed, but those who have learned how to fail successfully, who learn from their losses, who can ask honest and hard questions about life, about themselves and their abilities, who examine their performance and see where they could have done better. 

As an English writer of the seventeenth century put it: "I have lost all -- and found myself". (Shelby) 

There comes a time to stop trying. 

In Margaret Jensen's book, First We Have Coffee, there is a touching scene of her Baptist preacher father's being voted out of the congregation.  She describes how the news reached her.  Called to the dormitory phone, she heard her sister saying, "Margaret, this is Grace."  Then after a momentous pause, "Papa has been voted out." 

Margaret Jensen goes on to write: "Unable to share the family's disgrace with anyone, I went to class and failed the biology exam for which I was well prepared...I tried to figure out what could have gone wrong with Papa's call.  In my mind, the ministry had somehow been disgraced." 

For ten years he had shepherded and loved that congregation, but now they didn't want him anymore.  When Margaret arrived home, she found her sister Leona furious.  She explained life as she saw it for the Norwegian immigrant pastor, "They wanted an American pastor, one more geared to the change in times.” 

"What will we do now?"  Margaret asked.  Her mother's answer reflected a faith that seemed never to change: "God never fails, but it will be interesting to see how God works this one out.  But for now, we have coffee."  (Quoted by Rodney E. Wilmoth, "The Day He Was Rejected") 

Isn't that it?  There comes a time to stop trying. 

So, it may be an oxymoron -- but it's a solid truth.  We can fail successfully -- and we can learn to live by failing successfully if we keep in perspective these truths:  We can quit too soon, but we can also keep trying too long, and three, there comes a time to stop trying.