I wrote last time about change. While change is often necessary, it is important to realize that change is not, in and of itself, either a good thing or a bad thing. Just as we should not always do the things the way we have always done them, we also should not make changes just for the sake of making changes. When we make changes, we should make them with a specific plan and purpose in mind.
That’s not to say that we should wait until we’re one hundred percent certain of success before we make a change. That’s never possible. The only way to find out for sure if a change will be successful is to make the change and see what happens.
Still, the changes we make need to have some thought put into them. We need to think about what we’re going to change and why we’re thinking of changing it. We need to think about what we’re hoping to accomplish by making the change and why we think the change we’re considering will accomplish that. Then, we need to talk to some other people, and get some other opinions about whether they think what we’re thinking of doing will accomplish what we hope to accomplish.
The changes we make need to have some work put into them, too. Anything worth doing involves effort, and when we’re talking about making substantial changes, we’re often also talking about substantial effort. After all, if a change is going to be successful, it has to be something that people will not just accept, but will embrace. A change that is made in a haphazard, slapdash manner is unlikely to be embraced; in fact, it may simply be rejected. That means that, before we make a change, we need to make sure we have a group of people who are willing to do the work necessary to make it successful.
The changes we make also need commitment. We cannot start something new and just assume everyone will take to it immediately. Anything new takes time to be accepted. Changes must be allowed time to build momentum and to grow.
There’s one more thing we need to do if we’re going to make changes. We need to be willing to risk failure. As I said earlier, we can never be one hundred percent certain of success when we make a change. We can put all kinds of thought into something, put lots of work into it, be totally committed to it, and still have it go nowhere. I suspect a lot of us have had that happen at some point in our lives.
The thing is that that’s okay. If nothing we try ever fails, it’s an indication that we’re not trying enough things. We never want to fail, of course, but if we never risk failing, we’ll never really succeed.
We also need to remember that failure is seldom fatal. Even our failures can help lead people to God. Sometimes we learn things from failures that turn them into the seeds of success. Other times, we may have thought we failed, but we still managed to affect the lives of one or two people, who in turn affected the lives of many others. God can turn our failures into successes.
We need to be careful about change without being afraid to change. If we keep our focus on serving God, and we give our hearts to God, we’ll be able to make changes that will bring glory to God.
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